Deborah Smith Pegues - 30 Days to Taming Your Kids Tongue

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

EUGENE, OREGON

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Verses marked NKJV are from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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Cover design by Koechel Peterson & Associates, Inc., Minneapolis, Minnesota

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The names in the stories that appear throughout this book have been changed to protect personal identities.

30 DAYS TO TAMING YOUR KIDS TONGUE

Copyright 2014 by Deborah Smith Pegues

Published by Harvest House Publishers

Eugene, Oregon 97402

www.harvesthousepublishers.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Pegues, Deborah Smith, 1950- author.

30 days to taming your kids tongue / Deborah Smith Pegues.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-0-7369-5829-5 (pbk.)

ISBN 978-0-7369-5830-1 (eBook)

1. Oral communicationReligious aspectsChristianity. 2. Interpersonal communicationReligious aspectsChristianity. 3. ParentingReligious aspectsChristianity. 4. ChildrenConduct of life. I. Title. II. Title: Thirty days to taming your kids tongue.

BV4597.53.C64P438 2014

248.845--dc23

2014000908

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This book is dedicated to parents who desire to develop their children into polite, polished, positive, personable, and powerful communicators.

Nobody accomplishes any worthwhile objective without the help of peoplegood, caring, qualified people committed to getting the job done. That was my experience on this project. Special thanks to Darla Noble, my resident parenting expert and key researcher. Your input was invaluable. So was that of Yvetta Franklin, Patricia Ashley, Darlene Moss, Pamela Kelley, Delisa Kelley, Roberta Morris, Carolyn Ratliff, Elizabeth Mirr Wysocki, Dr. Saundra Dalton Smith, Frank Robinson, and Greg and Teresa McCurry.

My prayer squad played a major role in my productivity and focus. Thank you Pastor Edward and Vanessa Smith, Renee Hernandez, Billie Rodgers, Yvonne Johnson, Cheryl Martin, Diane Gardner, Marva Sykes, Sylvia Gardner, and Josie Martin. Jeanette Stone and the women in my Zoe Christian Fellowship of Whittier Life Group stayed on the wall interceding for this project to the very end. Thank you for your faithfulness and love.

My social media friends were awesome with their support stories, personal experiences, insights, and prayers. Thank you to all you parents who offered your input.

As always, Im grateful to my Harvest House Publishers dream team: President Bob Hawkins Jr., acquisitions editor Terry Glaspey, senior editor Rod Morris, and the rest of the crew. Thank you for your never ending ideas and the awesome job you do in getting the books into the marketplace. Your unwavering commitment to the Scriptures as a guide for everyday living is inspiring. Thank you for your high standards of excellence in every aspect of publishing.

Finally, there is no superlative adequate to express my appreciation to my husband, Darnell. The man is tailor-made for me and my divine purpose. What a joy to be married for over thirty-five years to such an adaptable, fun-loving, handsome, balanced, self-sufficient, and supportive mate. Im eternally grateful to God for such an asset.

Contents

I am not a parent or a psychologist. Im a self-proclaimed professional people watcher; a woman on a mission to help people communicate better. So relax. This book is not a truckload of shoulds to make you feel guilty about how you are managing the hardest job on the planetraising kids. Also know that I will not subject you to a bunch of incomprehensible psychobabble (truth is, I dont know any) about how kids need the freedom to do whatever their little hearts desire. I do marvel, however, at how modern parents jumped on the bandwagon during the sixties and started giving more credibility to child-development experts than to folks like Susanna Wesley, who birthed nineteen children. Her sons, John and Charles, were founding fathers of the Methodist Church. Parents who desired to raise godly children embraced Susannas classic rulesmany of which found their way into our household and affected how I was raised.

I took responsibility at an early age for the frequent care and feeding of my siblings. Im the second oldest of seven children and the only girl. By the time I was seven, my mom had taught me how to make meals from scratch for the entire family, to clean house, and to use the old wringer-type washing machine without getting my arms caught between the rollers.

Corralling a bunch of rambunctious boys was no small task; conflicts were commonplace. But I learned a lot about effective communication (actually, I should say ineffective communication), a topic that has fascinated me for over a third of a century. Ive managed difficult people as a former Fortune 500 financial executive and a nonprofit administrator. During the course of my career, I have taught many adults how to communicate directly and powerfully. Ive been blessed to proclaim my message to millions through television and radio appearances, book sales, conferences, and private interventions.

After the tremendous response from around the world to my book 30 Days to Taming Your Tongue , I realized that many adults have interpersonal communications difficulties that could have been resolved or minimized if they had been addressed in their early childhood. So, in a departure from teaching old dogs new tricks, Im writing 30 Days to Taming Your Kids Tongue because I believe it pays to teach effective communication during the toddler-to-twelve period of a childs life.

By the time kids reach their teen years, their basic communication behavior is already entrenched; for many, their people skills are mediocre at best. I find this to be a real tragedy because every endeavor that anybody undertakes in life will require interaction with people. There is no way around it. We all need people to help us achieve our personal or professional goals. Thus, we have to be intentional in developing strong people skills to communicate our desires and to position ourselves where others are motivated to embrace and support us. This is why good home training is essential. Kids have to be taught what to say and what not to say, which behaviors inspire support from others and which do not.

This book is a combination of old school standards and new school strategies. I believe that kids can be well behaved and still be expressive. I believe that parents can administer the rod of correction in several formsbut always with love and consistency. Chip Ingram, a popular pastor and Bible teacher, agrees: