The Good Behaviour Book: How to have a better-behaved child from birth to age ten

A child’s behavioural development is like a lift through a department store. The doors open and two children get off to find what they need on each floor. One child gets no sales help. He explores freely, puts on a bunch of new clothes, and gets back into the lift to go to the next floor. When he gets there he realizes that he still has the old clothes on underneath, and his new ones don’t fit that well. But he keeps going up on his own, putting new clothes over the old ones, carrying more and more excess baggage to each new floor. Soon he is weighed down with layers of clothing that he should have discarded earlier. Eventually, there is less and less room for new stuff.

The other little shopper gets the help of a wise and experienced disciplinarian. She has seen many children get out of that lift and knows just what he needs. “Let me help you try on some new clothes”, she offers, adding, “but we’ll have to figure out what to do with your old clothes. Some seem to fit you just fine, so we’ll keep them. They’ll be useful to you later. Let’s get rid of the ones that aren’t nice to make room for the ones that fit you better.” The disciplined child goes to each new floor not only with better clothes that fit but without excess baggage slowing his progress.

Which behaviours will children outgrow on their own and which need your attention? Behaviour that is linked to specific needs, tasks, or limitations of a certain developmental stage are probably best left alone; for example, thumb-sucking in a toddler, negativism in a two-year-old, shyness with strangers in a four- or five-year-old. Behaviour that may be understandable at a certain age but is nevertheless obnoxious should be worked on; for example, throwing food from the high chair, teasing the family dog, aggression toward parents. Children need limits that help them grow up to be polite, thoughtful, and caring. Your job as parents is to arm your children with the self-control tools that will help them make the transition from one developmental stage to the next.

Hands as tools. Along with learning how to get things, the year-old baby develops hand skills to manipulate what he gets. Doors are to be opened, taps turned, drawers pulled, dangling cords yanked, and waste cans emptied. Everything within walking and grabbing distance is fair game, or so he figures. To the inquisitive adventurer, the whole house is an unexplored continent, and he intends to leave no stone unturned.

Out of the mouths of babes. The development of language – verbal and body – makes parenting a bit easier. Baby can now begin to tell you what she needs with words. This new skill is a mixed blessing. While baby words are entertaining, they can also be frustrating as the parents struggle to understand just what “da-boo” means. Toddlers like to try on different noises to hear how they sound and how they affect their audience. They screech and squeal, yell and jabber. Sometimes their little baby words are pleasing to your ears, at other times they are nerve–wracking. Language also gives expression to feelings; a feisty “No” from your formerly agreeable child can raise your eyebrows.

guiding little hands

Exploring hands are always looking for things to handle, so give the young explorer word associations to help him sort out what he may touch. Try “yes touch” for safe things, “no touch” for objects off-limits, and “soft touch” for faces and animals. To tame the impulsive grabber, try encouraging “one finger touch”. Other words (“hot touch”, “owie touch”) will come to mind as you discover the world of touch together.

respecting little grabbers

Your toddler has a jar of olives, and you have visions that there will soon be a mess to clean up. You hastily snatch the jar from her clutches. And within a millisecond you have set off a protest tantrum. You’ve saved yourself a mess to clean up on the floor, but now you have an emotional mess to care for.

Grabbing a prized object from a child for whatever reason is not socially appropriate: it violates the personhood of the child. And it’s not good discipline – you’re teaching your child the very thing you tell her not to do. “Don’t grab”, you say, as you grab back what was grabbed. Snatching the jar away from her is bound to anger her, as well as reinforce the grabbing mentality.

There is a better way. For a young toddler, make eye contact and divert her attention to something else she’d like. For an older toddler, tell her you’ll help her open the jar so she can have an olive, and point to where you want her to put it. This is simply an exercise in politeness and respect, and “adult-in-charge” approach. Children need adults to communicate and model the behaviour adults expect.

nerve-wracking. Language also gives expression to feelings; a feisty “No” from your formerly agreeable child can raise your eyebrows.

