Handling misbehaviour

My 2 yo DCB aka: "the handful" is having a rough day but I am wondering if I am handling him appropriately in general. I have seen improvements but I don't know if something may work better?

Example:
Today
He put a handful of wood chips on his friend's head, they didn't like this. I said his friend doesn't like this, can he apologize to his friend? Instead he grabs a handful of wood chips and throws it at me. Instant timeout in the stroller as we were at the park (screaming, crying the whole shebang). Let him out, he apologizes to both me and his friend, we move on.

Later he hits his other friend because he wants what they have. I put him on timeout. Have to strap him into a highchair because he won't sit on the floor in the hallway for his timeout. Again, major meltdown, screaming and crying. Once he is calm (ended up being longer than a normal timeout because he was so worked up), I let him out and he apologizes to his friend. He and I chat for a minute about being nice to our friends so they like playing with him.

Screamed, cried and whined when he wanted someone's toy a few times today (at least he didn't hit!) He doesn't get the toy when he acts like this but when he wants a toy (and says it like a big boy) we will set the "share timer" and give him a turn after the current child gets a fair time with it.

Pushing into people (intentionally) when we line up at the door. Consequence, he has to go to the end of the line or wait in his chair until we are ready to go outside.

I just feel like it is constant with him.

Hmmmm sounds like my handful!!

You seem to be doing everything right IMO. My handful is 3 now and still struggles with talking. Mom and I have talked about it. She seems ok to leave it for now. It's not my call but I know a lot of his frustration is due to lack of proper communication skills.

Some days are good, some days are bad. He is exhausting some days. Days when I am at the end of my rope he sits in time out longer than usual. If he can't play nice I separate him to the other side of the room.

Keep up the good work!

Like mickyc I separate from the other kids if he can't be told. My handful is nearly 4 though, much different than a 2 year old. He gets whatever he wants from his mother, and is most days, an awful child....I know that is a terrible thing to say, but the kid is just constantly being awful to the rest of the group, this is just the past 6 months where he has been getting gradually worse. It's almost like he acts out more with me because I won't be manipulated like his mother and he resents me for it. Who knows?!? His latest thing this morning in the car driving my kids to summer school, was during tickling and laughing with my 12 year old son, he bloody well bit him! What the hell kid!! He is not a biter, although he is way to hands on with the others in my group. He had full attention from someone in the car and it was totally uncalled for. He has a massive attitude problem and I swear, I have tried everything under the sun to help correct his behaviour. Unfortunately, it isn't reinforced at home, in fact their actions undo all of my hard work. I'm friends with his mother and regularly see them interact in other settings. I also took him and his sister for recital pictures because mum was in the hospital and wow what naughty kids they were, even in public. Makes me sad considering how much time and effort I have put into these siblings over the past 5 1/2 years. Yesterday he wanted to open my husbands workout backpack on the bench at the front door. I opened it and showed him all the compartments as its pretty cool and unique, because why not, he wants to see it and no harm done. I'm not a party pooper lol He continued to ask to look the ENTIRE day! I said no over and over. They sit on the bottom step with shoes on ready for their parents at end of day and he asked again. I reminded him we had already looked and that we were not going to touch it again. The very second his mother walked through the door, he started to unzip the bag all the while looking at me like the Horace he is with his smirking face. I said no thank you what did I say, and he just says " I don't care I want to look" at which point I physically removed him from the bag. His mum in a very gentle voice said, when Amy says no, it means no. He knew he wasn't allowed, he doesn't care and there are no consequences so no incentive to behave. I told his mother last week that if it weren't for me closing in a few weeks, I would be terminating because it just isn't okay for him to be so disruptive and hurting the other kids. He has made me hate my job the last few months which annoys me even more that I'm unable to have a positive last time period doing this "normally" very rewarding job. On the rare occasion he isn't here, it's absolute bliss! I imagine your handful makes your day tedious when you feel like all you do is deal with his issues. Can you remind me of his age? I wonder if this is an ongoing issue and as chronic as it sounds, that if he understands enough, he can start to be penalized prior to a fun activity. As in he needs to earn your trust back. He has to sit and watch from a far because you can not trust him to keep his hands to himself. Not time out as such, and he would obviously get a turn, but not just back of the line, more watching from afar and being somewhat left out with him having a clear understanding of why he has to take a back seat in the activity. Depends on his age. My nearly 4 year old has that happen regularly if he has had back to back incidents in recent days. He usually approaches the activity with much more caution towards his fellow play pals and treads carefully because should something occur, he goes right back to watching rather than participating. I just don't even want to have to deal with this with every single thing we do, it's exhausting. Obviously this method may or may not work depending on this child's ability to comprehend why you are doing what you are doing. Additionally, I would be stuck to him like glue. Shadowing him, only allowing him to play right next to me regardless of what he is doing. He would not get to play with any of his friends if he was unable to keep his hands to himself.

