Help with My Toddler's Attitude!

I have a 3 1/2 year old little boy, and what he hates more than anything is to be by himself especially when he's in trouble, is I put him in his room and shut the door. If you have to stand there for a minute or two holding the door shut do it and see if it helps. I do it when he throws himself, and after a few minutes he usally calms down. If you would like another to try my friend makes her kids put their noise against the wall for a minute. Hope something helps you.

I agree about the daycare spot check. My son is 21 months old and has been at a home daycare since he was one. He has never learned bad language there and she stops hitting behavior as soon as it starts. I know that she uses timeouts in a pack and play where they can't get out. I have had hitting issues with my son, but don't use timeout. I have shown him that hitting has consequences by taking things away. If he comes after me with his popper, I tell him "if you hit, popper goes bye bye". He proceeds to swing at me with it and I take it and put it in another room, he throws a fit. I say he can have it back if he doesn't hit, he agrees and i give it back. He doesn't do it anymore and it really didn't take that many times of doing it. If he is hitting me, I take myself away. "mommy won't play if you hit", he throws a fit, I come back as long as he doesn't hit, etc...
The daycare people can tell you if there is a "trouble child", but do the check to make sure it isn't them! Good luck, there is only so much you can do with 18 months. I went through a horrible time between 15-19 months with tantrums and hitting. Now, at 21 months, it is like he has made a big language leap. Things are much easier because we can communicate so well. Maybe a few more months is all you need!

I am sorry to here you are having such problems and I have a suggestion, do a spot check on your daycare(where you dont tell them you are coming) I know it will be hard with a full time job but you may find the reason for the attude change is how he is being spoken to in daycare, whether by an adult or perhaps an agressive child who is picking on him and he is lashing out at home. Believe me I have no problems with daycare (as I am licensed daycare myself) but I would look in that direction. good luck, A.

My son also is around that age. He didn't start being that way until daycare as well, what I do is when he starts to throw a temper tantram I ignore him. Learn to tone def out that one cry and after a while he will stop. For him throwing things I have not cured that yet. If you find any other good suggestions please let me know as well.

My son is half your sons age (9 months old) but there is an 18 month old at his daycare. The 18 month old there screams at the top of his lungs for no reason or to throw a fit, he doesn't use manners (for example he will hand the provider a cup and say "water" to get a drink) and he isn't very nice. My son has picked up some of these habits (especially the screaming part) and the first few times he did it, I ran to him to try to figure out what was wrong and then I realized it was becoming a pattern of him screaming or throwing a fit and me going to get him. I started to ignore him and he has stopped that behavior now. As far as "shut up" goes - no one in my house is allowed to say "shut up" (including me and my husband). We say "be quiet" or "hush" but NEVER "shut up". I think it is a rude statement. Anyway, it's funny because I had to get my husband to stop saying it (who is sometimes like a 2 year old LOL) and I would ignore the statement all together and continue what I was doing. If he continued to say it I would just continue talking. I don't know if that will help with your son, but it might. It may show him that he needs to find an alternative to get you (or whoever) to stop what they are doing/saying that is annoying him. I did have a friend that would allow her son to go to a different room (say the bathroom for instance) if he wanted to say something mean. He was allowed to go into the room, say what ever he wanted (as long as no one was in there) and come back out, but if he said it to someone he was put in a chair facing the wall by the front door so that he was not allowed to talk to anyone. Her son, I think, was around your son's age at the time.

My suggestion is time out. He is old enough to understand what time outs are all about. 1 minute per time out period. If he gets up before the one minute is over, place him back into time out and the minute starts over again. TIme outs are for him, not for you, to do, so donnot sit by and watch him during the time out time. go about your normal day. He may get up, but pick him up and put him back until he stays for the full time of time out. Once his minute is over, go to him, get down on his level and explain to him why you put him in timeout. Believe me if he can tell you to shut up, he can understand what you are telling him about why he was put into timeout. Tell him that if he does it again he will go to time out again. Have him hug you and/or tell you he is sorry for his behaviour. this teaches him that his actions hurt you, and teaches him empathy. Be consistant, that is the key. I would sit down and have a long talk with teh daycare director. Tell her about your child's worsening behaviour while in classe. Maybe arange fora few hours to observe your son's class, and find out why he is doing this, or who he may be picking it up from. tell them that you use time out at home, and would like the same punishment be given while in daycare.

