Customer Reviews

Unconditional Parenting

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First of all, even if you're not 100% sold on Alfie Kohn's revolutionary (although it really shouldn't be) parenting and teaching ideas, this video is fantastic. Relative to most parenting videos and books, this one is full of fresh and provocative ideas that challenge and inform. Plus, my husband and I found ourselves laughing throughout the video, as Kohn manages to inject a lot of humor and entertaining points into his talks.

Substance-wise, this DVD lecture is something every parent should hear. Kohn uses reason and decades of psychological research to show how traditional methods of punishment and rewards (everything from the hickory stick to the sticker chart) may produce (in some kids) temporary compliance, but at a high cost in terms of long-term moral and emotional development, psychological intrinsic motivation, parent-child relationship, and on and on.

As the parent of two preschoolers, I have experienced very, very strong pressure from other adults to manipulate (and/or spank) my kids into submission and compliance. Frankly, as someone who's always been largely controlled by external rewards and punishments myself, I have found myself recently giving into others' control-oriented parenting systems and ignoring my own better judgement. After all, everyone was always telling me to, and my kids certainly are no model children, so I supposed I was wrong to try and "work with" my kids rather than just invoking my power to get them to do what we adults want them to do ("doing to" them). Some adults would argue that my kids wanted the "security" of knowing their "limits," and my compromising and working with them was actually causing them "anxiety"!

Kohn has lent a lot of support to my original mothering instincts--If I want my kids to have imagination, compassion, patience, initiative, planning ability and all those other good things IN THE LONG-TERM, I'd better parent to that end. (I can start by modeling those things as their mother in my relationship with them!) If I want SHORT-TERM compliance and to teach my kids to use power, force, praise, attention and other forms of manipulation to control others, then I can go ahead and keep parenting by everyone else's standards. I've already heard my 5-year old daughter repeatedly say things like, "Mommy, if you don't let me have the candy, I'm not going to play with you tonight." She tries to invoke the wee bit of power that she has as a very small and largely powerless child in order to get me to do what she wants. It's sad. Do we spend time together because we enjoy each other's company, or do we do it as a reward for compliance with our requests? The outside world may operate on a quid pro quo basis, but is that the level of relationship I want with my child?

Indeed, the more I reflect on Kohn's talk, the more I realize that our whole society operates almost exclusively on the principle that people need extrinsic punishments and rewards to get them to do what the powerful (i.e., those who set up those systems of rewards and punishments up) want. No one seems to truly care about how others feel on the inside, but only about how they act and look on the outside. The outside is how we measure success in almost every dimension of adult life: having wealth, beauty, prestige and well-behaved beautiful children attending Yale! Clearly, with our society's level of drug abuse, violence and so forth, this isn't working too well. Kohn doesn't address how society ought to treat its members, but his lessons and insights certainly raise some questions beyond how to get our kids ready for school on time.

After my husband I read read the book we decided to get the DVD to play for our family so they could see the parenting style we are using and WHY we have chosen it. The book is fabulous but the DVD really makes it all come together for us. Some of the points are better emphasized on the DVD and AK gets his main point across without taking too long. I would highly recommend this DVD to anyone wishing to expand their parenting knowledge.

There are lots of review about how great this is and it is a truely wonderful book & DVD! I wish there were more DVD's like this since it is hard for me to sit down & read a book and when I do have time, my spouse does not and I try to translate which just isn't the same. I highly recommend this DVD.

Every parent should hear what Alfie Kohn has to say about unconditional parenting. This is an excellent lecture to show family members and friends who have questions about why you've chosen to parent your children with compassion, patience, understanding and unconditional love. Alfie Kohn challenges the mainstream parenting advice with thoughtful insight, humour and a mass of research. If all parents unconditionally loved their children as Kohn suggests, we would soon have a new generation of confident, loving, intelligent and happy children.

After reading a numerous amount of books on education and parenting we read "Unconditional Parenting" and watched this DVD and we find them absolutely wonderful.

All we actually need to bring up healthy, happy kids is a bit of common sense and alot of respect for them and it should be easier than it really is. Alfie Kohn helps us ignore what we have around us and concentrate on what our children really need to help them grow up into kind, helpful, happy human beings.

I think this DVD should be seen by all parents/family/teachers in our society to help them have genuine, good relationships with their kids and turn parenting into something beautiful in every way.

Unfortunately thats what a lot of people think about Alfie Kohn - they are sadly mistaken. Parents REALLY want to do the right thing, but for many what they think is the best thing is counterproductive. According to some, if the kids aren't behaving right, then the parents just aren't exerting enough control.

Kohn doesn't make parents' job easier with simple techniques to control children - rather he makes the job harder by showing you what an illusion control really is.

The book is a fast read and very straighforward. However, most people reading this review probably don't get much past the Thomas the Train books before crashing from exhaustion. Pop in the DVD and sit back - you will get all the essentials. If you are an educator or other professional person interested in the literature references to back it up, then get the book or better yet "Punished by Rewards" which is quite a bit more scholarly.

In my city, we have group 'viewings' of this dvd because so many of us want to watch it. We also have discussions of it and we find it so amazingly helpful. It's just SO worth watching. Multiple times even! Gives a context to parenting philosophy and makes it so much easier to see bad parenting advice for what it is (in some magazines or books or from other people) and allows us to be confident in our decisions, especially in jumping out of the rewards/punishments paradigm! Many of us are making that change!!

As a full-time mom, I take my day-to-day work very seriously. I welcome a thoughful challenge and appreciate the insights of Alfie Kohn and other progressive parent/child advocates. Alfie Kohn's latest book "Unconditional Parenting" has helped me reevaluate my child-rearing tactics and consider a more loving, respectful, and creative way of relating to my children. I've been putting the theories to work over the last two weeks and have noticed a positive change in my household. My two year old son shines when he offers his own suggestions for how to resolve conflicts, and I find that I am more patient and loving even when things are not going as smoothly as I would like.



The DVD version of the book made sharing Alfie's insights with my husband very easy. We had an uplifting discussion afterwards and he couldn't wait to put some of the skills to use the following morning. I especially appreciated how Alfie elaborated on the Ten Principles of Unconditional Parenting. Alfie is a very engaging speaker and did a fine job including the best points from the book.

I have a 2 year old and had been watching Supernanny on TV, thinking I'd be using her tactics of timeouts and such. Then my husband and I read this book together over breakfasts on the weekends and it made so much sense to us. Wouldn't we prefer that a child choose not to hit another child because they understand it would hurt the other child, rather than that they feared punishment? Wouldn't we prefer that they earn good grades because it's fun to learn and apply ourselves than to do it because they want a cash reward?

Long-term goals are lost when we use rewards and punishment, according to this author, and I have to agree. He advises to parent from the perspective of your child, and this concept opened our eyes to a whole different kind of life with our kid. We no longer have battles and our daughter feels loved and nurtured. I wish I could make every parent read it!

Actually, all parents should read the Unconditional Parenting book, but if you (or your spouse) lack the time to do so, this is the next best thing. It will challenge the way you think about parenting your children and you will be a better parent because of it. If you are tired of sticker charts or one-size-fits-all consequences like "one minute of time out for every year of age" and want to think about how the way you are parenting today will shape both your relationship with your child and the adult your child will become, then this video is for you. This video really is just an introduction to his ideas, but it's a good one.