The concept of behavior modification in children is fairly straightforward.

Use a structured, measurable set of action steps to help a child change a specific behavior.

Of course, any parent who has tried child behavior modification knows the process is not that easy!

Nonetheless, given a sturdy, thoughtful plan that is customized to dovetail with a specific child’s personality and abilities as well as applied consistently, behavior modification has worked for many families.

Questions parents might ask during times of guiding behavior changes are “how do I effectively ‘push’ my child to learn these new strategies? How and when do I stand firm while helping my child work on changing his behavior?”

These are excellent questions. Let’s take a look at them in more depth.

– When to push. How to stand firm.

Let’s face it. Change is hard. Change is hard when you are an adult equipped with maturity, tools and experience.

But a child hasn’t mastered all of that yet. In all likelihood, he’s facing a transition he’s never had to make before. What’s more, he probably doesn’t WANT to change.

Put all that together and behavior modification can just plain hurt at times. A child has to dig deep and use emotional and intellectual muscles he didn’t know he had and maybe doesn’t care about it.

So a good rule of thumb on when to push a bit harder is precisely at the moment of change. When it “feels” hardest to the child is the moment to push through because that’s the moment when change is prepped and ready to occur.

To do this effectively, in calm times, talk to your child about taking advantage of these opportunities for change. Is she tired of being nagged about changing her behavior? Then here is the shortest path to peace. Together identify those moments when a behavior can be genuinely modified and make a plan that might include the following.

– What specifically will your child do in that moment of change that’s different from what she’s done previously? Knowing what to do physically or verbally gives your child something to focus on when the going gets tough.

– What support can you give her in the moment of change? Decide on a helpful encouraging word or action that you can offer her at the very moment behavior modification is possible. This will help her stretch her ability to stand firm in the middle of change and stay in control of her emotions and actions.

– Use an application aid, if helpful. Choose anything your child has already learned, such as bike riding, and apply those lessons to what she’s currently learning.

For instance, pushing through and trying again those first few times of bike pedaling insured that staying upright was that much closer. Stopping pedaling took her away from her goal of riding independently.

You can even map out the moment of change using terminology from the application lesson. For example, “when you are very angry and want to cuss at me is just like losing your balance when you were learning to bike ride. Instead of crashing (cussing), put your foot down on the ground (take a deep breath and signal me that we need to stop talking NOW) and regain your balance (self-control).”

Here’s a simple example.

I have a daughter who was in love with tantrums when she was a preschooler. She was deeply attached to them as evidenced by her ability to go on and on with one, even while holding her hands over her ears because her own voice was too loud for her!

We tried many things with varying amounts of success and failure, all the while discussing with her the results of each effort.

As she matured and with practice, she was able to give herself (and us) insight into the moment of tantrum. Often her frustrations just boiled over and her strong feelings frightened her.

After assuring her that those strong feelings were really just asking her to help them calm down, she decided that getting a hug at the moment of the most intense feelings would help her stay in control and begin the process of letting go of the frustration.

Her part of the deal was to ask for a hug instead of hitting the floor kicking and screaming. Our part of the deal was to stop what we were doing and give a serious hug for however long it took for her to feel in control again.

As you can imagine, this took practice but we kept encouraging her and now, at the age of ten, she still comes and asks for a hug when she needs one. That’s a cue to me to stop and listen fully to help her process what’s going on inside of her. She tells me she doesn’t even remember her tantrums; believe me, they are something I won’t soon forget!

Behavior modification in children is an excellent tool that a child can learn to use to overcome his frustrations rather than be governed by them. As a parent, your job is to help with structure, encouragement and to be the “buck stops here” person.

As your child develops self-control, you can both be proud of his hard work and hard won successes.

Author Bio: Colleen Langenfeld has raised 4 kids and can help you enjoy your mothering more at http://www.paintedgold.com . Do you know your child as well as you would like? Get a free report on reconnecting with your kids plus grab more child behavior modification strategies today.

Category: Parenting
Keywords: behavior modification children,child behavior modification,behavior modification,child behavior