The Myth of the Super Nanny

By Thomas Haller and Chick Moorman

Reality TV is a national obsession. In any given week, you can watch police officers patrolling the streets of a major city, executives attempting to gain the favor of “The Donald”, boxers slugging it out in an effort to escape the slums, teams racing from destination to destination around the world, individuals pushing their fear to the limit with bugs, reptiles, or heights, and stranded islanders positioning themselves to be the last one standing. In the attempt to become a part of this TV craze, people are trading homes in decoration frenzy, switching spouses in a relationship challenge, and opening their homes to a nanny for a discipline makeover.

Of all the reality TV shows presently entering our homes, the ones that will have the most lasting effect on us as a nation are those that are seeking to reshape our role as parents. And therein lays an unknown and hidden danger. Parents watching shows like “Super Nanny” or “Nanny 911” don’t realize that the techniques being used are often counter-productive to their goal of raising responsible, caring, confident children. They fail to notice that these shows, which claim to model effective parenting, are actually filled with myths, misunderstandings, and misinterpretations of what it takes to parent in a respectful, nurturing manner. This often leaves parents confused or misinformed about discipline strategies and the "reality" of their effectiveness.

In this article, we attempt to help you create your own "reality" about discipline by revealing the most commonly held discipline myths and ways you can combat them to strengthen your own personal parenting style.

MYTH 1: Consequences need to be severe to be effective.

FACT: It is not the severity of a consequence that has impact. It is the certainty. The certainty that specific, logical consequences follow actions, allows children to trust the discipline process. Your consistency in implementing consequences is the glue that holds a discipline strategy together. If consequences are implemented consistently, children learn over time that if they choose to leave their bike in the middle of the driveway, the bike will be hung up in the garage for a few days. Teenagers come to know that if they choose to visit off limit sites on the computer, they have chosen to lose computer privileges for several days. When the consequence occurs consistently, children can count on it and plan accordingly.

MYTH 2: Children learn more quickly from punishment than they do from consequences.

FACT: While it is true that you sometimes get a more immediate result with punishment, it is the consistent implementation of consequences that produces long-term behavior change in children. With punishment, the child is more like to focus on you, your behavior, your anger, than on themselves and the results of the choices they made. Learning rarely results from punishment because children are too busy activating resentment, resistance, and reluctance. They are more likely to spend their time thinking of revenge fantasies, and how to not get caught next time than they are of the cause and effect relationship between their behavior and the consequences which follow.

MYTH 3: The discipline has to be immediate or the effect will be lost and the child will simply repeat the behavior.

FACT: Discipline can be effective whether it is immediate or delayed. How you discipline is more important that when you do it. You might want to take 15-20 minutes to think through how you want to respond to a particular behavior. It could be important to wait until later to discuss options with your partner. Helping children see the cause and effect relationship that exists between the choices they make and the consequences that are directly related to those choices is more important than whether the consequences occurs immediately or the next day.

MYTH 4: Consequences are a more effective form of discipline than punishment.

FACT: It doesn’t matter whether you call the discipline strategy you are using a punishment or a consequence. It is not the action you take that determines whether or not it’s punishment; it’s HOW you take the action. For example, a “time out” or a toy being put away for a few days could be a punishment if it is administered arbitrarily and capriciously. That same discipline strategy could be a consequence if it is a natural outcome that is more closely related to the behavior and is delivered consistently.

MYTH: 5 Parents need to be in control of their children and discipline strategies are the way to stay in control.

FACT: Effective discipline calls for the parents to arrange consequences so that the child is in control. They set it up so that the child is in control of his choices and thus controls the outcomes which result.

Consequences are not used to control, to manipulate, to demonstrate power, or to get even. Attempting to use consequences for control crosses the line and becomes punishment.

Punishment is force, unrelated to the behavior and comes across as retribution. Disciplining from the power stance places the child in a position of being “done to” by others in a position of authority. The child, feeling powerless, does not see himself as being in control of the outcomes. He sees himself as the victim.

