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What is the best way to teach a child? According to BYU alumni Denise Barney, the answer is praise. In a 2017 lecture to alumni of the School of Family Life, the Family Studies graduate spoke about how to teach children through praise.

Instead of negatively addressing children’s bad behavior, she said, one should commend children on their good behavior: “As you give praise, be descriptive: ‘I really love how you took out the garbage; that shows me that you’re responsible.’ So you’re describing the behavior and then you’re adding a value to it.” Barney added that our relationships are the only things we get to keep and that praise helps foster these relationships, making home “a place where they want to be.”

Barney also addressed the importance of attention: “If we are giving attention to negative behavior, we are strengthening it. If we’re giving attention to positive behavior, [the] same thing occurs, we are strengthening that.”

In this two-minute video, she talks about how to modify a child’s behavior through proper praise and attention. The full lecture can be viewed here.

Denise is an expert in the Power of Positive Parenting, a parenting manual written by Dr. Glen Latham, having taught classes on it for 15 years. She is also the mother of six children ages 30 to 17.