Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #49 Disciplining Other Peoples Children

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#49 Disciplining Other Peoples Children · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:05
Speaker 1: This is The Happy Family's podcast with doctor Justin Pilson,
0:08
Speaker 1: where Luc and Susie our husband and wife radio team
0:10
Speaker 1: with three young boys. This is the podcast for the
0:12
Speaker 1: time poor parent who just wants some answers.
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Speaker 2: Now, we spend so much time trying to work out
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Speaker 2: the best way, the right way to discipline our children,
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Speaker 2: to be able to nurture them, to grow them, to
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Speaker 2: teach them to be, you know, the people that we
0:26
Speaker 2: want them to be. But then every now and then
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Speaker 2: we come into a situation where somebody else's kids are around, yes,
0:35
Speaker 2: and we don't feel like we have as much control,
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Speaker 2: which I feel makes us more tempted to just want
0:40
Speaker 2: to want to smack them, even if that's not something
0:43
Speaker 2: you do. Like it's weird. I feel like when it's
0:46
Speaker 2: your kids, you've got a long history of strategy. When
0:49
Speaker 2: it's somebody else's kids, it can be even more frustrating
0:52
Speaker 2: because what are you allowed to do or say? And
0:54
Speaker 2: what are you not allowed to do or say? This
0:56
Speaker 2: is a public debate we've been having for years and
0:58
Speaker 2: probably will never stop having.
1:00
Speaker 1: Can you discipline other people's children? Doctor Justinkilson, help us
1:04
Speaker 1: help us know the boundariesier the.
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Speaker 3: Most important thing that we need to focus on here
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Speaker 3: is what discipline is. So normally, when this debate comes up,
1:12
Speaker 3: people are like, is it okay for me to hit
1:14
Speaker 3: someone else's kid? Or is it okay for me to
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Speaker 3: stick someone else's child in the corner and tell them.
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Speaker 4: To just sit there and get over it? And I
1:21
Speaker 4: think that that's unhelpful.
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Speaker 3: We have a fundamental misunderstanding in this country of what
1:27
Speaker 3: discipline means. And I know we've talked about this more
1:31
Speaker 3: than once, but it's worth rehashing discipline if well, this
1:35
Speaker 3: is interesting. If you look disciplined up in the dictionary today,
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Speaker 3: it says punish and punish when you look that up
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Speaker 3: says to hurt someone because you don't like the way
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Speaker 3: they've behaved. But if you look up discipline in the
1:46
Speaker 3: dictionary that's more than about twenty or thirty years old,
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Speaker 3: says something different. It says it comes from the root
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Speaker 3: Latin would disciplus or a disciple, which is one who follows.
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Speaker 3: So if we're going to use hitting and hurting as
2:04
Speaker 3: our form of discipline, what exactly are we inviting children
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Speaker 3: to follow. We're inviting them to follow a model that
2:10
Speaker 3: says mighty is right, the big person can use their
2:12
Speaker 3: power over the weak person and make them do whatever
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Speaker 3: they want. The older versions of the dictionary tell us
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Speaker 3: that discipline actually means teach, guide, instruct, So if we
2:24
Speaker 3: are having a conversation about whether it's okay to discipline
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Speaker 3: other people's children, the answer is absolutely, we have a
2:30
Speaker 3: responsibility to teach them, guide them, and instruct them. We
2:33
Speaker 3: just need to do it without yelling, without using our hands,
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Speaker 3: and without sticking them in corners or taking things off them.
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Speaker 2: Yes, to be honest, I find easier to do that
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Speaker 2: calmly with somebody else's kids. Yes.
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Speaker 3: It's so funny when people are saying to me, I
2:49
Speaker 3: keep on losing the plot. My kids, they're driving me insane.
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Speaker 3: I just want to stop hitting them. I say, well,
2:53
Speaker 3: just pretend they's somebody else's although then they might say, fine,
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Speaker 3: go home.
3:04
Speaker 2: So when someone let's just say, you've got somebody else's
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Speaker 2: kids in your care, and your kid and their kid
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Speaker 2: doing the wrong thing, whatever it might be. So, what's
3:14
Speaker 2: what's the strategy. Where's the line of what's okay and
3:16
Speaker 2: what's not okay?