A mind of their own. Toddlers think, but not logically. Just as motor skills take off during the first half of the second year, toward the last half mental skills blossom. The one-year-old plunges impulsively into activities without much thinking. The two-year-old studies her environment, figuring out a course of action in her head before venturing forth with her body. But a baby’s desire to do something often precedes the ability to do it successfully. This developmental quirk drives toddlers into trouble and caregivers to the brink. Even though you know that baby hasn’t mastered a skill yet, your explanation won’t stop him from trying. For example, one morning our son Stephen insisted on pouring his own juice. He had the ability to manoeuvre the cup and jug but lacked the wisdom to know when the cup was full. He did not want us to pour it for him. So we let him stand at the sink and pour water into cups while we poured the juice at the table. After a pouring party at the sink he accepted my hand on his hand and followed my nudge about when to stop pouring.

thinking “kid first”

Kids do annoying things – not maliciously, but because they don’t think like adults. You are likely to have a miserable day if you let every kid-created mess bother you. As you enter the kitchen, you see your two-year-old at the sink splashing water all over the floor. You could sink into a “poor me” mind-set: “Oh, no! Now I have to clean up the mess. Why does she do this to me?” Here’s a healthier choice. Instead of first considering your own inconvenience, immediately click into your child’s viewpoint: “This is fun. Look at all the different things you can do with dishes and water.” You’ll remember that what she is doing is developmentally appropriate. She’s exploring and learning. You’ll also realize that because two-year-olds get so engrossed in their activity, she is likely to throw a tantrum if you try to remove her. If you wait a few minutes, she’ll go on to something else; and, besides, water cleans up easily anyway; no big deal. She won’t do this anymore when she’s six. You’ll find yourself smiling. Getting out of yourself and into your child saves mental strain. You don’t have to clean up the mess in your mind along with the water on the floor.

During the second year your baby’s temperament will become more apparent. “Bubbly”, “daredevil”, “determined”, “cautious”, and “adventurous” are labels toddlers acquire. Children come wired differently, and different kinds of children need different kinds of discipline. Matthew, a relatively cautious toddler, seemed to think out a task carefully before attempting it. And if he got himself in too deep he would not protest being rescued. Our two-year-old Lauren came wired with a different programme. She sees an enticing gadget on top of the kitchen counter and she is willing to risk life and limb to get it. Because of her personality, we don’t often let her out of our sight. Her drive helps her keep going, to get up after falling, to persist after being told “no”, to struggle with words to make her needs known. It also inspires her to climb higher if the biscuit tin has been moved to the top shelf. The parents’ task, in the words of one frazzled toddler manager, is to “keep my child from breaking his neck, and yet encourage him to learn.”

talking with toddlers: what they can understand, what they can’t (#ulink_1199b052-5a6d-505a-b5a8-bf823561586b)

Even though toddlers don’t say much, that doesn’t mean that they don’t comprehend what you are asking. As a general guide, take what you imagine your toddler understands and double it. She is probably picking up at least that much.

Follows directions. Around age fifteen months toddlers can begin to follow one-step directions: “Get the ball.” By two years they can follow two-step directions: “Please find your shoes and bring them to me.” Prior to eighteen months toddlers seldom follow verbal warnings unless accompanied by action. Shouting “Don’t pull the cat’s tail” is meaningless unless you get up, cross the room, pry his fingers loose from the cat’s fur, and show the child as you tell him: “Pet the cat. Be gentle to the cat. Don’t pull the cat’s tail.” By two, children can follow most verbal commands without physical help.

A one-year-old baby can understand that “no” or “stop” means that she should stop what she is doing, and that is about the limit of her understanding. But that doesn’t mean that you don’t offer an explanation: “Stop. Don’t touch”, you say as you pull her hands away. “Hurt baby.” As time goes by, make your explanation more complex: “Stop. Don’t touch. Hurt baby. Cooker hot!” Parents can usually tell how much of their explanation sinks in by their child’s reaction. For the toddler, keep explanations simple and brief. Better to spend your creative energy devising alternatives to misbehaviour than defining terms.

