Fostering a Positive Parent/Child Relationship: Disciplining with Constructive Critism

Because young children take what is said to them quite literally one thing my husband and I decided to make a priority as parents was ensuring that we used only constructive words when disciplining our children, having both had experience with non-constructive criticism from our own parents when we were children - bless them, at the time they didn't know any better - and both being very interested in childhood development we knew that non-constructive criticism could be hurtful and demeaning to children. 

Basically what we do is try to be sure we are very specific when we are discipling to avoid any confusion on our daughters' part, we want them to know it's not them that is the problem it's the specific behavior. I'll put a little example here, I hope it helps.

Phrase: "I don't like that." - your child may hear, "I don't like you." Because they tend to think so concretely they may have a hard time connecting "that" to only the behavior and not themselves in general.

Try instead: "I don't like that behavior." or "I don't like that tone of voice." or "I don't care for that (insert behavior here)"