How to Teach Your Children to Respect You and Others

Everywhere we look these days, we see people not showing respect to other people. Even authority figures like police officers report that disrespectfulness is at an all-time high in our society.

Respect starts at home, and is learned (or, sadly, not learned) very young. Showing respect for other people not only makes you a better person, it leads to greater opportunities and blessings throughout your life.

With all that going for it, showing respect is something we should all want our children to do.

Instructions

1. Always remember that what goes around comes around.

   Or, as the Bible commands, "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. (Matthew 7:120)

   What this means in terms of parenting is that your children will always do as you do, and not as you say.

   If you treat your children respectfully from the moment they are born, they will grow up naturally respecting you right back. If you yell, scream, throw things, nag, and punish, your child will do the same to you. This is not defiance, this is how they learned to interact as human beings.

2. Treat others with respect.

   Not just to their faces, but in your conversations about others, your own personal honesty (when the grocery clerk gives you too much change back and you help her correct that mistake, it can have a powerful effect on your watching child), and your patience and compassion to others.

   This is especially true when someone is having a hard time and you help bring the situation back to calm rather than reacting defensively and harshly. This "turning the other cheek" shows your child how to have less disrespectful drama in his life rather than more.

3. Encourage your child when he shows respect to you and others.

   There is no such thing as too much sincere and deserved praise to a child who is doing the right thing - whether that's the toddler saying "please" and "thank you" or the teenager sticking up for a friend who is feeling the brunt of peer bullying. By showing appreciation for your child's attempts at respect, you are laying groundwork for a calm and focused life for him.