I thought I had posted steps for how to handle reinforcing your requests to your child, but just checked the archives and realized that I’ve written it on parenting boards and in private emails but not here! So I will give an example of my general approach here. (For the person to whom I promised to post about transitioning to a crib: I wrote the post yesterday and my system froze so it was lost – I will rewrite it and post it in the next couple of days. Please forgive the delay.)

I’ve already said how important it is to be clear about what you want your child to do. This means that you need to be crystal clear in your own mind about what you want – don’t skip this! Once you’ve decided what kind of behavior is acceptable and not acceptable in your home, and your child crosses you, what do you do?

Let’s take the example of a child hitting a sibling, since it’s so common and makes parents furious! Usually what happens? You don’t do anything until after the child has hit his sibling. Instead of waiting for your child to hit the sibling, and then responding to the incident, you want to preempt the behavior from the beginning. That means you are going to stop him before he hits his baby brother.

How can you stop him? Make sure he stays in your presence – and I don’t mean only the same room. Glue him to your side if necessary. When you wash dishes or cook, have him busy in the kitchen with you. When he is playing with his cars on the floor, you are sitting close by on the couch. You want to catch him as he is about to do the behavior you have forbidden, and the only way to intercept him is to be there.

The idea is not only to physically prevent him from hurting his brother all the time, but to help him learn that you won’t tolerate it and change how he thinks about his actions. In the first case, it will only work when you are there to stop him, and your eventual goal is to help him develop an internal awareness of what is acceptable behavior, not just the short term goal of stopping the hurting. You are waiting for him to reach his hand out to hurt the baby, and when you see him start to stretch his hand out, you will swiftly catch him hand and strongly tell him, “No hurting!” No yelling will be necessary, and you will be feeling calm because you know you are taking steps to address the situation proactively instead of just reacting to what is already done.

You will need to do this regularly and consistently so that your child gets the clear message that he’s not going to get away with this. His behavior should improve quickly. Remember, though, that you don’t want to be the punitive parent, always looking for your child to do something wrong. What are you going to be doing with your child so close by, for all of that time when he isn’t about to misbehave? You are going to be actively building the relationship. Play, talk, read – this builds the bonds of love between you both, and gives you a solid platform to discipline from. This is really, really important – don’t skip building the relationship and make your child feel you are like a policeman, watching him every second for any tiny misdeed. That would be a total misunderstanding of what I’m suggesting.

I know that most moms will say that it’s too hard for them to keep their child close by for so long. Here’s something to think about: would you rather spend your time working on prevention or putting out fires? I’m a believer in prevention being worth more than the cure. Wouldn’t you rather not get sick in the first place than need to have any kind of treatment for it, even if the treatment is relatively pleasant?

By taking this kind of action, you are eliminating the need for extensive discipline further down the road. Whatever action you want to correct, you are basically going to swiftly and firmly let him know isn’t going to go over with you. I don’t want to share too many specifics because I know people get hung up on the exact how (I’m often asked what exact consequence to give), and it’s the process that I want you to understand. (Some general suggestions of things we have done: remove him from the area, take away what he is using wrongly, have him sit/stand for a certain period of time, have him practice the kind of behavior you want to see for several times.) Once you understand the approach, you can tailor the exact response to your personality.

Avivah