S.I.
Hi K.,
Im sorry if this gets long winded. :)
My kids are about the same age difference as yours are and I started going through this same thing. I developed a system that is still working for us today (5 years later) that I think you can adapt to your family. I first wrote down what I thought were my core rules for what I thought was acceptable behavior for my daughters age group at the time. Things like no hitting, no spitting, no biting, no climbing on the counters, chores get them done, stuff like that. I also asked her for her input on rules she thought should go on the posterboard, this helped to include her in her own responsibilities. I wrote all of these in big letters on a big piece of posterboard and hung it up at her level. I then came up with a punishment list that I was comfortable with, things like 2 mins on the naughty mat (age appropriate, 1 min. per year), calm down time in their beds 10 mins. almost like a minnie nap, taking a toy or privelage away for 24 hours. In order for my daughter to understand that her actions made consequences happen, I color coated the punishment list. Yellow was for a verbal warning, orange was for taking toy/privalege away, red naughty mat with timer, etc. Next to each of the rules there is a colored line, there are three next to each rule. The first one is normally the verbal warning. The second is normally taking something away. The third is the last resort minnie nap.
When it was time to start this system I hung up the rules in a prominant place in our livingroom (at her level), for the first month we read through the rules once a day, then she could choose one rule from the list and we would go over the colors and what they meant on the punishment list (which I hung up on my refrigerator). Next to the punishment list is a small dry erase board. This is what we use to keep track of what rules have been broken that day and how many times it has been broken. At the end of the day they get a clean slate.
This system has taken the stress out of teaching my kids the rules for both them and me. When something happens, say big brother has hit little sister and your are naturally angry and stressed by this. Instead of searching for something to do as a punishment right off the top of your head.... you simply tell your child to show you the rule that was just broken and ask them what is the first color on that rule for the punishment. Then you have them come to the fridge with you and ask what punishment is that color for? When they tell you, you write it down on the dry erase board with the date, childs name, and transgression, also the time if they have something taken away. I then make sure to go over with them why this is not ok behavior (if they are going into time out this helps them to know what to think about in time out), when the timer goes off and their time is up I talk to them again about why and try to make sure they understand, I ask them if they need a hug and then I drop the subject completely, I dont bring it up again. Punishment has been served no need to re-hash, who wants things thrown back into their face right?
This has helped my and my fiance with our blended family sooooo much. It helps us to keep things fair even when it isnt our own child. Instead of you needing a calm down time afterward you just look at a list and you are done. We are all busy people and we can all forget things, so writing down what has been done already keeps me from having to remember one more thing on top of the many I already have that day! We didnt even realise how much stress there was from this until we started doing this. I did a lot of research on the internet about this, about 70% of the fights we would have were about the kids. I took all the info I got from the sites and just thought about it and came up with this. I hope this will help you as much as it has helped us. :)
Stef