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Originally Posted by bright sparks

Like mickyc I separate from the other kids if he can't be told. My handful is nearly 4 though, much different than a 2 year old. He gets whatever he wants from his mother, and is most days, an awful child....I know that is a terrible thing to say, but the kid is just constantly being awful to the rest of the group, this is just the past 6 months where he has been getting gradually worse. It's almost like he acts out more with me because I won't be manipulated like his mother and he resents me for it. Who knows?!? His latest thing this morning in the car driving my kids to summer school, was during tickling and laughing with my 12 year old son, he bloody well bit him! What the hell kid!! He is not a biter, although he is way to hands on with the others in my group. He had full attention from someone in the car and it was totally uncalled for. He has a massive attitude problem and I swear, I have tried everything under the sun to help correct his behaviour. Unfortunately, it isn't reinforced at home, in fact their actions undo all of my hard work. I'm friends with his mother and regularly see them interact in other settings. I also took him and his sister for recital pictures because mum was in the hospital and wow what naughty kids they were, even in public. Makes me sad considering how much time and effort I have put into these siblings over the past 5 1/2 years. Yesterday he wanted to open my husbands workout backpack on the bench at the front door. I opened it and showed him all the compartments as its pretty cool and unique, because why not, he wants to see it and no harm done. I'm not a party pooper lol He continued to ask to look the ENTIRE day! I said no over and over. They sit on the bottom step with shoes on ready for their parents at end of day and he asked again. I reminded him we had already looked and that we were not going to touch it again. The very second his mother walked through the door, he started to unzip the bag all the while looking at me like the Horace he is with his smirking face. I said no thank you what did I say, and he just says " I don't care I want to look" at which point I physically removed him from the bag. His mum in a very gentle voice said, when Amy says no, it means no. He knew he wasn't allowed, he doesn't care and there are no consequences so no incentive to behave. I told his mother last week that if it weren't for me closing in a few weeks, I would be terminating because it just isn't okay for him to be so disruptive and hurting the other kids. He has made me hate my job the last few months which annoys me even more that I'm unable to have a positive last time period doing this "normally" very rewarding job. On the rare occasion he isn't here, it's absolute bliss! I imagine your handful makes your day tedious when you feel like all you do is deal with his issues. Can you remind me of his age? I wonder if this is an ongoing issue and as chronic as it sounds, that if he understands enough, he can start to be penalized prior to a fun activity. As in he needs to earn your trust back. He has to sit and watch from a far because you can not trust him to keep his hands to himself. Not time out as such, and he would obviously get a turn, but not just back of the line, more watching from afar and being somewhat left out with him having a clear understanding of why he has to take a back seat in the activity. Depends on his age. My nearly 4 year old has that happen regularly if he has had back to back incidents in recent days. He usually approaches the activity with much more caution towards his fellow play pals and treads carefully because should something occur, he goes right back to watching rather than participating. I just don't even want to have to deal with this with every single thing we do, it's exhausting. Obviously this method may or may not work depending on this child's ability to comprehend why you are doing what you are doing. Additionally, I would be stuck to him like glue. Shadowing him, only allowing him to play right next to me regardless of what he is doing. He would not get to play with any of his friends if he was unable to keep his hands to himself.

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For a 2yr old (as OP's child) it is legit, not acceptable but they are 2 and as much as they may know the rule they just don't have the impulse control to always wait their turn etc. But, at 4yrs old it is just sad. If they are raised to not have to follow rules and not behave socially then they are just being set up to fail in school, fail in friendships, fail at work and fail in marriage. We can hope that they just figure it out after a few years of school and seeing how others behave but having been raised to act this way only makes their life harder and the lives of all the people around them harder.

It just doesn't make sense to raise a child that way. I get it, raising kids is HARD. I have a 2yr old, she drives me up the wall. BUT I want her to be a 2yr old for 1yr not the rest of her life so I have to be the adult and set limits, set consequences and follow through. Otherwise it'll go on FOREVER!