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Speaker 4: Oh that's so. Let me share a couple of examples here.
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Speaker 3: One of my friends had was in the kitchen with
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Speaker 3: her husband and their teenage son. He was about sixteen
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Speaker 3: years old, and the teenage son had one of his
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Speaker 3: buddies over.
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Speaker 4: Let's call him Buddy, okay, just because he was the budget.
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Speaker 3: He was the buddy.
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Speaker 2: I see how you connected you.
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Speaker 3: Right, So Buddy starts dropping a couple of words, some
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Speaker 3: course language, the kind of language that my friends don't
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Speaker 3: use in their home under any circumstances.
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Speaker 4: Ever, and so this is.
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Speaker 3: An opportunity for some discipline my friend's husband. She watched
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Speaker 3: him as he just walked out of the room after
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Speaker 3: he had dropped the third or fourth swear word, and
4:00
Speaker 3: a moment later he said, hey, and he called out
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Speaker 3: to his son, I just need to chat with you
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Speaker 3: for a sec And so she was left with Buddy
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Speaker 3: in the kitchen and in the living room, he quietly
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Speaker 3: whispered to his son and he said, that's the fourth
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Speaker 3: time your friend Buddy has said this. Would you like
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Speaker 3: to let Buddy know what our rules are or would
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Speaker 3: you prefer that I do? And I love the way
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Speaker 3: he did that. He actually gave his son the opportunity
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Speaker 3: to do you want me to?
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Speaker 4: Do you want to do?
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Speaker 3: It could be embarrassing for you. Would you rather do it?
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Speaker 3: And his son said, I've got it.
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Speaker 4: I've got it. So they walked back into the kitchen.
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Speaker 3: In about thirty seconds later, the son said, hey, buddy,
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Speaker 3: let's go and do this, and so they disappeared out
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Speaker 3: of the kitchen.
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Speaker 4: It was the perfect.
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Speaker 3: Opportunity and while they were out of the kitchen, they
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Speaker 3: had the conversation and they never had that problem again.
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Speaker 3: If the children are younger and you don't have that option,
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Speaker 3: and by the way, you do, you can say to
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Speaker 3: your seven year old, you know, this is what's been
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Speaker 3: going on. You know what the expectation is. Would you
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Speaker 3: like me to talk to your friend or would you
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Speaker 3: prefer to do it yourself. I think it's a really
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Speaker 3: soft way and it helps the kids to be responsible.
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Speaker 2: We underestimate them, and we experienced this recent without. He
5:01
Speaker 2: was seven at the time, about to turn eight, when
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Speaker 2: a child in his class, who had been told all
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Speaker 2: year he was going to come to his birthday party,
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Speaker 2: had recently had an encounter of bullying, an official allegation
5:15
Speaker 2: and mediation at the school with one of our son's
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Speaker 2: friend and as it turns out, when we had the
5:20
Speaker 2: conversation with our son as well, But the mediation was
5:23
Speaker 2: about the friend. And so he had this friend who
5:25
Speaker 2: was going to come to his party, and then the
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Speaker 2: kid who had been mean, who was also in theory
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Speaker 2: coming to the party, and Susie you started the conversation.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, And I said to him, I hope you understand what.
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Speaker 1: We're not going to have this person at our party
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Speaker 1: now because because of the way he's been with your friend.
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Speaker 1: Your friend is already RSVP. They've been your friend for
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Speaker 1: three years now, and I don't want them to feel
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Speaker 1: uncomfortable in our home. Does that make sense?
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Speaker 4: Is that okay?
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Speaker 1: And he said, yeah, that's okay. I just don't know
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Speaker 1: how I'm going to tell him. And so we came
5:52
Speaker 1: back to the conversation a little bit later, and I'd
5:55
Speaker 1: found out a bit more, and that's when I'd found
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Speaker 1: out that our son had also had some difficult he's
6:00
Speaker 1: with this same child. And I said, well, you know what,
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Speaker 1: I'm making the call here, so I'm happy for you
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Speaker 1: if you need to to say to this boy that
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Speaker 1: he can't come to the party, because I made the
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Speaker 1: call that there's already a lot of children and I've
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Speaker 1: said that he's not allowed to come. I gave him
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Speaker 1: an out, and his response was, no, I'm going to
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Speaker 1: tell him he can't come to my party because he's
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Speaker 1: been mean to me and my friend and that's not okay.
