What about disagreements between parents about discipline?

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Many parents describe differences of opinion between fathers and mothers regarding raising kids and how to discipline them. Which of these comments by parents best fits your situation?

A. "We never agree about what the kids should be expected to do or how to deal with them so that we end up in battles with each other and the kids just go on doing things their own way."

B. "Mom lets the kids get away with murder so Dad steps in with a heavy hand and gets so harsh that the kids are afraid to come out of their rooms, and still they misbehave all the time."

C. "We try to be consistent in parenting but after we agree on what we’ll do, one of us gets side-tracked and everything falls apart."

D. "We have worked hard to agree on what our rules are and what they kids should do, but our way of reaching our goals is so different that things go haywire and we finally just give up."

E. "We have reached agreement, both on our goals for our kids’ behavior and on how we will meet them. We try hard to stay consistent but occasionally things come up where we don’t follow through very well."

F. "After identifying the goals each of us has for our kids, we developed a specific plan of discipline that clearly identifies our expectations, the benefits to the kids of complying, and our steps to follow through consistently, even when we are very busy."

How to Raise Disciplined and Happy Children was developed working with real-world parents and so considered differences between parents, even those who are divorced and living rather different life-styles.

Sneak peek: The book presents an approach to parenting that is different in many ways from what most parents do. Because of that, as parenting partners work out their plans they typically find that their differences don’t matter as much as they supposed, because they end up focused on how best to support their kids in maturing into responsible individuals.

Bonus sneak peek: The book also provides specific guidelines for families with such striking differences of opinion that conflict remains.

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