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Originally Posted by Lee-Bee

For a 2yr old (as OP's child) it is legit, not acceptable but they are 2 and as much as they may know the rule they just don't have the impulse control to always wait their turn etc. But, at 4yrs old it is just sad. If they are raised to not have to follow rules and not behave socially then they are just being set up to fail in school, fail in friendships, fail at work and fail in marriage. We can hope that they just figure it out after a few years of school and seeing how others behave but having been raised to act this way only makes their life harder and the lives of all the people around them harder.

It just doesn't make sense to raise a child that way. I get it, raising kids is HARD. I have a 2yr old, she drives me up the wall. BUT I want her to be a 2yr old for 1yr not the rest of her life so I have to be the adult and set limits, set consequences and follow through. Otherwise it'll go on FOREVER!

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Haha I totally missed the 2yr bit which was what, the 2nd words in the OP. Lol...sorry folks. massive brain fart!!

For a 2 year old it is normal. Apologies are to passify the adult and have no real meaning to the child. A good habit for them to get into but be careful it doesn't backfire if child refuses to say sorry. Take stock of how often you are using the share timer because that might be part of the problem rather than the solution. Letting one child play with a toy till they are done with it may be better than expecting them to get their play over with in a certain length of time in the sense that it gives the 2 year old wanter power to be a bully by only wanting the toy that someone else has and the timer makes them give it up eventually. I'm sure there are plenty of other toys in your playroom and if one is being used they have to go choose a different one. Favourite items can be rotated daily or after snack when you go back to play the child that wanted gets first dibs on it to have a turn if they want, etc.

Because the behaviour is normal for a 2 year old you can go the time out route or you can go the play somewhere else route - annoy your friends and you have to play over here where you can't annoy them - toss the bark chips all you want but over here not there. Child may get up and move back to the group whenever they want but must play within the rules (ie no set time to be apart). Repeat offence and then you get put in the stroller. What that does is acknowledges that the behaviour is normal but at the same time not acceptable but not every offence is worthy of a time out.

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Originally Posted by playfelt

For a 2 year old it is normal. Apologies are to passify the adult and have no real meaning to the child. A good habit for them to get into but be careful it doesn't backfire if child refuses to say sorry. Take stock of how often you are using the share timer because that might be part of the problem rather than the solution. Letting one child play with a toy till they are done with it may be better than expecting them to get their play over with in a certain length of time in the sense that it gives the 2 year old wanter power to be a bully by only wanting the toy that someone else has and the timer makes them give it up eventually. I'm sure there are plenty of other toys in your playroom and if one is being used they have to go choose a different one. Favourite items can be rotated daily or after snack when you go back to play the child that wanted gets first dibs on it to have a turn if they want, etc.

Because the behaviour is normal for a 2 year old you can go the time out route or you can go the play somewhere else route - annoy your friends and you have to play over here where you can't annoy them - toss the bark chips all you want but over here not there. Child may get up and move back to the group whenever they want but must play within the rules (ie no set time to be apart). Repeat offence and then you get put in the stroller. What that does is acknowledges that the behaviour is normal but at the same time not acceptable but not every offense is worthy of a time out.

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This was really helpful, thank you. I have been wondering about the share timer as I want them to have ample time to play with the desired toy but this has seemed to help them with sharing somewhat. It at least stopped a lot of the bickering over toys.

I have used the idea of separation without a timeout with older kids but never tried it with a 2 year old. I will have to see how that works.

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Originally Posted by torontokids

This was really helpful, thank you. I have been wondering about the share timer as I want them to have ample time to play with the desired toy but this has seemed to help them with sharing somewhat. It at least stopped a lot of the bickering over toys.

I have used the idea of separation without a timeout with older kids but never tried it with a 2 year old. I will have to see how that works.

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I'm not a fan of the share timer. In my opinion if a child is playing with a toy they should be free to play with it as long as they wish, as long as they are playing with it and not just holding it to prevent another child from using it. It just sucks to have a set time to use something. I think even young children start to realize there is no point in getting involved with their play if the timer will ring and end your play before you are done.

I just tell the child that so-and-so is using it, when she is done with it you can have a turn (I then turn to so-and-so and say when you are finished can you tell your friend so she can have her turn). It not only means the kids can enjoy their play but it also means you are not becoming toy share timer police in having to set and reset the timer all day.

I also agree with not using time outs for everything. Especially with a 2yr old. Tell them if they are not playing nice they need to play elsewhere and send them off. When they try and return say "oh, it looks like you are ready to play nicely". The message learned is that they need to play in a socially acceptable manner to be part of the group.