What techniques can I use to stop my 5 year olds bad behaviour?

Question

She is very high maintenance. I'm at the end of my tether, shouting constantly (which doesn't work!), exhausted and undermined by my partner who says I'm too hard on her. Before you even say, I wont be smaking her....

Answer 1

Five year olds are quite demanding. As long as you realize that children become increasingly more labor and time intensive instead of less so, you may be able to get a perspective on this.

It is important to make the child feel secure and loved and to meet its needs for attention and entertainment somehow. It's better if you think in terms of anticipating and over satisfying her needs (as you are the more capable, more knowledgeable adult) rather than letting her base levels of requirements dictate your relationship with her.

For example, if you know that she demands four stories at bedtime, find and resolve to read nine stories to her, so that she has fallen asleep and is completely sated before you reach the end of your rope. Doing this cheerfully will put you back in control of the situation and turn things around.

Give praise and hugs for anything she does well or correctly, or any time she obeys you. Pretend to not notice less successful situations, unless imminent danger threatens her or you. Even then, come as a rescuer instead of a punisher.

For example, when my little one would break a dish or glass, I would rush to her, saying, "mother will help you clean that up" instead of chastising her for breaking something.

Keep in mind that you will be old one day, and that you will want your lovely daughter to visit you, take care of you, and even let you stay in her home for extended periods.

Answer 2

First of all I will say there are no rules that teach you how to be a good or bad parent it is very much learn as you go. You can buy many self help books but at the end of the day you have not time for this as a five year old is demanding pysicaly and emotionaly. You are exhausted and your partner is no help as he is on the childs side. Parenting is both of your responsiblitie and there should be no good guy and bad guy which is what she has at the moment and is taking good advantage of this children are much cleverer than we give them credit for and this five year old has total control over your home and relationship with partner now is the time to step in and put a stop to it.
Shouting does no good because all that will do is make her more angry, more determined as she wants the last say and also is causing problems between you and your partner.
First of all you must stop loosing your temper and getting angry easier said than done I know but try and stay calm and not loose your temper if needs be walk out of the room and count to 10.
Second you need to sit down with your partner and tell him how you feel and that you both need to decide on what to do in regards of punishment for her ie: Time out, removal of fav toy ect like others have mentioned. You both need to agree on this so you are both banging the same drum and she can see that. It is no good one issuing a punishment or telling her when the other does the opposite she will see that conflict and use it as she is doing now! So you need to both decide what you are going to do and stick to it no matter what in other words you are both the adults and in control and not her.
Thirdly it is what and how you say things to her that can make a huge diffrence to her behaviour. It is no good saying NO unless you have told her why it is no. For example if she wants sweets before her tea and you say no is not good enough it should be.Yes you can have your sweets after you have had your tea so she is still getting them however it is on your terms and you have control. This is the same for anything tell her why she is not stupid she has you running ragged that takes some doing.
Fourthly praise her for all the good things she does no matter how small and cuddles so she can feel safe and needed.
Fifth try and do fun things with her cooking 5 year old love that this will give you some you and her time that is not full of conflict but happy times. The list is endless in what you can do with her and I am not going to list them as you will know what she likes far more than any of us.
Sixth should be at top of list try and think about what triggers her tantrum is it because you have said no to something she wants? Is she bored,lonely, fed up children do feel like this too it is not just an adult thing. She may well be highly intelligent and needs stimulation.
Anyway I could go on but I hope I have helped in a small way.There is a lot of good answers and between them all you may find the answer.

Answer 3

Rewarding good behaviour and ignoring bad behaviour works for me.

You can buy great reward charts cheaply on ebay, the child has to attemt to get 6 or so ticks daily for a reward at the end of the week, choose the reward together before starting each week so it's something your child can work towards. Alternatively, making your own sticker chart and setting small rules, that if stuck to, get a sticker and X amount of stickers per week gets the reward.

Obviously ignoring bad behaviour has it's limits, but pick only the big things to punish over, let little things seemingly go unnoticed, often a child pushes their limits for attention - if they are not getting praise for being well behaved then being naughty gets them noticed.

One other thing that I believe helps is Omega 3 for kids. My son has been on this since Christmas and in combination with the above has turned from an agressive, badly behaved little b*gger, into a caring, thoughtful, loving little boy.

Good luck!

Answer 4

Hello.
I do understand how you might be feeling. My daughter is nearly 15 and has autism. Her behaviour is very challenging and has been from being 18 months old. She was diagnosed at 10 years old, until then, everyone thought she was 'spoiled, badly behaved, badly brought up, rude etc'.

My favourite technique when she is having an episode, is to use distraction. This usually involves me acting like a 5 year old, but it really does work. For example, when she throws herself on the floor screaming, I would pick up an item and make some really wild story about it, or use it in the incorrect manner, such as put gloves on your feet and say, are you ready to go to the shop with me? breaks the cycle and eventually, you are able to regain control of the situation.

Yes, this is time consuming, but as time goes on, you will find a few little scenarios that work for you, that you call on when u are stuggling to cope. It takes patience and yes, if in public, you will look strange - however, you won't be as stressed and you will have a better relationship with your child.

