When it comes to bringing up children to become responsible adults, discipline is paramount.
However, how you handle your kids when they exhibit bad behavior differs from how another parent tackles such situations with their kids.
What you see as an acceptable medium of punishment may come off as cruel punishment to another parent.
That leaves us questioning how to discipline other people’s kids when they are in your custody or misbehave around you.
An African is saying that “when a child is in the mother’s womb, the child is hers. But when the child is born, it takes the community to bring him up”.
Maybe a few years ago, that saying was right, but today, parents have boundaries when it comes to someone else disciplining their kids.
Sometimes, when kids get naughty around you, the temptation to ignore them might creep in because you do not want to have issues with their parents.
But what if they could harm your child with their activity or behavior?
This is enough reason to step in and introduce some caution. However, the situation should determine how you respond or handle it.
These are some possible scenarios and the responses befitting them.
Bullying
If you go out for a picnic with your three-year-old daughter and your sister’s five-year-old daughter, you are seen as a parent to both kids.
But when your niece eats up all her sweets and begins to pull at your daughter’s hair because she wants to collect hers, what do you do? It may seem like an easy situation to handle, so you just tell your niece to ask nicely.
But what if she pushes your kid and injures her the moment you turn to answer a phone call and even throws all the sweets away? This is embarrassing behavior, and you might get furious, but because she’s not your kid and your sister is difficult, you have to be diplomatic.
Here’s what to do: Pack up the blankets and tell your niece there will be no more outings with her in the sternest way possible, but do not yell.
Take your niece home and leave her to play alone while you nurse your child’s injury until it’s time for your niece to go home.
It doesn’t mean you are a terrible aunt or parent for not doing what you would do to your child if she bullied someone else.
It only says you do not want to have reasons to quarrel with your sister over a child because tantrums are inevitable at that age.
However, you should tell the child’s mother what happened immediately after she arrives so she can caution her kid if it pleases her, but make sure she understands that you are unhappy with the behavior. The above is a worst-case scenario.
Use of Foul Language
When a child insults your child or uses foul language when conversing with your child, kindly tell the child, ” Hey, young man or young lady, we do not talk like that here.”
Once you have done that, tell your child that you never want to hear such bad words from him or her, and there’ll be a punishment if you ever hear it. Make sure the other kid is listening while you talk to your kid.
That way, you have successfully sent an indirect message to the other kid that such a character attracts punishment.
You do not necessarily need to communicate such behavior to the child’s parent because there is a chance the child learned such words from home.
You should, however, be more concerned about keeping your child’s vocabulary clean.
Bad Manners
Saying the magic words “please”, ” sorry”, and “thank you” is something every child should be taught as early in life as possible.
What if you have kids at your house to play with and notice one of them never apologizes when he does something wrong? You don’t have to be harsh about it.
Address all the kids immediately and teach them about the three magic words.
Go further to tell them there will be a reward for any kid who uses these sweet words when needed.
Table Manners
Children are allowed to make mistakes. Regarding table manners, teach them in the most helpful way possible.
My friend’s son had the habit of dipping his bread into his cup of chocolate milk, but it was okay.
He learned from watching the other kids eat the right way. Sometimes, kids eat the way they do because it’s the only way they know how to eat or how their parents taught them.
Let it go! There are other ways to discipline children without losing your cool.
If you snap every time they offend you, they might be scared of you and see you as a bad person.
When dealing with other people’s kids, you should treat them with empathy and understand that some of their behaviors result from their home training.
How do you handle a case of a parent paying no attention to their child’s weak character in front of them? If a child misbehaves and the parent turns a blind eye, it says a lot about the kind of person that parent is, and you handle the issue by talking to the parent.
Some time ago, I was shopping in a mall when a six-year-old girl called a pregnant lady a fat pig and spat at her under the watchful eye of her mother.
People around expected an adverse reaction from the child’s parent toward this character, but instead, she laughed and said, ” Kids can be naughty.
Everyone who had witnessed this misbehavior lashed out at the child’s mother, and she realized how terrible a parent she was.
Children are sensitive, so you should try not to hurt their egos with the way you caution them.
Avoid scolding a child in the presence of peers so they do not feel embarrassed. Call them out and rebuke them in private.
Avoid a family where a particular child deliberately does things to annoy you, and the parents do not see anything wrong with their child’s behavior.
