Toddlers (0-4)

Time-out for youngsters tip

One more tip for making time-out effective.

If your son doesn’t say OK to anything, take him to time-out.  If you say NO, and he whines, he goes to time-out.  If you tell him to do something, and he doesn’t say, OK, he goes to time-out.  If he hurts another person, he goes to time-out.  He needs to get really used to going to time-out.  The more he goes, the more he will recognize that time-out is the place to calm down and then talk, and that the sooner he does that the sooner life is good again. 

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Out of Control on Time-out

“My almost 3 yo fights and kicks and cries when I take him to time-out (I have to carry him there), and then cries very loudly and even will scream at me when I’m telling him that he needs to stay there until he can become happy.  My husband thinks all of this is very disrespectful and feels that we need to spank him or do something different so that my son doesn’t do this.  He thinks I am teaching my son that it’s okay to fight me and scream at me.  What do you think?”

I understand your husband’s frustration, and yours.  Your child is definitely “out of instruction

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Pre-teaching small children how to go to bed when asked

“I met you at your recent Stansbury Seminar.  It was so great!  I could have listened for days.  I can’t get my daughter to stop sleeping in my bed.  She is three years old, and I don’t think she should still be sleeping in my bed.  No matter what I do, she has a fit if I try to enforce her sleeping in her own bed. “

Children wanting to share their parent’s bed is a very normal childhood desire.  When I was young, I remember thinking that my parent’s bed was softer, warmer, and just more cozy than my bed was. It is good that our children want to be close to us, but

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Changing generations

The Universe is governed by laws. One of those laws is that an older, wiser species comes before the new, innocent young of the same species to guide the younger toward right choices and acceptable behaviors. I have heard parents say before that their children didn’t come with instruction manuals. This is true, and each child is uniquely different, but I have wondered if parents make statements like these to make themselves feel better

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What consequences do small children earn?

 “In your house, what are the privileges that are taken away when they lose ‘everything’ for 24 hours?   At what age can they understand that?   Or, what do you do with very little ones who are testing boundaries (and throwing fits) but can’t really do chores or understand losing things?  I don’t know if my 29 month old could put the two together, behavior wise.   I can’t really make him do chores or lose privileges as a teaching tool for him, but I do see him disobeying on purpose to test me.   My almost-4 year old could understand losing privileges as a consequence, but I don’t

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Time for Mom & Toddlers who won’t rest

There are some great questions in some of the recent comments. 

“…Most women I know are neglecting taking care of themselves on some level (physical or spiritual) to take care of their families or other obligations. Personally, I have been struggling lately to try to find some time for myself on a daily basis for things like scripture-reading, exercise, personal study time, and maybe a nap (I’m pregnant and tired!).

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For Crying out Loud ~Screaming

“I have listened to the cd’s from your mini-seminar at our LDSEHE conference. I am so amazed at your system! I can see how it would work wonderfully in my home – especially with my 3 older children. My fourth child is turning 2 Saturday. I love her! She is so cute and so smart and very spirited. She is my first screamer squealer and it is driving me bananas! Especially in the car. I don’t feel she can be reasoned with but she does understand some of what I say. How would you recommend teaching her that screaming and squealing is not part of our vision!

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Should 3 year old lose privileges for 24 hours too?

“How do you take away all privileges from younger kids? My 3.5 year old is really pushing… This post was the first time I really understood the “lose all privileges for 24 hours” thing. I can figure out how to do that with my 6 and 8 year olds, but the younger ones, I just can’t see it. Can you give me a visual please?

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Too many reminders?

“With young children like my 3 yr old, I am very tempted to give at least one reminder, another chance, before they get a consequence.  So if he starts to whine and say no to an instruction, I remind him of each of the steps and encourage him to do them.  Is this teaching him that it is ok to whine first and not to start out with the appropriate response?  Or is it just pre-teaching?  Is there a limit to how many times pre-teaching should happen?  How can I tell if I am trying to govern him or just pre-teaching and giving him a chance to understand what choice he is making?”

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AngryBoy

Strong Willed 3 Year Old

“I’m trying to figure out how to make this work for my 3 year old. He is very high spirited, very defiant and REALLY can’t take no for an answer. I struggle minute to minute with obedience and with whining and I worry that if I did things the same way I do them with my older children, only using time-outs, he would be in time-out constantly. Actually I don’t know if he would ever make it into time out if I waited for him to be calm first.

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little boy crying

4 Year-Old Stress

We got home late. My four year old fell asleep on the way home. After waking up, he came in to go potty, get dressed and go to bed. From the bathroom I heard crying. He was in there for a long time. He was in the bathroom trying to clean up a mess that he had made in his pants.It was very stressful and disturbing to him to find a dirty pants problem. This stress along with his extreme tiredness made him very sad and he just couldn’t help crying.

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boy waiting

He Won’t Clean His Room?

I’m having trouble figuring out a good consequence beyond time out for my 3 yr old. He and his brother who just turned 6 share a room. I gave them an instruction to clean their room this morning, and he left the room to play with toys before it was done.He went into time out nicely, and loved being praised for being good in time out after his 3 minutes were up. He promised to finished cleaning. But then he did it again. We repeated the process and he had a second time out, but he left time out before the time was up. Is it bad to use the same consquence twice in a row? Do consequences always need to get bigger?

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FatherAndSonLookingUpIntoCamera

Perspective And Self-Preservation

Dear Parents,

    My son happened to lose his hat in the Air and Space Museum in DC.  We didn’t find out that he had lost the NEW hat until we had been kicked out of the museum at closing time.  It took me 30 minutes to find a guard that would break the rules and let me in to retrieve the hat.  Luckily my daughter said that she knew exactly where he put it.  After successfully tracking down the hat, at dinner time, in flaming heat.  My husband seemed a little upset about the matter.  He looked put out. 

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Child pouting

Helping Young Children Accept “No” Answers

“Nicholeen, I was wondering how you teach these principles to the younger children. My children are (almost) 8, (almost) 6, 3.5, 20 months, and a 2 week old. (not that I expect to be doing this with the newborn right away. *grin* ) I can usually expect my older two to follow instructions, but the 3 year old and 20 month olds do not. I realize that the 20 month old is still learning, and “no” is her favorite word.

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