Last week I went along to a parenting night organised by my mother's group. One of the girls had heard a child behavioural expert, Janet Cater, speak at her daughter's daycare and contacted her about meeting with us one evening as a group to answer all our most pressing questions. Being that we all have terrible two year olds, there were many questions indeed.
Funnily enough, she started the night off by joking that although she is an expert, she doesn't have any great advice for two year olds, who are apparently in a league of their own - "Get back to me when they're three," I believe her advice was, which was excellent considering they're all just turning two. What a year we're in for!
As I've said before, I've been dealing with challenging behaviours for MANY MONTHS so I'm hoping by 2.5 we'll have outgrown the terrible two phase. This is unrealistic but it gets me by. Whatever works, right?
Despite the fact that Janet has no advice for parents of two year olds she did have lots of practical advice for dealing with very specific behaviours such as hitting (hooray!), tantrums, jealousy of younger siblings and so forth. She also gave some interesting insights into the way toddlers' brains work and why they're sometimes impossible to reach.
Since meeting Janet, I've been a very PC parent! There have been no "NO"'s, no finger pointing, and certainly no use of the dreaded "N" word (naughty, that is). This has lasted three days and while it is wearing thin, it actually has been effective. Here are the three major strategies I've been using:
1) Talking LOTS about gentle touches
"Oh look how gently Mummy is touching baby dolly. Can you show me how to gently touch baby dolly?" etc. See what I mean, totally PC! H is very motherly and LOVES stroking her assortment of dolls and stuffed animals, so this part is easy.
The more challenging part is when we leave the house. I have to address her before we leave and ask her to please remember her gentle touches. Then when we're out, if she hits or pushes, I need to address the VICTIM and ask if s/he's okay, then explain that H is still learning about gentle play and she forgot her gentle touches. THEN I need to address H and remind her to remember gentle touches, or we'll take a break. PHEW! It's more laborious than just saying no but I can definitely see it being effective in the long run. Parents of hitters, give it a go!
2) Talking lots about sharing
Janet said that the majority of children hit because they simply don't understand sharing, and if this is coupled with a dominant personality (um, yep!) it can be more of a significant "problem". H doesn't have any siblings yet so she really has no idea about sharing. Honestly, we have barely ANY behaviour problems at home and I think this is down to the fact that H has reign of the house. She actually has a great attention span and is very independent, so can play alone happily for upwards of 45 minutes - as long as no one gets in her way! Then it's on.
So, I've realised that I need to play more with her at home and really focus this time on sharing. Janet suggested setting up activities that are targeted at taking turns, such as games of knocking things down or building things together. I've really focused on talking about "turns" over the last few days so hopefully this will pay off.
3) Singing about everything
Lots of the Mums present last week are having issues when it comes to feeding, dressing or getting in the bath. You know, just that every day necessary kind of stuff that turns in World War III. Personally, as soon as I say "Let's get dressed" H runs screaming to her room and sits in a borderline fetal position in the corner (another great strategy for dealing with this has been laying clothes out the night before and getting her dressed the second she wakes up - still half asleep).
Janet's suggestion was to use a song to kind of distract the toddlers from the fact they don't want to be doing whatever it is they don't want to be doing. I used to do this a lot but I've found the more stressed I get the more all my strategies fly out the window and I turn into a crazed monster, so it was good to be reminded. Since then I've been making up excellent songs such as "When you put your leggings on you look so very nice/ Put your top on too and then we'll go and eat some rice" - it actually does work.
I did learn some other useful tips, such as always waiting 15 seconds after an instruction to give them time to process and not even bothering to talk to your child in the middle of a tantrum, as they actually can't function rationally at that point (body contact and a calm attitude is best, naturally). I purchased Janet's book, Why Won't My Child Listen?, because let's face it I read everything and I'm into that kind of thing, but I don't know how necessary it would be to those who aren't obsessive infoholics like myself. Most of her advice was VERY practical and no nonsense, which is in my opinion the best type of advice but not necessarily something you need to pay for.
For me, it was a great reminder to be patient and not always resort to the negative, so it was worth every penny.
Z x
No comments:
Post a Comment