Parents should not agonize over anything a child does or fails to do if the child is perfectly capable of agonizing over it himself.

Invariably, micromanaging results in four problems: deceit, disloyalty, conflict, and communication problems.

The assumption being that if high-risk children could be made to 'feel good about themselves,' these epidemics could be mitigated. ... This prescription, unfortunately, has proven to be yet another in a long list of nouveau homilies that haven't lived up to their promises.

The essence of successful discipline is not technique; rather, it is self-confidence.

The fewer words a parent uses, the more aurhoritative the parent sounds & the clearer the instruction.

Today's mom watches her every child-rearing step lest she commit some egregious and apocalyptic parenting faux pas that will certainly doom her child to a life spent sleeping under overpasses, or worse, not going to Harvard.

Parents make sure homework is returned without error, drill their kids on upcoming tests to the saturation point, and then complain if teachers do not give the grades they think their kids deserve. By that point, it's hard to tell whose grades they are.