Outline:
“Kids need a parent, they do not need a friend,” Hannah said in her viral TikTok video
A Mom’s Approach to Raising Respectful and Well-Behaved Children
A mother is teaching her children to be great listeners and highly respectful — and now she’s sharing her insights on parenting. In a video that has gone viral on TikTok, a mom named Hannah shared some of her best advice for raising kids, which included being “unhinged” at times. She also talks about where she gets her guidance from and what she believes is the most effective tool for parents.
Hannah knows she’s shaping the next generation, and she’s ensuring they grow up with respect. In her popular TikTok video, the influencer and mother of two discusses how she’s often complimented on her sons, whom she calls “really well-behaved children.” Her 4- and 6-year-old kids rarely require discipline anymore, and she credits this to her approach.
Four Key Tips for Effective Parenting
Hannah shares her top four tips for parents, starting with the importance of beginning early.
“Starting young is a huge part of this. If you start too late, your kids have already formed some really bad habits that are going to be really hard to break,” she says. “I started disciplining around 16 to 18 months, and I think we underestimate our kids and think they can’t clearly understand these boundaries that we have put in place, when they really can.”
For Hannah, disciplining her young kids meant getting down on their level and explaining what they did wrong, how they should’ve behaved, and what the consequence would be if they continued. For her family, the consequence was sitting by themselves for one to two minutes. The consequence would repeat itself if her kids kept misbehaving. Hannah said this could sometimes take two hours.
Her second tip was consistency. She said if parents aren’t consistent with their kids, they will get taken advantage of. Her third tip was making sure her kids acknowledge her when she’s talking to them. She says her kids have to respond to her politely whenever she has a request.
“This way I know that they heard me, they know that they heard me, and they know that there’s a clear, set expectation,” she says.
Hannah’s last tip was that parents need to be a little “unhinged” sometimes. She said if talking in a gentle manner isn’t doing the trick, then you need to up the ante by getting louder.
“I have snatched my kids out of library story times, the store, McDonald’s play places, fun places,” she says. “If they are misbehaving to a point that I have had it, I will snatch them up, I will put them in the car, I will tell them what their problem was, and their consequence at home is going to be so not fun that they will never act like that again.”
“Sometimes your kids need to know that you mean business and you will not be taking their s— basically,” she went on. “Kids need a parent, they do not need a friend. They do not need me to gently talk to them softly and kindly all the time. Sometimes they need [me to be] in their face, loud, ‘Hey, we’re not going to act like that. This is not how we behave ourselves as citizens of this world.’”
Where Hannah Gets Her Advice
Now, Hannah speaks with and shares where she gets her parenting advice from — as well as what she thinks is the most effective parenting tool.
“I get most of my parenting advice from my mom,” she says. “I have seven siblings and growing up we were a foster family, so my mom has more parenting experience than anyone I know. She has raised hard-working, independent and thoughtful humans, so I take a lot of stock into what she tells me.”
“When my boys were really little, I think I called her once a day asking how she would handle certain behaviors and her advice was always helpful, nonjudgmental and to the point. She’s really biggest inspiration!” shares Hannah.
The Most Effective Tool for Parents
As for the parenting tool she keeps in her back pocket, Hannah says parents really need to be consistent and “mean what they say.”
“I really think the most effective tool a parent can have is to be consistent and mean what you say,” she says. “Kids by instinct are boundary pushers, and that’s great when we’re talking about constructive boundary pushing.”
“But when they are trying to see how far they can push mom or dad until they break and they can get what they want, that’s when you really need to stay consistent and stick to your guns,” continues Hannah. “Kids need proper boundaries and expectations and it’s important that we as parents hold strong to those.”