Positive Parenting

Teaching Through Encouragement
 

Free 6-Week Online Course

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Looking to add some new parenting tools to your toolbox?

Consider us your hardware store.

Dear Parents,

We’re thrilled to be offering a 6-week course on positive parenting using research backed, evidence-based tools– totally free of charge. There’s nothing we’re trying to sell you, no secret catch. Sound interesting? Read on…

For almost all of us, parenting is one of the biggest, most challenging, and most rewarding experiences in our lives. From the moment our children entered this world, our lives were no longer really our own. We learned fast that our job was to develop and protect and grow this little life that came from us.

Family life can sometimes move at a pace that exceeds our energy. Developing our kids into the adults of tomorrow isn’t easy. In raising our children, we smack into obstacles that they can often throw up in front of us:

“My son won’t listen to me.”
“My kids are running me ragged.”
“My daughter fights me on everything.”
“I wish my kids would stop fighting.”

We hear these statements a lot from the parents we work with. They often come with stories of conflict, of exasperation, of uncertainty. Sometimes it’s just a feeling that things should be different, easier.

The amazing thing about these statements is what the parents behind them want to accomplish. If we focus on what we want to grow, if we flip these statements into what they’re in service of, they could sound more like:

“I want my son to pay attention so we can have a happier home.”
“I’d love my kids to settle down so I can find more energy in my parenting.”
“I wish my daughter would cooperate, it would make our relationship so much better.”
“It’d be great if my kids could be happy together and learn from each other.”

As a parent, you’re your child’s most important teacher. You’re the one who loves them most on this planet. You’re the one who cares more than anyone else that they succeed in the world. You organize their life, manage their schooling, keep them on track with everything they’re doing.

The best teachers teach through encouragement. They focus on strengths, they shine the light on what they want to grow. The best teachers teach skills by celebrating small, successive steps that meet larger goals. They use positive reinforcement and are positively involved. Teaching through encouragement makes self-esteem burn brighter and enables seedlings of confidence to reach towards the sky.

How would you like to become a better teacher for your child? To motivate them and encourage them to be a strong, cooperative link in your family’s experience? We’ve got a 6-week, skills based positive parenting program that’s just for you.

All sessions are live and online – attendance is required!

 

Here’s What We Cover…

(Click to exapand each week’s description!)

Week 1: Shining the Light on What’s Strong.
July 16th, 7:30pm

Ever taken a long road trip in the hazy months of summer down an endless highway? Then you’re probably familiar with the array of bugs that get smashed on your windshield. This is a good metaphor of where we start. Imagine that windshield is your awareness and attention. With the bustle of life it can be easy to focus on those bugs. And, if we do fixate on what’s going wrong then we can miss the wider beauty of what’s happening in the landscape that lies just past those squashed bugs of challenge – the beauty of the landscape that’s out in the world and the landscape that’s within you. This is what it means to focus on strengths. This is where we start.

Week 2: How We Ask Affects What We Get

Encouraging cooperation through the use of good, clear directions.
July 23rd, 7:30pm

Ever heard that well-worn saying “ask and you shall receive”? One of the first steps to encouraging cooperation in your home is through giving good directions – clear, specific, and assertive. Like a golf swing, you’ll learn a smooth way to hit the ball of behavior down the fairway. You’ll also learn how to follow through effectively, with praise, when you get that cooperation you’re looking for from your child. Many parents say that the formula we’ll teach you is like magic.

Week 3: Teaching Behavior With Arrows of Encouragement
Using tokens and incentives to encourage and teach new behaviors.
July 30th, 7:30pm

If you’ve had the opportunity to watch a Zen Archer, you’ll have noticed a few things when they line up to shoot their arrow down the range. They approach the firing line with a mindful directness. They focus intently on their aim and being in harmony with their surroundings. They look down the range with grounded steadiness and when the bullseye is in sight, they let the arrow fly. What we are looking to do in this session is set you up to be a Mindful Archer; to pay attention to the bullseyes of good behavior that your child holds up. Then, you’ll mark it with an arrow of encouragement – like a Cupid’s arrow – something tangible, an incentive, that they’ll get. You’ll learn how to teach your child what the bullseyes of your expectations are and how to reward them when they’re on target.

