Discipline Without Damage by Dr. Vanessa Lapointe

I finished reading the Discipline Without Damage – How to Get Your Kids to Behave Without Messing Them Up book by Dr. Vanessa Lapointe.  It was a good read.  Coming from a very strict and disciplinary family and background, I needed new strategies to discipline my kids.  I do not want to apply what I went through on them, but the whole Western culture is just too “loose” in my opinion.  I needed a balance.  This book was perfect.  I want to share the nine key stepping stones to discipline without damage in the moment:

  1. Respond with connection: Have children feel your intention to understand them and do right by them.
  2. Stay low: Respond with calmness and control in an intensely caring way.
  3. Drop a flag: Provide a very quick and simple direction of what needs to happen (aim for 5 words).
  4. Maintain firmness with kindness: Hold your line and have compassion.
  5. Give no explanation: Avoid explaining your position to children.
  6. Choose your moments: Be mindful of your children’s zone of need and set boundaries intuitively.
  7. Exit gracefully if needed: Maintain control if you need to abandon the boundary.
  8. Keep relationship as the bottom line: Do nothing that will interfere with the relationship you are cultivating with your children.
  9. Debrief the incident once calm prevails: Start at the beginning and move through to the safety of the ending.  Avoid blame or shame.