Workshop can help parents be a bit better

Parenting mistakes. We've all made 'em.

Whether it's grounding your son for three weeks because he missed curfew, or screaming over the mess your daughter calls a room, every parent has issued edicts that sounded better in the moment than in the morning.

But mistakes can result in lessons learned. And when it comes to parenting mistakes, really, don't we all want to do better next time around?

Parents get the chance to learn new tricks of the parenting trade Jan. 28. Amy MacDonald of Batavia, a psychologist and mother of five, will present "Mistakes Even Really Good Parents Make" from 7 to 9 p.m. in the Geneva High School auditorium, 416 McKinley St. The talk is sponsored by the Geneva Coalition for Youth

Many of MacDonald's clients are dealing with parenting issues, and she saw the same situations coming up over and over.

She'll first review the overall goal of most parents: "What are we doing here, what are we trying to accomplish?" Parents get stuck on little things, but the bigger question is "what are we trying to accomplish?"

"We're teaching children how to live in the world, and loving, nurturing and teaching them while they get to that point," she said.

She'll discuss good parent mistakes and the pitfalls that can befall devoted parents who want the best for their children. Frequently, a small change can make a big difference, she said.

"If a parent can just get help looking at things from a different direction, oftentimes things work out nicely."

The popular phrase is "pick your battles." If a parent picks every battle, MacDonald pointed out, every battle is minimized.

To get the conversation going -- and to evoke humorous recognition from parents -- MacDonald will discuss 10 mistakes. The parent may:

1. Pick the wrong battles and then hang on like a pit bull.

2. Deprive children of having a parent he or she can respect.

3. Be a bully or wimp but not a leader.

4. Undermine your leadership by picking at your child relentlessly.

5. Establish a "crime or punishment" system, in which the parent sets the child up to fail and then punishes the resulting failure.

6. Teach your child to whine, beg, argue and throw a tantrum.

7. Normalize and tolerate entitlement.

8. Over rescue your kids and teach them they can't handle anything.

9. Over-involve yourself in your child's activities.

10. Misunderstand your, and your child's, motives.

The point of the list isn't to make parents feel like failures. It's to let parents get some direct information on how to make life go more smoothly and also "to laugh a lot," MacDonald said.

"Everybody has made these mistakes," she said, including herself. "No kid needs you to be a perfect parent. You just need to be good enough."

MacDonald strongly believes that one of the best things parents can do for their kids is to provide leadership, empathy and nurturing. Be really tough on issues of safety and respect, she advised.

"The rest is problem-solving."

Parents only get so much ammunition, so to speak. MacDonald's theory is that "We don't want to spend our bullets on the mundane things. We want to keep our ammunition safe and dry for when we need it, for issues of respect and safety."

And grounding and other punishments parents like to use? Punishment is fairly ineffective in changing behavior, she said.

"There are usually other things that we can do."

On the other hand, matters of respect and safety are crucial.

"I would never tolerate an eye roll or a door slam," she said. "I can't possibly keep a child safe if I can't command respect."

MacDonald wants parents to be able to communicate empathy to their children, that they know it's a really good idea to come to parents with their problems. And she wants parents to communicate to their children the following premise, and promise: "I will keep you safe, and I will insist that you respect me. After that, we're a problem-solving team and we'll figure it out."

When kids know their parents are reasonable, "it's amazing how quickly they'll fall in line over the issue of respect," MacDonald said.

Want to stop the broken record with your own kids? The forum will help teach parents how to change the tune.

And that's beautiful music for everyone.