Week 4: Setting Limits by Being an Assertive Goalkeeper

Using research based, non-negative time outs as a teaching tool.
August 6th, 7:30pm

By this point, we’ll have spent three weeks looking at how to begin teaching through encouragement. Only when that foundation is laid do we learn how to set limits for our kids. Setting limits is important because it is the other half of teaching them to cooperate with your expectations. By this point in the course, you’ve learned how to follow through in positive and incentivizing ways when you get compliance. Now you’ll learn how to follow through with the use of mild negative consequences – done in a way that will be another teaching tool in your parenting arsenal. At the end of this session, when your kids kick a ball of behavior into your net, you’ll have ways to celebrate the goals you want them to score. You’ll also now have a way to keep the balls of misbehavior from getting past you.

Week 5: Make Yourself an Architect of Can-Do Charts
Breaking down routines and chores using incentive charts.
August 13th, 7:30pm

You child has different routines in your home. Some of them they do well at, others they could probably use some help with. Can-Do Charts are like a chore board or are sometimes called incentive charts. You know, the ones where if they complete a series of tasks they can earn a reward. This session takes these charts to another level. It’s puts you in the position of a Thoughtful Architect. You’ll draft a plan for a routine or a chore for your child. You’ll clearly define the corners and territory of the task so that you can teach your child what your standards and expectations are. You’ll incentivize the whole chart in several ways so that when your child builds your plan to spec, you’ll be able to reward them for it and celebrate their successes in immediate ways.

Week 6: Engineering Solutions to Conflict and Wrap-Up
Problem solving by running effective family meetings and course closing.
August 27th, 7:30pm

To live as a family means to find yourself negotiating conflict within the family. When problems arise that inflame conflict, you need to become a Skillful Engineer to forge solutions. You need to bring your family together, as a team, to build bridges. By working together to test solutions and build out these bridges, you’ll be able to move forward onto better ground. You’ll learn to do this using family meetings that have you all around the table under your leadership. Also, in this session, we’ll wrap up and touch in on what life looks like moving forward for you as a parent.

What You Get

This course is designed to support you in as many ways possible.  Here’s what you can expect:

  • Six online 75-minute sessions. These are delivered live in webinar format.
  • Lots of time for practice and questions during each session.
  • Access to replays of all sessions.
  • A workbook for each piece of content.
  • Check-ins between sessions to keep you on track.

The course is designed to be experienced live.  We ask that all participants be able to attend all sessions.  Mark them on your calendar, make sure you can attend if you’re away from home.  It is the summer and things do come up, so if you miss a session you’ll be able to catch up on the replay.

Andrew Leonard, IMC

Parent Support Coach

Meet Your Coach

Andrew Leonard is a youth and family service professional with nearly 25 years of experience in the sector.  His work has primarily focused on outdoor and experiential education.  He has deep experience working families who have had kids undergo a diagnosis of type 1 diabetes, running medically supported camps across the country to support kids, teens, and parents.

Currently, Andrew works as a Parent Support Coach with the Canadian Mental Health Association, British Columbia Division.  In this role, Andrew delivers telehealth programs coaching parents of kids with mild to moderate behavioral challenges.  This includes parents working with diagnoses of ADD/ADHD, ODD, DCD, and other antisocial issues in their children.  In this role, Andrew uses the Parent Management Training – Oregon Model (PMTO), a model backed by decades of research and evidence-based practice.

Andrew is also trained as an Integral Master Coach™ through Integral Coaching Canada (ICC), one of the world’s premier coach training programs.  As a coach, Andrew has worked with adult clients nationally and internationally on topics that deeply matter to them.  Integral coaching is founded on the robust developmental model provided by Integral Theory, which Andrew weaves into all areas of his current practice.

How to Register

Registering for this program couldn’t be easier.  Follow this link or click the button below to be taken to our registration page.  After a few short questions and dropping us your email address, you’ll receive a confirmation and be set!

  • Be able to commit to being present for our live sessions. The dates of each session are below.
  • Have access to a computer and an internet connection that you can use for each session.
  • Be able to commit to home practice of the tools taught. These home practices don’t take up a lot of time and are totally skills-based (no lengthy theory or reading!), requiring no more than a few minutes reflection or some time spent with your kids.