As for tanturums, my thing is this. let them do it. put them in a safe place, where they can't hurt themselves, property or you adn let them have at it. Ignore it. tanturums are thrown to get a reaction from you, even negetive attention is still attention. Ignoring it, and going about your day will teach them that throwing a fit will not get him the desired result, and was a compelet waste of his time. He is tired, and his throat is probably sore, and all for nothing. Mommy didn't even notice i was going nuts, and why was i anyway. See what i mean. Ignore bad behaviour, but reward good. praise him for every single thing he does right. Every time he listens to you, does what you ask, or behaves, reward that behaviour with lots of postive attention and praise. ignore the rest. He will get the picture very soon.

HTH
B.

hi...
there was a lot of good advice given already... i think whatever you decide to do.. stay consistent!! if you keep your foot down and will not tolerate that behavior.. and constantly correct him on it.. then he will change.. he has no choice... at that age it may take a while for him to understand.. but keep a firm voice when you discipline him, he'll notice the difference and try not ti get frustrated and overly upset b/c then both of you will just be kinda crazy.. it can be overwhelming with 2 small children when you are trying to keep one under control and the other is so dependent still.. my kids are 19 months apart.. so i feel your pain.. it'll take a couple weeks, but he'll start to understand if you stay consistent.. and let the daycare know that if he starts that behavior, how you want them to handle it, and maybe what provokes it, whether it be another child or a certain situation..
thats a hard age.. just dedicate some time to making him change that behavior, and your life will get easier... the best thing is to let himknow its not acceptable.. dont make excuses for it though.. b/c then you'll just start slippin and letting him get away with it.. like, oh, he's so young.. it must be those other kids.. things like that.. although that may be the case, if you help him to understand thats wrong he'll start to change those ways... but i hope you get a handle on it.. good luck!! let us know how it goes!!

Have you tried ignoring this kind of activity...I have a 4 year old with learning disabilities and he was doing the same thing...I tried it all, but nothing worked. Then a family councler told me that she thought this behavior was just to get attention, and she thought that if I ignored him when he did it and didnt give him the attention he was expecting he would stop, and sure enough it worked wonders.

Wow, you are busy with two little ones! You go mommy!

I have three boys, and in my opinion, at that age, no definately does not work (as you've seen). They are starting to assert their dependence. I have a few suggestions. Talking isn't one of them unless it is short and specific, in a way he can understand. We often try to rationalize with our little ones and it is above their comprehension or we lose them if we talk too much.

I'm sure daycare is a contributing factor, but I know there isn't another option. Hopefully at daycare they have some sort of age-appropriate consequence. I like the "time-out" chair. If he is at home, redirection works well- find something to get him off the bad behavior and onto something constructive. The time out chair is well understood at that age AS LONG AS IT IS CONSISTANT. Two minutes would probably be long enough, but I kept my kids there the whole time- no excuses. It isn't a panacea, it doesn't completely fix it, but it will let them know that there are consequences for bad behavior.

And let me add as well: I totally agree that spanking does not work at any age, but especially as young as 1.5. I am glad you are searching for other options. I hope that helped. If you need any more advice, let me know. My email is ____@____.com.

L.

I wonder which daycare he attends, as we had similar issues with our son around the same age and tied it to his daycare. In order to correct the problems, we actually starting working to teach him sign language. His communication skills had not yet caught up with the stuff in his head that he wanted to express. He was frustrated and angry all the time, but once he had a way to express himself, the anger diminished.