Parenting a child with special needs sometimes requires learning new health care skills or new forms of communication, such as sign language, or understanding mental health issues. No matter what type of special needs a child has, parents must teach their child the difference between right and wrong, polite and impolite and responsible and irresponsible through discipline. The American Academy of Child Adolescent Psychiatry says that all children need expectations and rules to learn appropriate behavior. It's the parents' job to teach the rules, encourage compliance and initiate consequences for noncompliance.
Step 1
Develop a list of positive behaviors you want to encourage and negative behaviors you want to discourage. Your list should reflect your child's abilities and limitations, rather than focusing on age-appropriate activities. Consider self-care tasks, manners and chores. For some children, the behaviors might be simple and include things like eye contact when spoken to, pointing instead of yelling and not throwing things. For other children, the list might include several daily chores, a respectful tone of voice and following a bedtime routine.
Step 2
Decide on one or two motivators, or positive rewards, and one or two consequences, or negative actions. Motivators might include earning story time, candy, dessert or a new toy. Consequences might include a stern warning, timeout, removal of toys or an extra chore. Your goal is to encourage your child to follow the rules but at the same time prepare yourself to provide discipline if she does not.
Step 3
Provide opportunities for your child to do things the right way. Clearly explain what you expect. Role play the correct behaviors or make up a story about the correct choices you expect your child to make. Create an environment that encourages your child to make the right choices whether it be by providing a picture schedule, using verbal reminders or retelling the stories about appropriate behaviors. When your child is compliant, provide him with a motivator, an encouraging word or one of your previously determined rewards.
Step 4
Implement negative consequences for poor choices and noncompliance with a calm, matter-of-fact voice. Do not feel anxious or guilty about implementing a consequence. You are helping to teach your child how to function successfully within society. Disaboom, an online resource for disabilities, reminds parents, "To deny children with disabilities these consequences would deny their development into responsible adults."
