Sarah Ockwell-Smith, author of How to Be a Calm Parent and The Gentle Discipline Book, has championed “Gentle Discipline” in a Metro article discussing the recent ban on smacking children in Wales.

In the article, which you can read in full here, Sarah explains that “gentle discipline is treating your children in the way you would have liked to have been treated by your own parents as a child”.

Sarah goes on to discuss how setting clear and consistent boundaries, and being calm and respectful, are the best ways of tackling bad behaviour, rather than generating fear: “You cannot make a child respect you if they are scared of you.”

How to Be a Calm Parent, Sarah’s brand new indispensable guide to more peaceful and enjoyable parenting, is out now. Grab your copy here or, better, via your local bookshop or Bookshop.org.

You can follow Sarah on Twitter @TheBabyExpert.