Sound Discipline is now BELONG Partners!

  • What Kind of Bystander are You?

    Imagine that your daughter and her friends are sitting hanging out in the family room – talking and texting and you hear, “Oh that is so gay!” Do you feel uncomfortable but remain silent because you don’t want to embarrass your daughter? Do you wait and talk about it in private afterwards? What do you do when you hear Uncle Alfred make a derogatory comment about women or children or people of a different race or sexual orientation? Do you just say to yourself or your children, “That’s Alfred, he is a little off color?” What do you think that…

  • An Ode to the Wild Things

    Our children are born into an adult world where many experiences are new, confusing and often scary. They are working hard at taming the wild things. As parents, we can help our children make sense of the frightening things in the larger world around us.

  • Making Amends

    We can remember that being sorry is a feeling. Asking children to say, “I’m sorry” while they are still upset or feeling hurt themselves gives a confusing message to both parties. And yet… it is important to teach our children to make amends. What do we do?

  • Self-regulation Matters

    But she KNOWS better! Why does she act this way? How many times have you thought this, said it or listened to another parent share their frustration this way? And when you reflect on it, how many times have you noticed, reflecting back on one of your not-so-wonderful parenting moments that indeed YOU knew better? Join the club.

  • Non-stop Negotiation Getting You Down?

    As the parent it doesn’t always feel so great when all of your positions get shaved away by your budding courtroom lawyer. It is exhausting. Setting limits firmly and still honoring the dignity of your child isn’t really hard, but it takes practice.

  • Small Steps into the New Year

    A lot is written this time of year about what we “resolve” to do for the future. Goals are great but it can be really discouraging when, despite good intentions, they are not met.

  • Time Out? Time In?

    The idea that a grumpy child is going to go sit somewhere and calmly think about what they “should have done” is quite preposterous. Did you? I didn’t. When I was sent to my room I spent the whole time thinking about how unfair the situation was or plotting how I was either going to make that particular parent “pay.” Just guessing, but I don’t think that was what my parents were aiming for.

  • Kids and Money

    Contributed by Jody McVittie Do you have questions about how to teach your children about money? When do you start allowance? Do you link it to chores? How much do you give them? How do you teach generosity? The simple answer is that YOU get to decide. Here are some suggestions – and you get […]

  • Family Work: Whose Job is It?

    Contributed by Jody McVittie, MD When I grew up everyone in our family had jobs to do. Many of them were centered around our family dinners (setting the table, clearing the table, washing the dishes, sweeping the floor). Other family jobs included feeding pets and taking care of the garbage (this was in the days […]

  • Are we there yet???

    Contributed by Jody McVittie, MD Part of my memory of early family vacations include very annoying choruses of, “Are we there yet?” from the back seat. In my more sarcastic moments my internal voice was saying, “Are we stopped yet?” “Does it look like it?” and other variations of maternal snarkiness. I’m not proud of […]