6:22
Speaker 1: And the next day and that's what he said, he said,
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Speaker 1: I'm not going to tell him it's your fault. I'm
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Speaker 1: going to tell him it's his fault. And he came
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Speaker 1: back to me the next day and he'd had that
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Speaker 1: conversation with him, and the other child's first reaction was, well,
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Speaker 1: you can't come to my party either. But there's not
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Speaker 1: been an incident with that boy ever since, with either
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Speaker 1: of the children, with either my son or his other
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Speaker 1: good friend. And in fact, he said to me the
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Speaker 1: other day, you know what, I think we're kind of friends.
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Speaker 4: Now.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's amazing what happens when we have these clean conversations.
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Speaker 4: And I want to say clean, I mean, we just
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Speaker 4: get straight to it.
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Speaker 3: And so to go back to Luke's initial question, if
6:54
Speaker 3: there are a couple of kids that are messing around
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Speaker 3: and they're doing the wrong thing and they're not your kids,
7:00
Speaker 3: I think it's very simple for us to step in
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Speaker 3: and say I need to talk to you for it
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Speaker 3: just a minute Isabelle or Caleb or whoever it is, buddy, buddy,
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Speaker 3: we want to say what's happening here is not how
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Speaker 3: we do things in our home. It might be okay
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Speaker 3: for you to do it at your place, but that's
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Speaker 3: not how we do it here.
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Speaker 4: What we do here is this, this, and this, and.
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Speaker 3: If you want to extend the conversation for just a moment,
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Speaker 3: you might say, can you think of any reasons why
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Speaker 3: we might not like that here?
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Speaker 4: Because we want them to understand why.
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Speaker 3: It's not about being all hardcore authoritarian, it's about actually
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Speaker 3: teaching them. Maybe I can share a quick personal experience
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Speaker 3: as well. We had a situation with one of my children.
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Speaker 3: Well I'll just say which one. It was, the eldest one.
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Speaker 3: She's old enough to have boyfriends. We've told our kids,
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Speaker 3: no boy We've only got girls. Okay, so from the outset,
7:49
Speaker 3: we've just said, you don't have a romantic interest, you
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Speaker 3: don't have a boyfriend until you finished high school, because
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Speaker 3: we want you to. You know, it messes up with
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Speaker 3: friendships and it gets in the way of your schooling.
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Speaker 4: And da da da da da.
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Speaker 3: Anyway, we got halfway through year twelve, so we think
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Speaker 3: we did okay with the first one. She's halfway three
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Speaker 3: year twelve, she's finally got a boyfriend, and we're.
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Speaker 4: Like, ah, oh, this is driving crazy.
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Speaker 3: But there's been a couple of incidents where together they
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Speaker 3: haven't acted with integrity and as a result, while they
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Speaker 3: haven't been up to what I would call mischief, they
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Speaker 3: haven't been honest with us. And so when the boyfriend
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Speaker 3: was visiting a little while ago at our place, I
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Speaker 3: said to him, we'll call him Jared because that's his name.
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Speaker 3: I said to him, Jared, we need to have a chat.
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Speaker 3: And he looked at me with that look of dread
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Speaker 3: and fear in his eyes that any boyfriend, you know,
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Speaker 3: with my girlfriend's father, and he knew when I pulled
8:41
Speaker 3: the baseball bat out that.
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Speaker 4: So we went for a walk and we sat down
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Speaker 4: and I.
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Speaker 3: Said, Jared, I want to have a really clean, open
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Speaker 3: conversation with you. This is an expectation that I have.
