The best attitude for the parents will be to practically...

The best attitude for the parents will be to practically stop the child from doing such a thing if it happens in their presence. If the child tries to snatch something from another child, they should softly intervene. And despite all this, if the child takes the thing from the other child, the parents should restore it to the real owner as soon as they can. The things that they don’t want the child to handle, they should take care to keep them out of his reach.

When the children reach a certain level of intelligence, they will start understanding about ownership of things. Now they will not try to grab others things. However, some children do continue the habit of stealing even after attaining the idea about ownership of things. In such a situation the parents should not remain silent spectators. They should not be complacent now, thinking that the child will automatically give up the habit.

He might turn into a thief, or at least a kleptomaniac, who picks up things of others just for the heck of it, not knowing what he is doing. It is not right to ignore even if the child steals something belonging to his own parents Some parents are so protective of their children that if someone reports that the child has stolen their things, they start wrongly defending their child. and blaming the other person of false accusation.

Such ignorant parents, with their negative attitude, unknowingly encourage the child to blatantly continue his stealing activity. The child will learn to steal and deny having done it. Therefore the parents should not be unconcerned when they face such a situation. They should make efforts to stop the child from stealing and lying about it. There will be the risk of the bad habit taking root in his nature and making reform very difficult.

‘Ali has said: “Giving up habits is very difficult."[^1] At the first instance the parents should try to remove the causes of the child wanting to steal. If the child needs pencil, paper or eraser; the parents should fulfill this need. If they neglect this need of the child, it is likely that he will pick the things from his class-mates. He may even take money from the father’s pocket to buy the things.

If the child wants a ball to play and the parents refuse to buy one for him, he might forcibly take the ball of a friend forcibly. Or even he might steal a ball from the neighborhood grocer. The parents must take care to fulfill the child’s needs to the extent possible.