A useful developmental fact that parents need to remember is that toddlers think concretely. They cannot generalize concepts. An eighteen-month-old can learn that your cooker is hot (usually by experiencing it solo – the hard way – or by some supervised exploration), but when he goes to Grandmother’s house, don’t rely on his knowing that all cookers are hot. This ability to generalize develops around age four.

Discipline through talking. A toddler’s growing receptive language skills (what she understands) make discipline easier. Between eighteen months and two years, children may say little, but they understand all. (All brief, simple sentences, that is.) Capitalize on this developmental achievement by announcing what you’re going to do before you do it: “Daddy’s going to change your nappy.” Rather than catching your toddler by surprise, a prior announcement at least gives daddy a fair chance of getting the child’s cooperation. (See related feature, “Discipline Talk” (#litres_trial_promo).)

Baby’s expressive language skills (what she says) also make discipline easier. Not only can she now understand what you want her to do, she can tell you what she wants: “Off” means she wants her nappy off. Here’s when your wise investment in responding to your baby’s cues begins to pay off. A baby who trusts that her signals will be responded to learns to give more readable signals.

Between eighteen and twenty-four months of age another developmental perk makes discipline easier, the ability to think before acting. How consistently a toddler does this depends more on temperament than intelligence. Impulsive children often rush into a feat instead of first figuring out the consequences and plotting an alternative course. Just watching your child play will teach you where he is in his developmental thought processes. At fifteen months Lauren used to drive us bananas by trying to go up a flight of steps carrying a bowl of cereal. To prevent the inevitable spills, we didn’t allow this activity. At nineteen months Lauren grabbed a bowl of cereal and started for the steps. She stood at the bottom, looked up turned around, and handed the bowl of cereal to Martha before taking off up the steps. Reaching the top, she turned around and reached out for Martha to bring the bowl of cereal up to her. She now had matured enough to figure out the consequences of her action and develop creative alternatives using her adult resources for help. These improvements in language and cognitive skills also decrease the likelihood of tantrums, since the child is less frustrated and better able to figure out alternative ways to get what she wants.

developmental discipline

Think “age-appropriate behaviour” and you’ll be able to give age-appropriate direction. Here are some helpful reminders that will help your discipline be developmentally correct.

Some challenging behaviours are developmentally correct

In the normal course of development those same behaviours the child needs to exercise in order to move on are the very ones that can get him into trouble. As a child goes from dependence to independence, he will often merit labels like “defiant”, “won’t mind”, “bossy”, “sassy”, and “impulsive”. Some of these behaviours are simply a by-product of the child’s need to become an independent individual. And the “stubbornness” that keeps your child from obeying is the same spunk that helps him get up after a fall and try again.

Get in “phase” with your child

Developing children take two steps forward and one step backward. In each stage of development, they bounce back and forth from equilibrium to disequilibrium. While they’re stepping forward into uncharted territory, finding new friends, trying new things, expect discipline problems due to the anxiety that tags along with experimenting. In each stage, expect the calm to come after the storm. The same child who spent two months in a sulk may act like an angel for the next three. This developmental quirk can work to the child’s advantage and yours. Spot which phase your child is in. If he’s trying to move away and grow up a bit, let out the line. During this phase, your child may seem distant from you; she may even answer back and defy you. Don’t take this personally. This phase will soon pass. The child is just in the “do it myself” phase and needs some space and coaching (including correcting) from the sidelines. One day soon, as sure as sunrise follows nightfall, you’ll find your child snuggling next to you on the couch asking for help with tasks, suggesting activities you can do together. You may even wake up one morning and discover your six-year-old nestled next to you in bed. This child is now in a reconnecting phase, a pit stop in the developmental journey when your child needs emotional refuelling. Take advantage of this intermission. It’s time to patch up breaks in communication, cement your relationship, and recharge your child and yourself for the next unsettled phase.