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Speaker 3: How do you feel about that it hasn't been lived
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Speaker 3: up to at this point. And I recognize that there
9:01
Speaker 3: are two involved in this, but I want you to
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Speaker 3: be absolutely clear on where I stand and why do
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Speaker 3: you have any quation. We had about a fifteen minute
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Speaker 3: conversation at which point I said, betray my trust and
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Speaker 3: I'll destroy you.
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Speaker 4: No, I didn't really say that.
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Speaker 3: I might have thought it, but I didn't say it.
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Speaker 3: And it's amazing what's happened since. You know, it's been
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Speaker 3: considerable time since, and the level of respect has remained
9:27
Speaker 3: because it was done the right way.
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Speaker 4: He still shows up at our house, he.
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Speaker 3: Still says hi, he still shakes hands, he still engages
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Speaker 3: in conversations because it's not about getting other kids in
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Speaker 3: trouble when they do something that's inappropriate. It's not about
9:40
Speaker 3: saying you're a rap bag, You're never coming back here,
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Speaker 3: I can't trust you, you're this, you're that again, whether
9:44
Speaker 3: they're two or twenty two.
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Speaker 4: It's about sitting down and saying, we don't do it
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Speaker 4: like this here.
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Speaker 3: I wonder if you can tell me why, what can
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Speaker 3: we do about this in the future and so on.
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Speaker 3: As it turns out, you can even ask them to apologize.
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Speaker 3: You can even say what happened was wrong. And I
9:59
Speaker 3: think that you need to appologize to this person for
10:01
Speaker 3: that and walk them through that.
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Speaker 1: And better to have that conversation while he's Jared and
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Speaker 1: not when you start calling him son.
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Speaker 2: Because couldn't you hear the tenson pulling up? You can't
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Speaker 2: face then.
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Speaker 4: My daughter actually total total tangent. My daughter said to
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Speaker 4: him the other day do you like him? Do you
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Speaker 4: like him?
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Speaker 3: And I said to her, right now, it doesn't matter
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Speaker 3: whether I like him or not. If it ever gets
10:34
Speaker 3: to a point where you're a few years older and
10:36
Speaker 3: things are still going, and you know things are getting
10:38
Speaker 3: serious enough that you want to talk about a long
10:39
Speaker 3: term relationship, then we'll talk about whether I like him
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Speaker 3: or not.
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Speaker 4: I'm going to get you might.
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Speaker 1: Not like my answer, Doctor Justin Kilson, Is it okay
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Speaker 1: to discipline others? Well, if it's the right thing, the
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Speaker 1: answer is.
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Speaker 2: Yett, I've got I've got to I can't let him
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Speaker 2: go your share, because there's one scenario we have, there's
10:58
Speaker 2: one scenario we haven't come and that is you've talked about.
11:02
Speaker 2: It's your turf, it's your home, it's your rules, it's
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Speaker 2: people that you know. We're at a playground, we're at
11:07
Speaker 2: a public place. It's not someone we know. Another child
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Speaker 2: is misbehaving, maybe being a little bit rough, maybe being
11:13
Speaker 2: a little bit mean, maybe using language that you're not
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Speaker 2: happy with. How do you go about that scenario, we've
11:20
Speaker 2: got no ground.
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Speaker 3: Three quick things. Number one, you need to call it out.
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Speaker 3: Number two, you need to do it in a way
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Speaker 3: that is non threatening. And number three, you need to
11:28
Speaker 3: look for the parents. Now, every now and again, parents
11:31
Speaker 3: can become quite defensive and so and even aggressive, So
11:35
Speaker 3: you want to be careful in the way that you
11:36
Speaker 3: invite other parents in. You might walk up to a
11:39
Speaker 3: parent and say, your son just called my son a
11:41
Speaker 3: name and then he pushed him over, and your son's
11:43
Speaker 3: being a bully, and that's probably not a good way
11:45
Speaker 3: to start a conversation. Instead, you might say where's your dad,
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Speaker 3: where's your mum? And then you walk over to that
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Speaker 3: person say I'm not sure if you've noticed or not,
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Speaker 3: but your son and my son have been a little altercation.
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Speaker 3: Just thought i'd come and get you. I'm having a
12:00
Speaker 3: chat with my son, but I thought you might want
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Speaker 3: to have a chat.
