Reply to Punishing your child by not letting them a birthday party last minute

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]People who punish their children instead of properly disciplining them don't do parenting right anyway. Flame away I don't care. All that child is learning right now is to be extremely sad and resentful towards the parents for not letting him/her go to the party. How about logical and natural consequences for bad behavior instead of parents just showing that they have the power to take away whatever they want from a child...

If your child behaves so badly that you feel the need to take away a birthday party where you are one of three invited and a close friend...maybe you've done something wrong along the way and your way of parenting isn't working very well to begin with...[/quote]

OK wise parenting one-- tell us how you would have handled this? I do think not attending a birthday party CAN be a natural consequence of bad behavior.  I tell my child all the time that only kids who behave can go out to dinner (for example) because kids who run around screaming aren't allowed in restaurants.  Likewise, kids who are out of control (or hit other kids or scream etc) are not welcome at birthday parties where they will have to play nicely with other children.  However...if I had RSVP'ed to attend a 3 person birthday party, I would not use that as the punishment unless it was really egregious.  If it was a 30 person, whole-class party at chuck-e-cheese, I might think differently.

[/quote]

I am going to reply even though you started with a snarky remark...

Taking away a birthday party is NEVER a natural consequence. "Natural consequence" means a consequence that occurs naturally by the childs behavior - not a punishment artificially given to the child. Not attending a birthday party also most likely wasn't even a logical consequence in this case. This would have been logical for example:

1. Child needs to wear sunscreen to the birthday party because it's a pool party and the sun is blazing.
2. Child refuses to wear sunscreen.
3. You say "Okay, don't wear sunscreen - but you can not go to the party then as it requires you wear sunscreen."

That is logical consequence. Not natural. Natural would be:

1. Child needs to wear sunscreen to the birthday party because it's a pool party and the sun is blazing.
2. Child refuses to wear sunscreen.
3. You say "Okay, don't wear sunscreen." Child goes to the party and gets a very bad sunburn. Sunburn = Natural consequence of not wearing sunscreen.

IN OPs CASE:

1. Kid behaves badly at home.
2. Kid goes to party anyway.
3. Kid behaves badly at party.
4. Kid gets to hear how other kids don't want to play because of bad behavior. Kid is sent home early because of bad behavior. THAT is the natural consequence.

IN YOUR CASE:

1. Kid behaves badly at home.
2. Kid goes to restaurant anyway.
3. Kid gets mean stares, bad comments from other customers, eventually the family has to leave. THAT is the natural consequence.

The point of natural consequences is to let children experience by themselves what their behaviors do to other people and in return the consequences it has for them. It means a lot of stepping back and holding back on the parents part.
The point of logical consequences is to intervene as a parent mostly before a natural consequence occurs to actively teach children right from wrong and to teach them consequences that usually aren't as harsh as natural ones would be.

And then there's punishment. That's a whole different story and that's what has happened here.

I can not say what the natural or logical consequence would have been for the child not allowed to go to the party because I do not know what exactly that child even did wrong in the first place...but that child was being punished, not shown natural OR logical consequence.[/quote]

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