Good luck
Sara

Answer 5

children tend not to respond to shouting. all this does is cause you toghet more stressed. one thing children do pick up on is ,when parents do not agree . they can use this to get what they want. by playing you off against each other.
you have not stated what you are calling bad behaviour .so the first thing i am going to suggest is look at what your daughter is eating and drinking you will be very suprised at how much additives in food and drinks can make children display such bad
behaviour, when my daughter was growing up she used to be very volitale and bang her head against walls and scream and paddy but she was on a lot of medication syeriods. when i took her to see the specalist they wanted to put her on drugs to calm her down i said no. and i found this as alternative is not easy but my keeping a diary and watching how her behaviour changes after having something to eat or drink you will be able to start
removing these thing from her diet and change them .
this is a long process and does take time .

you can take away her toys or stop giving her treats until behaviour improves .but what ever you decided you have to always follow through with the puinshmnet . for example

don.t tell her she can,t play out because you are going to suffer and then you will give in just so you can get peace. so maybe
theys an activity she really likes doing stop that.

have a time out place. for when she been bad and send her there. then in the other corner a play corner for when she been good, it not easy looking after childen and when the behaviour is
not very good you as the parent get stressed and angry . try not to shout . say what you have to say quitely and calmly and then let your daughter no the puinshment for not be behaviouring is
and carry it out. but both parents need to be united.
if hubby is at work and all he sees is the lovely happy pleasant
little girl , then maybe it time for mum to leave dad with the daughter for a long weekend .

my daughter was little angel when she was out and about and with other family members ,and they all thought that i was imaging how my daughter was then my brother had to stay with me for a while and he could not belive that it was the same child

Answer 6

i learnt some great things that proved good from tv programmes such as Little Angels, Nanny 911 and Supernanny. the things that most worked for me are...

when they are not making sense, take yourself down to their eye level and try to talk to them instead of shouting at them (i know it sounds easier said than done).

introduce time-out so when they are naughty, this is the place to where they will go til they calm down or til you think good enough.
or, a naughty spot for which if u have stairs is good or a chair somewhere maybe. a place they must stay (like the time-out thing) to calm down and think about what they have done.

you should explain briefly why they are being put there but then walk away. they have to stay there for one minute for each year of their age. if they move the time starts over, and if they see it through then they say sorry, a kiss and a cuddle and its forgotten.

if they tend to make you say things like "stop it" 20 times over, thats the: ask once politely, then one warning, then to the designated space.

it is tough being a parent and nobody wrote a book for us to read and get all the answers, hope some of this helps! and your partner really needs to get on board with you too for anything to work.

sorry if this seems long, all the best x

Answer 7

Know this: five year olds are completely obsessed with gaining and keeping adult attention. That's a five year old's full time job. They go from hour to hour trying different things to absorb approval, and if not approval, then attention of the bad sort works just as well for them. They're like little junkies looking for their next adult-attention fix.

So if you're doing anything 'constantly'-- anything -- it's too much. Stop lavishing relentless time and energy on her, it's driving you both mad. She's old enough to do some stuff by herself a while, so encourage that, and you do your own thing too.

When she starts being naughty to gain your attention (because that's her goal), stop taking the bait. Punish her quickly and quietly in whatever way you do it (make her sit on the stair, go to her room, stand in the corner etc), and -- importantly -- withdraw. Do not hover over her shouting and challenging -- just walk away and go back to doing your own thing. If she 'breaks' her punishment, punish her again quickly and quietly -- always stick to the explained punishment and carry it out -- and again withdraw. The message from mum is "I run the show here, the five year old does not."

When punishment's over, it's good if she apologises to you so you two can 'make up' and normalise things. And of course good behaviour should always get a little of the approval sort of attention!

Answer 8

Stop shouting now. When you shout you pay attention to her bad behaviour, thus rewarding her ignore bad behaviour by having a place where she must sit for five minutes ( one minute fo each year of her age} Do this coolly calmly with the minimum of contact simply and clearly say why you are putting her in her place what you expect fro her and how Long she must stay. This will be murder for the first few times you do it, persist until she has say alone for the full five minutes. Now for the nice bit! Always notice and praise whenever she is behaving reward good behaviour lavishly, take time to play and enjoy her,remember only reward good behaviour and o shouting.

Answer 9

You have to show your child who's boss. A lot of times the reason a child acts up continuously like that, is because they are allowed to.

I know, I know you've tried. But every child is different so every discipline technique will have to be different.

Try taking away her favorite toy until she agrees to act better. Don't yell and scream, wait until she has calmed down, then talk to her calmly and explain to her why what she is doing is wrong. Tell her the things she can do to keep from that happening again.

Make her a board with stars (or whatever kind of sticker she enjoys) and every time she gets something right or does a good job, add a sticker. Make a big deal out of it. When she's bad, take a sticker away, tell her why you're doing it and let her see you do it.

Invest in earplugs. She will scream and cry until she gets the point, but the trick is not to give in. I know it's exhausting but it can be done.

You and your partner NEED to get on the same page. You simply must present a united front when it comes to taking charge and changing her actions.

I helped my friend raise her daughter (from 2 to 3 and a half) and she had the WORST temper I have ever seen. She would scream and fall on the floor, bang her head against a concrete floor, scream until she vomited and butt heads with anyone who tried to touch her.

The best thing we did was walk away. Keeping a close eye on her so she didn't severely hurt herself, but walked away and "Ignored" the tantrum. Eventually, she stopped.

Watch Nanny 911 (Fox) or Super Nanny (ABC) and pick up tips.

Talk to your partner, that's going to be one of the absolute best things you could have on your side.

Good luck!

Answer 10

First of all you and your partner need to form a united front coz it's otherwise going to confuse your child. Never argue in front of your child about how she should be handled, agree beforehand and stick to the plan. By shouting yourself, you teach your child to shout. Easier said then done but try and speak in a calm voice. I use time out a lot, take your child to an area where she is to think of what she has done and she is to stay there until you tell her. Be consistent though. She will learn eventually that bad behaviour will no longer get her all this attention. Good luck!