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Speaker 4: With yours as well. And so you want to do
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Speaker 4: it softly, You want to do it gently.
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Speaker 3: Harsh startups lead to harsh outcomes more often than not.
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Speaker 3: The other thing that you want to bear in mind
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Speaker 3: a story from a friend of mine. He was at
12:14
Speaker 3: a fine dining restaurant where you can take your children,
12:18
Speaker 3: you know, the one with the golden arches and the
12:20
Speaker 3: one with.
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Speaker 1: The oh yes, another one and it's golden, so it
12:23
Speaker 1: must be high class.
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Speaker 4: Yes.
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Speaker 3: And he had his kids playing on the playground and
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Speaker 3: there was an altercation and he went in there and
12:32
Speaker 3: started to deal with it, but he was probably a
12:34
Speaker 3: little stern and the focus of his attention was on
12:37
Speaker 3: somebody else's child. And the parents of that child came
12:40
Speaker 3: in and they were very upset with the way things
12:41
Speaker 3: were going. So we do need to call it out.
12:44
Speaker 3: We do need to point out, hang on, that's not
12:46
Speaker 3: how we do things. You might do it like that
12:47
Speaker 3: in your family, we don't do that in public. That's
12:49
Speaker 3: not okay. Where are your parents. Let's see if we
12:52
Speaker 3: can work this out and involve the parents as much
12:55
Speaker 3: as you can. If the parents don't care, if the
12:56
Speaker 3: parents are on their phone playing Candy Crush, being busy
12:59
Speaker 3: doing wortant things, then just call it or remove your
13:02
Speaker 3: kids or go somewhere else.
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Speaker 2: It's a confronting, but it's important thing. And I guess
13:08
Speaker 2: there was a time where I've seen it wasn't me involved,
13:11
Speaker 2: where one parent I think appropriately went up to the
13:14
Speaker 2: other set of parents, and there's been a bit of
13:16
Speaker 2: an issue here, and those parents got upset with their
13:20
Speaker 2: kid and had public discipline in the modern interpretationism flogging,
13:28
Speaker 2: and it was almost like they went, I regret actually,
13:31
Speaker 2: because now that kid is getting really in physical trouble
13:36
Speaker 2: because of the don't we don't get to control. We
13:39
Speaker 2: don't understand what the nuances are with other parents and
13:42
Speaker 2: other kids.
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Speaker 3: But it's no surprise to me that if the kid's
13:45
Speaker 3: being a bully and then they get bullied by their parents,
13:47
Speaker 3: that's why that kid's being a bully. That's what they've
13:49
Speaker 3: been taught at time. So we need to be better
13:50
Speaker 3: than that. But yeah, we can't control it. One thing
13:53
Speaker 3: that I have done in public at one point, very quickly,
13:55
Speaker 3: was I approached a parents said I don't want you
13:58
Speaker 3: to I don't want you to get cranky at them,
13:59
Speaker 3: but I just wanted to let you know I've sorted
14:01
Speaker 3: it out at this time. But there's been a little
14:03
Speaker 3: bit of friction between these two. If it keeps going,
14:06
Speaker 3: we can just go somewhere else or whatever.
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Speaker 4: But I just point it.
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Speaker 3: Out and and most of the time most parents will,
14:12
Speaker 3: you know, most parents want to do the right thing.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's true. I like true. That's something to be
14:17
Speaker 2: that's a great little thing to put in the toolkit.
14:20
Speaker 1: Beautiful, very very good, doctor Justin Coulson, Thank you so much.
14:23
Speaker 4: It's a pleasure. Thanks.
14:24
Speaker 1: And of course there are loads of resources available, lots
14:27
Speaker 1: of information, books, podcasts, and programs. You can find them
14:30
Speaker 1: all that happy families dot com dot au. But if
14:34
Speaker 1: listening to doctor Justin Coulson makes you think that people
14:36
Speaker 1: in your organization or school could benefit from hearing him
14:39
Speaker 1: as well, you can find out how to have Justin
14:41
Speaker 1: speak for your school or organization at Justin Coulson dot
14:45
Speaker 1: com