Parenting is a difficult job. It demands new styles and strategies with changing age and stage of a kid’s development. However, child experts have identified the best parenting style that nurtures a child’s overall development.
Moreover, out of the various parenting methods, the Authoritative parenting style stands out with its more empathetic features. Kids of authoritative parents show astonishing results in every life aspect.
So, here we bring the list of characteristics that are inbuilt in every authoritative parent. Do you want to adopt this parenting style? Inculcate these qualities and be an authoritative parent.
10 Tips to Be an Authoritative Parent
Communicate with Your Child
- Authoritative parents are masters of giving positive attention to their little ones. The doorway to building a strong relationship with kids is a two-way communication system.
- Such parents listen to their kids. They make their kids realize that their opinions are important enough to listen and ponder upon.
- Want to be an authoritative parent? Start listening and laughing on that same joke, which your child has already cracked five times before!
Nurture Child’s Emotional Needs
- Start acknowledging your child’s inner feelings. Also, teach them to accept their emotional part by labelling and validating various feelings.
- So next time if the kid is crying stop saying-Don’t cry it’s not a big deal! Instead of that validate his feelings. (It’s not a big deal at our age, but for kids, it can be a reason to get upset).
- Label his feelings and make him comfortable realizing that getting upset is okay. Invest your energy in fulfilling a child’s emotional needs.
Set Clear And Achievable Rules
- Authoritative parents establish clear and achievable rules for their children. It is the best parenting style because parents explain the reasons behind every rule they set.
- They make sure kids know what their expectations are by setting a few rules. Instead of yelling at the children ‘Stop using the cellphone’, they explain the health effects of device overuse.
- They never nag or scold children for the same thing. They adopt smart tricks to tame their kid’s behaviour. Like for device overuse, they may restrict kids by using parental control apps.
Establish Logical Consequences
- Authoritative parenting establishes logical consequences for breaking a rule or for misbehaving.
- Parents make their kids understand that there is a result of every deed. They have to bear a consequence of their behaviour.
- If a child breaks the rule of device usage, as per the authoritative parenting, parents will disconnect the privilege of gadgets.
Authoritative Parents Teach Life Lessons
- The authoritative parenting style makes kids wise and fair to deal with various life situations.
- These parents keep on sharing life lessons to make their kids understand the meaning and reality of life.
Offer Perks
- The authoritative parenting style offers an incentive to acknowledge and motivate their kid’s good qualities.
- That doesn’t mean kids are tempted to do something by showering gifts and chocolates. Rather, when a child is striving with a specific problem, they employ incentives to help a child achieve that task.
- When a kid successfully limits his screen life, a parent can perk him with an extra hour on weekends to play games!
Educate That Freedom Comes With Responsibility
- The authoritative parenting style makes sure that kids balance their freedom with responsibility.
- For every freedom they get from parents, they clearly know what responsibilities are attached to it. Eg., If they get a cellphone, they know how to use it responsibly.
Create Learning Opportunities
- Authoritative parenting sees learning opportunities in every mistake their kids do. They never embarrass kids for committing mistakes.
- In fact, such parents help children rectify these mistakes and this gives them new learning experiences.
- So, next time if a child hurts someone, do not intimidate him. Instead, make him learn to share a toy with the kid he hit /hurt too.
Be The Pro-active Parent
- Establish a sound and healthy relationship with your kid by sharing every facet of his life.
- Be his digital partner by playing online games with him, help him finish his school projects, Enjoy his favourite cartoon show – this is how you encourage an active relationship with your child.
- For authoritative parents, this is the best way to tame teenagers, as they always want friendly parents!
Never Break The Bond Of Trust And Affection
- There are many life instances, wherein, as parents, you will need to act uptight. You can’t always be his friend. At times, we need to exercise a few hard techniques too.
- But even in such a situation, you need to respect your child’s self-identity. Hurting, physically harming, emotionally and physically abusing may frighten the child. The authoritative parenting style always makes sure that kids are not manipulated or threatened so much that they fear the parent.
- In any situation, they keep the bond of trust, love, and care alive. Even during punishing the kids, parents assure that the little ones are loved and trusted.
As a concluding note, we recommend giving undivided attention to your child every day at least for a few minutes. Even when they behave badly! Let them feel that they are loved and accepted in any situation.
Given a choice, an authoritative parent always prefers to make their kids confident about who they are and what they are capable of!