Today’s Parenting Tip:

Decide:        You can correct your message, when it comes out the wrong way.

Practice:     Listen for any plastic compliments you give to children today.  (For once you made a healthy snack choice.)  When you hear one, stop and correct it.

Tell the child you didn’t mean to say it that way and say it another way.

You can also tell her you are practicing the best ways to tell her how great she is.  (Thanks to Jean Illsley Clarke for describing plastic messages.)

Let us know which tips you like the best or any others you think of that you want to pass along to others.

Today’s Decide and Practice daily parenting tip was inspired by our featured picture book, THE MONSTER WHO LOST HIS MEAN.  Read the book to a child in your life each day as a reminder of what you are deciding and practicing that day.

Come back each day for another good parenting decision and how to practice it. (Each day’s activity will also be posted on Daily Parenting Tips page for easy access.)

Read the whole story at Correct; Don’t Criticize – Part 2.