6 Great Ways to Improve your Parenting Skills

For most parents having a child is a learning experience that never stops. Improving that learning curve can be one of the few things that has an immediate return on your child's well-being and happiness. To help you, the parent, improve that learning curve, here are 6 great ways to improve your parenting skills.

Trust but Verify

Trusting your child is something that is easier said than done. To do this, trust what your child does and says, but verify it as well. When you do that, it allows the opportunity for the parent to know if they can trust their child. With each time that the verification turns out to be accurate, a little more trust can be afforded. Using this rule to trust but verify will open your eyes to your child's behavior and ability to tell the truth.

Listen to your Kids

Simply by listening to what you children have to say, you can show them how much you care and how much you need them. Many parents use the idea that they are to busy and their kid's cries, complaints, and even cheers can fall on deaf ears. Simply by listening to your kids, you'll learn their strengths, their weakness, what makes them happy and what makes them sad.

Act as a Role Model

A child's first role model and influence is their parent. For example, how the parent react to anger will show the child or children how they should react to anger. If you see yourself reacting or behaving in such a way that you wouldn't want your child to repeat it, then it's a clear sign that it's time to change you behavior a bit. 

If you make a poor role model for your kids, then chances are they can make an even worse role model for their friends and their own future children. It's important to instill the proper ethics by being the best role model for them that you can be.

Make Rules and Stick to Them

The best tool that a parent can have is making rules and sticking to them. It can be something as no snacks after a certain time to disciplining them, you have to make your rules and keep them. By making rules and sticking to them, you'll be able to show your children that your rules won't be broken. If you do break your own rules and let things slide, then the kids will learn that rules are made to be broken. That accidental lesson could lead them into all kinds of trouble later in life.

Show them Affection

Show your children you love them by showing affection. Depending on the age, this can be a confusing situation for a parent. As a young child, it can be as simple as giving them a hug and telling them you love them every day. When they get older, say into their teens, they don't want so much public affection and will take offense to it.

When they're older, an occasional hug as they leave for the day and telling them you love them can still have a huge impact. Constant hugging, as you may have done when they were a child, will no longer be acceptable.

Quality Time

One of the most important factors of raising a productive child is to spend quality time with them. Making time in your schedule for your children will show them through actions that you love them. Many parents say they are too busy to keep up, or they are working to much to make time for their kids. These reasons not to make time will cause children to question if their mother or father loves them. Never give your kids the chance to question your love for them, make time and make them feel truly loved.

Parents may find relief and encouragement from parenting classes online.  The most standard program is the 4 hour parenting class.  While many people take these classes for personal growth, others may take them for a court ordered parenting requirement.  Either way, the educational experience will be well work the time and money spent.