This week, we've been trying to work on Avery's bad attitude and tantrums she's been throwing when she doesn't get her way. It's been extremely difficult - so if any parents have any advice, I'll gladly take it. We're working on correcting it, but I'm not sure if there's a better way we haven't thought of.
Bad attitude/tantrum example #1:
Avery got up in the middle of the night. Neither Andrew or I sleep well with her in the bed, so we have a pallet (still) on the floor next to our bed, which she is always welcome to sleep on. But lately she has been getting in bed with us. Sometimes we don't notice, other times we do. So this particular night I noticed and told her to lay in her pallet or go back to her bed. She shrieked, stamped her feet and cried, and woke the baby. Reasoning with her didn't work, finally she was yelled at and put back into bed. The next morning I asked her if she remembered what happened last night, she did, and so television privileges were taken away for the day.
Attitude chart:
We also started an attitude chart. It's basically some construction paper glued together. There is a starting point, in the middle (was going to do daily, but decided to do weekly), and 3 colors going down on the not so good side (uh-oh, warning, trouble) and 3 colors going up on the good side (keep it up, good work, awesome work!!). I added some magnetics to the back, so it's hanging on our fridge right now. There is also a clothes pin with Avery's name on it and we slide it up and down depending on how she is. When she's bad, the pin gets moved to uh-oh. It can either go down from there, or up to keep it up. If she's good it automatically goes into the good areas (she doesn't have to "work" it up from the not so good area). This has been helping a lot because she can actually SEE how she's being warned or rewarded. Unfortunately, we have more warnings and troubles than rewards at this point, but I'm hoping this goes UP!
Bad attitude/tantrum example #2:
My parents took Avery shopping for her Top Banana snack for preschool. Apparently, she saw some donuts she also wanted, so my dad handed her the bag. Something happened and she got mad and threw the bag of donuts in the store (Oh my word, if she had done this with me - I would have been seeing red and Mommy would have needed a time out). My dad (thankfully) took the donuts away from her (although after apologizing, she did get them back). I'm not upset with the way they handled it by any means (they are grandparents, I'm glad they did anything!), but I'm upset as to where she is seeing this behavior and thinking this is okay for her behavior. It so is not!
So, we're just going to keep taking TV away (she constantly wants to watch a movie and her movie of the day is a big treat to her). I'm hoping this will help her understand that she cannot keep throwing these types of tantrums. This 3 year old phase is rough! I'm so over it. So, like I said, any advice is welcome here. This is my first time dealing with this. Maybe I'll be an expert by the time Hadley goes through this - or perhaps, my sweet little itty bitty (really not so itty bitty) baby girl will make life easy for Mama and stick with her happy personality - it's so easy to please her! :)
Been there...done that. I told EVERYONE within a couple weeks - maybe even a couple days of Nolan turning 3 it was like a switch has been flipped and my little boy became something else! 2 was NOTHING. I wish I could say it gets better, but unfortunately, we've discovered that the "switch" was kicked into a higher gear for age 4. It breaks my heart. Part of me wonders if age 4 is really that much worse, or if having Parker added to it. Good luck! PS The teacher in me just LOVES your management chart w/ the clothes pin :)
ReplyDeleteThis makes me so nervous lol. 4 being worse - I can't imagine!
ReplyDeleteAnd thanks, I'm obsessed with Pinterest and found the idea on there. So far, it's been working great. I love to be organized, so that just kinda goes along with it. :)