When parents and child are out of harmony, discipline problems multiply. If your child is trying to break away when you are trying to bond, you are likely to overreact to what may be normal behaviours of independence. If you are too busy while your child is in the reconnecting phase, you miss a window of opportunity to strengthen your positions as comforter, adviser, authority figure, and disciplinarian.

Respect negative phases

When your child is developmentally negative don’t take it personally. This is hard sometimes because life does have to go on. This is why a project such as toilet training should not be undertaken during a negative phase. To do so would just frustrate you and give your child more to say no about. Another way to respect negativity is not to punish behaviour that a child is developmentally incapable of (such as saying “yes” during a negative phase). Use non-punitive methods of directing developmental negativity. Above all, do not punish for any aspects of toilet learning. As with food discipline, it’s your child’s body. Trust him to learn its natural functions.

Plan ahead

Discipline problems are likely to occur when a child is making the transition from one developmental stage to another, or during major family changes: a move, a new sibling, family illness, or so on. I recently counselled a family whose previously sweet child had turned sour. The mother had started a new job, and at the same time the child started a new school. If possible, time major changes in your life for when a child is not going through major changes herself.

What is “normal” may not be acceptable

“I don’t care what the book says, Bobby and Jimmy, fighting is not going to be normal in our home”, said a mother who knew her tolerance. Part of discipline is learning how to live with a child through different developmental stages, and the child’s learning how to live with you. A child’s early family experience is like boot camp in preparing for life. A child must learn how to get along with family members in preparation for future social relationships. He needs to be adaptable, to learn to adjust his behaviours to a particular family need. Billy is boisterous by temperament. Yet Billy is expected to play quietly for a few days because mummy is recovering from an illness and has a headache. It is healthy for the child to learn that the sun rises and sets on other people beside himself. Children must learn to adapt to house rules to prepare them to adjust to society’s rules.

Disciplining in a developmentally correct way does not mean becoming lax. While it is necessary to tailor your discipline to the temperament and stage of your child, widen your acceptance when the going gets tough, there is no excuse for not expecting and helping your child to obey. It is easy to pass off behaviour by saying “He’s just going through a stage” or “That’s just part of his temperament”, yet it’s important to keep a balance between the child’s need to develop and the family’s need for well-being.

channelling toddler behaviours (#ulink_ca48b999-d9e6-5aa1-a935-e8ad8c1b0049)

Paying attention to your toddler’s emotional needs and understanding his developmental level are the first steps in disciplining a toddler. Once you realize how and why toddlers act the way they do, it will be easier for you to tolerate behaviour you shouldn’t change and change the behaviour you shouldn’t tolerate.

When your baby learns to walk he officially becomes a toddler. This and other developmental milestones, mental and motor, bring a new set of challenges. Your role as disciplinarian expands from simple nurturing to providing a safe environment in which your toddler can explore and learn. Have realistic expectations for normal toddler behaviour: toddlers are curious, driven, strong-minded. They need these qualities to learn, to persist, to bounce back in spite of life’s little setbacks, to get up and try again. Toddlers also begin to think of themselves as individuals separate from Mummy. This is both exciting and frightening: The toddler is ready to shed the restrictions of being a baby but not ready to leave behind the security.

The lessons an attachment-parented baby learns during his first year help him cope with the ambivalence of toddlerhood. Because he is used to feeling right he is less likely to get himself into situations that make him feel wrong. Because he enters toddlerhood trusting in himself and in his caregivers, there is a balance in what he does and how he acts. There is a purpose to his actions that make him fascinating to watch. The attachment mother reads her child like a book and anticipates what will happen on the next page. She will learn specific ways to channel her toddler’s behaviour.

