I have a 20 month old son. I don't want to resort to spanking what other discipline techniques are effective?

Question

I don't necessarily want to spank because I believe parenting by example is better than showing aggression to deal with agression. However my son does not talk yet and I feel that reasoning with this child is useless. How can you effectively start disciplining such a young child?

Answer 1

Time out is the way to go. As a general rule, time out lasts 1 minute for every year the child is. You need a specific time out area, preferably a room with nothing in it. No toys, no TV, nothing to get into.....zilch. Every time the kid misbehaves, gently, but firmly, tell him what he did wrong and then punish him with a time out in his special room. Never "reason" with a child. People don't gain the ability to reason until their late teens (if at all, lol). As a matter of fact, reasoning with your son is his passage to manhood. Until he is a man, you are the father and he is the child. You tell him to do things and he obeys. You teach and he learns. Sometime after age 18 or so, he gains the ability to do this process internally. Around age 20, it sharpens and hardens into something useful. By age 25, he's surpassing you in wisdom and knowledge....but only if you do your job right.

Answer 2

I agree that at 20 months, spanking is not ideal. Good for you for looking for other options. For my daughter, I would give her a time-out. Not the kind of time-out where you send your child to their room because at 20 months, you can't do this. What I would do is put my daughter on our couch and not let her off for a period of time. This worked well because she was always such an active child that being forced to sit still for even five minutes taught her a lesson.

In a couple more months, you can start taking priviliges away. I started that at two years. If your son acts up, take away something that he is playing with at that moment in time or the food he is eating. Then give it back to him after he's either stopped whatever bad behavior he was doing or after you think it's been long enough for him to learn a lesson.

Both of these worked for me and my daughter. I've only had to spank her once in four years, so other forms of discipline work just fine too!!! Good luck!!!

Answer 3

First of all, spanking is not a way to deal with agression. Spanking is popping your kid on the rear to get their attention. Second of all, time outs are joke and if you are thinking of using time outs--don't! I've seen tons of children who's parents are just like you who think spanking is wrong and so they use other techniques instead and believe me---their children are unruly, misbehave, walk all over their parents, throw fits, are spoiled, and grow up getting into trouble far worse than what you could even imagine. Time outs are a waste of time. Your child sits all day long--what good is sitting in the corner going to do? Let me tell you--absolutely nothing!

Now, I'm not saying you should spank him for every little thing because spanking should always be a last resort. If he gets into something he shouldn't be getting into then smack his hands and firmly say "no". If he does something he shouldn't do then ALWAYS give him a warning. If he does it again, spank him. Then you will have his attention and you can grab him by the arm and say "I said no, do you hear me?" and he will get the point. After a few occasions of spanking him, then eventually you won't have to because you can always just tell him "I'll spank" and he'll know what that means and then he will behave because he knows what he'll get if he doesn't.

Spanking is not abuse and you lazy parents need to get that into your heads. I think any other form of discipline is lazy and absolutely teaches the child nothing because time outs and things like that have to be taught. I mean, sure you sit him in the corner then what? He gets up and walks away and you have to put him back. You have to teach him that before you can discipline him which is why it's a horrible form of punishment. With spanking, one little pop on the butt and you have their attention and there's no teaching involved.

Get over yourself, be the parent and use some real discipline on the kid before he gets out of control--which he will if you use lame methods of punishment like time outs and taking away priveledges.

Answer 4

Your child understands very well. We do a 1 minute time out in the guest room. The boys are 17 month old twins. Never use their own room. The twins understand that really well. They may be fighting over a truck and I'll tell them if they keep going I'll give them a time out. As soon as I say that they typically stop. I follow up with a short verbal explanation. Also if you spank they tend to hit others to resolve very small problems. Seems silly but they understand so well. Ask your child to go get his shoes and see what happens. I'm probably way off target but it works at our house.

Answer 5

Speaking as a parent with the world's most stubborn child, I've had my share of discipline problems with her. At that age, what I typically found that worked best was getting right down to her eye level, look her straight in the eye, and say "NO"-firmly, not yelling. You're right-a long winded explanation to a child who isn't even two is a waste of your energy. Just redirect the child's interest after you tell him no, and find something more constructive for him to do. It takes a ton of patience (which unfortunately, is not one of my finer qualities), but once kids learn to speak, some of these problems do get better.

Hang in there, Mom!

Answer 6

You don't have to spank but occasionally it may need to be done, but slap the top of his hand or put him in his room raise all his toys so he can't reach them and shut the door, let him sit in there for about 10-15 minutes then go get him and ask him if he is going to be a good boy. Some times you may need to lower your voice when you say his full name enough to spoke him then make him sit in a chair for a little while sit across from him, if he moves tell him don't you move, if he moves slap his hand and just let him sit there and cry there are a couple of things you can try.

Answer 7

the most effective technique when disciplining a kid is consistancy. He or she needs to sit down, you make them (no spanking involved) even if it takes 20 minutes. When they are doing something wrong don't offer fun things inorder for them to stop (no candy) because you are still rewarding them for that bit of misconduct. I am a pre-k teacher do I can understand :) good luck!

Answer 8

TIME OUT works wonders. It should be 1 minute for every year the child is. You need to get down to thier level and tell them in an upset tone that "You are not allowed to ....." Then put them on time out. We have a timer that I set. When he is done I ask him if he is sorry and he says sorry and gives me a hug. They understand more than you may think. My son is 21 months old.

Answer 9

I agree with the time out method.
However, I will say that I was spanked as a child and it was never done out of anger. Whenever I did something wrong, I was never spanked right away. When I finally got it, my parents would tell me what I did wrong so I would associate the two things. And it was never so hard that it injured, bruised me, etc.

Answer 10

Physical discipline will be necessary if you want him to have some of your respect towards others. Over the past 20 years or so, parents have become more tolerating and in turned raised a generation of ungrateful, uncaring and unmotivated kids. Dont be a " im their friend" parent... be a parent.