Keeping your cool

[playfelt]

On the "why" this is typical behaviour for three year olds - they used to call it the whine and cry year in old baby books. Be careful that you only respond to necessary comments and ignore the other ones or you will get yourself into a power struggle you won't win and that is sort of what it sounds like might be happening. Yes child heard you. Make your statement and then leave it at that. One reminder specifically to a child if they appear to not understand what you said/meant after giving them a few minutes to respond is ok but don't harp on them. However logical consequences follow. You don't get to do the next activity till you have done the stuff around you etc. In the above scenario they may miss out on snack and that is ok since you made it available and you set the criteria for getting it and child chose not to make himself available for snack so not your problem. Not the way to deal with lunch but ok to skip snack. (for lunchtime give them a task ahead to get ready and then limit their access to only toys that can be put away easily - ie not lots of parts so it happens).