When children see themselves as in control of whether or not they experience consequences or outcomes, they are empowered. They learn to see themselves as the cause of what happens to them. They realize they personally create the results which show up in their lives by the choices they make. It is therefore, the children who need the power and the control for discipline to be effective

MYTH: 6 Discipline strategies are effective only if they get the child to comply.

FACT: Compliance or noncompliance by the child has nothing to do with the effectiveness of a discipline system. When discipline strategies demands compliance such as in the case where the parent keeps increasing the severity of the punishment until the child complies, children learn that adults have power and they don’t.

In the use of consequences, the effort does not concentrate on making the child comply. The goal is to present choices, allows the child to choose, and give them room to learn from the positive or negatives outcomes which occur. With the consequence system, children learn a lesson from either the positive or the negative outcome.

Punishing a child with increasing severity until they pick up their toys might get them to pick up their toys. It will not teach them to take responsibility for their toys or create internal motivation to produce the desired behavior.

With consequences, the choice is presented, “You can choose to pick up your toys or you can choose to leave them here. If you choose to pick them up you will have decided to use them for the next week. If you decide to leave them here, I will pick them up, and you will have decided not to have them available for a week. You decide.” With this style of discipline, the child may choose to pick up his toys and he may choose to leave them there. Either way it’s perfect. If he picks them up, it’s perfect. You don’t have to. If he leaves them there, it’s perfect. It’s the perfect time to help him learn what happens when he chooses not to pick up his toys.

MYTH 7: When you implement a discipline strategy, the child needs to know that you are angry.

FACT: Anger is not helpful in a discipline situation. When you discipline in anger the child’s attention focuses on your strong emotion. He looks outward to the person applying the punishment rather than inward to his own internal reaction to the results of the choice he made.

Sincere empathy is much more effective than anger in a discipline situation. “Bummer, what a shame. I bet that will be a challenge for you now,” is empathy that maintains a positive connection between you and the child, even as you hold them accountable for their actions. When the child hears empathy, instead of anger, he is more likely to look inside and to notice the connection between cause (his choice) and effect (the consequence

MYTH 8: Children have to know they were wrong for discipline to be effective.

FACT: Making children wrong for their behavior is counter-productive to raising responsible children. An effective discipline system does not make children right or wrong for their behavior. It simply holds them accountable for their behavior.

If your child fails to put his bike in the garage as agreed, don’t make him wrong. Don’t make him lazy. Don’t make him forgetful. Don’t make him irresponsible. Don't put him in the naughty room. Just make him someone who doesn’t get to ride his bike for three days as agreed to earlier.

Even if the problem occurs over time, refrain from making your child wrong. Blaming and faultfinding don’t help children learn how to make different choices and behave differently in the future. Fixing the problem is more important than fixing blame. Together, join in the search for solutions and model for your child that you value solving problems more than you do assigning blame and handing out punishments.

MYTH 9: Making children say they are sorry is a consequence that helps kids learn new behaviors.

FACT: Having kids say they are sorry does not teach new behaviors. It teaches children to numb out their real feelings, push them down, and lie to the other child.

Saying you are sorry is a form of cheap forgiveness. It gets you off the hook without having to learn anything. Instead of teaching children to say they are sorry, teach them to articulate what they learned and what they intend to do differently next time. In this way the emphasis will be on learning rather than on begging forgiveness.

Remember, your role as a parent and the "reality" you are attempting to create in your home is to empower your children to be responsible, caring and confident as they move through the development stages of childhood. Designing you own home-based reality show by avoiding these discipline myths will help you play out that role effectively.

Chick Moorman and Thomas Haller are the authors of “The 10 Commitments: Parenting with Purpose," (available from Personal Power Press at toll free 877-360-1477, amazon.com, and bookstores everywhere). They also publish a FREE email newsletter for parents. Subscribe to it at ipp57@aol.com. Visit www.chickmoorman.com, www.thomashaller.com, and www.10commitments.net.