Offer redirectors. A baby’s mind is filled with hundreds of word associations. One pattern of association we noted in Matthew’s developmental diary was that when I would say, ÉC;Go&#x201D to sixteen–month–old Matthew he would get the baby sling and run to the door.

distract and divert

Your one-year-old is toddling toward the lamp cord. Instead of scooping him up and risking a protest tantrum, first get his attention by calling his name or some other cue word that you have learned will stop him in his tracks long enough to distract him pleasantly. Then, quickly divert him toward a safer alternative. For example, when Lauren was younger (and it still works now sometimes), as soon as she would head for mischief we’d call out “Lauren!” Hearing her name took her by surprise and caused her to momentarily forget her objective. She’d respond “Yeah?” Once we had her attention, we’d quickly redirect her interests before she’d invested a lot of emotional energy into her original plan.

“Go” to sixteen-month-old Matthew he would get the baby sling and run to the door. We used this ability to associate for distraction discipline: When we saw Matthew headed for major mischief we’d say, “Go.” This cue was enough to motivate his mind and body to change direction. We filed away a list of cue words to use as “redirectors” (“ball”, “cat”, “go”, and so on). Of course, you must carry through and go for a walk or play ball or find the cat; otherwise your child will come to distrust you and you will lose a useful discipline tool. Toddlers from fourteen to eighteen months need lots of energetic catering to. Past eighteen months you can start saying things like “Not now. Maybe later.” (See other discussions of redirectors (#ulink_0962d77d-6d52-541c-a317-5b03f88c4f33) and here.)

Our strong-willed Lauren, at seventeen months of age, was stubbornly bent on going into the next room and finding her mother, who was trying to write. As I put out my arm to stop her she angrily pushed it away and began to throw a tantrum. I conveyed to her that she must stay with me, but I decided to make a game of it. Instead of physically restraining her, I let her play with my arm while using it to keep her from getting by. This turned into a “Give Me Five” game; and then, as she used her hand to push my arm away, I would take her hand and show her how to stroke my whiskers and she would laugh about it. Soon Lauren forgot her strong desire to go into the other room, deciding it was fun to stay and play with daddy. It took time and extra effort to distract Lauren, but it saved a lot of wear and tear on both of us. Instead of getting into an unpleasant father-daughter power struggle, I was able actually to improve our relationship. The stronger the will of the child, the more creatively a parent has to work at steering the child into good behaviour.

Distract and substitute.

Set limits. Much of your discipline depends upon your ability to set limits. Humans need limits, and the younger the human the more defined should be the limits. Boundaries provide security for the child whose adventurous spirit leads him to explore but whose inexperience may lead him astray. Consider the classic experiment: After a school playground fence was removed, the children, who previously roamed free all over the playground, huddled toward the centre of the grounds, reluctant to explore the formerly fenced-in corners. Limits do not really restrict a child but rather protect the curious explorer and his environment, freeing him up to function better within those confines. For example, your toddler doesn’t want to hold your hand as you cross a street or parking lot together. You firmly set a limit: street or car park crossing is only done while holding hands. There is no option. We worked hard to achieve the right balance between freedom and constraints for our toddlers. It was not easy. We wanted them to learn about their environment and about themselves, but not at the expense of harming themselves or others. They liked having rules and knowing how to apply them. When a rule needed applying they would often recite the rule to us just to hear it and see if it still applied.

Limit setting teaches a valuable lesson for life: The world is full of “yeses” and “nos”. You decide what behaviour you cannot allow and stick to that limit. This will be different for every family and every stage of development. Setting limits introduces a new level of frustration, which every child must experience at home before he is hit with it in the world outside the door. You decide you don’t want your toddler to throw rubbish around, so you keep the lid on or the door closed. You keep the door to the utility room closed because you don’t want the shelves mindlessly emptied. You make him stop pulling the dog’s fur and teach him to pat nicely. Scissors and sharp knives are off-limits. You learn to keep them out of reach, and you firmly “distract and substitute” when the inevitable happens. Setting limits helps the whole family. The toddler needs to learn how to share the house with the whole family, and parents need to be realistic about their tolerances. As one mother put it, “I know my child’s limits – and mine.”