My husband set this up before he went to work, and I supervised throughout the day. We gave nails and a hammer to this boy and told him to nail 25 nails into this board. Just like the nails were "hurting" the wood, words hurt people. I allowed him a couple of short breaks, but this took him nearly two hours.
Then we had him take all the nails back out, one by one. This was actually much harder than putting them in, and my husband had to help him finish after he got home from work (or he would probably STILL be working on it!). We showed him the damaged wood, and told him that even when he apologizes for hurtful words, the wounds remain behind. You can never take words "back" as if they had never been spoken. They leave a mark on the hearer.
It was a pretty powerful visual. In addition to spending hours on this project, he had to do all his regular school work too. He had no play time ~ his entire day was spent nailing the wood and doing school work. Only God knows his heart, and knows if he has truly learned this lesson, but we pray he has (and I'm very grateful to Lisa Whelchel for this idea!).
Psalm 141:3 ~ Set a guard over my mouth, O Lord; keep watch over the door of my lips.
4 comments:
Wow, what a good idea. I tend to be a yeller and a spanker if the kids REALLY push my buttons. I bet he learned a lot more from this well thought out consequence.
Good job mom and dad! I have that book too - but haven't opened it in a while. Need to pull it out. My book is a signed copy that my friend took to get signed for me while I was on home IV therapy with my second princess. I was so bummed I couldn't go myself (I was a Blair fan back in the day).
I'm sorry that happened but what a great way to handle it! I bet he won't forget that experience for a long, long time, if ever. Very good and meaningful and loving visual!
Love that book! I just used it recently with on of my little ones.
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