8 POSITIVE DISCIPLINE TECHNIQUES FOR PARENTING TODDLERS

Positive discipline seems to be a really hot topic at the moment lots of teachers educators parenting and talking about it and it's something that I was really interested in when I had children my childhood was a very positive childhood my mum practiced a lot of positive discipline she has a degree in child psychology so she was really clued up in the whole positive discipline world and that's how we were raised but it wasn't until I became a mom that I knew what it meant to be a positive discipline kind of parent so I'm going to share just the basic concept of positive discipline.

I am not qualified in any way I'm just a mom interested in the subject and wanting to share my own experiences and my techniques in case that helps other mums out there so the basics of positive discipline is that there are no bad children there's good and bad behavior and positive discipline is a model that focuses on bringing out the good sides the good points of behavior and I mentioned a little bit about this when I did a video talking about calling their child naughty and how we don't do that in our house we don't use the word naughty because I feel like it's a way to brand the child and not the behavior so it's all about teaching clear boundaries without the need for punishment you don't have to be a permissive parent or a soft parent as some people call to practice positive discipline you can be firm and assertive and respect your child's feelings and still bring out the good in their behavior so I'm going to share a few things that I use on a day-to-day basis to practice positive discipline :

1- To Give Loads Of Positive Attention

we know the kids they just love attention good or bad if they know that they're going to get our attention they will do it so what we as we try and focus a lot on positive attention so when my children do something nice if they are you know putting their toys away or really well-behaved I bake that up so much so that they feel like they want to do more of that and kind of in contrast I try to ignore my nervous misbehaviors so when they do little things that are not nice for example tipping the toy box completely out like all the toys out of the fault of the box it's not nice it's not great it's not ideal someone will have to tidy that up but that is a minor thing that I can let slide and if I give attention to that the likelihood of them doing that again is higher than if I ignore that because they knew that that that didn't really get an attention from mommy so it's not worth doing it again so focusing a lot on positive behavior letting the minor things that slide obviously the big things you have to give it enough attention but that's one of the things that we do

2- To Treat the Cause and Not the Symptom

so if your child's behavior is off if they're not themselves they're acting up a little bit more they're being a bit more time for me just like trying to get your attention a lot and it's coming out of nowhere try and look for what's causing that behavior and it won't always be obvious you might have to observe for a few weeks to know what's causing that behavior and I'll give a real example of something that's happening to us right now so my daughter Isabella who's - she's been going through a phase of being really clingy to me to the point where you just can't breathe can't go to the toilet you can't do anything without a child holding onto your legs if you know what I mean then you know how hard that can be as much as I love my children you know to have them constantly attached to me is really hard she's also been acting up a bit and and throwing a you know Tantrums out of nowhere being a bit more difficult - behavior wise and I didn't know what was causing it but I the time last week to kind of pay attention to her and observe her and see every time what was causing that behavior and it made me feel really guilty and sad but it was the fact that she was missing me time with mummy I've been working really hard over the last couple of weeks I'd say you know I've just been putting a lot more extra hours into my work and you just don't know how that's affecting your children until it does affect them and I realized that I needed to take a step back and just spend quality time with her I went back to look at my old pictures of James who's my first child and the amount of time that I spent on the floor playing with him and just spending that quality time with him individually was crazy compared to the amount of time that I spend with her and I know being a second child it's harder because I already have another child and now I have a business to run but she shouldn't suffer she shouldn't she's did that salary you're wrong she shouldn't suffer because of you know life but when I give all my attention to her and her behavior has been fantastic just completely top-notch she's being cooperative she's being able to play on her own she's been able to listen to me and to just behave well and so that led me to think that I was treating the symptom and not the cause I was trying to get her to let go of me and to not be so clingy and instead by me being with her a bit more just spending that quality time it was all that she needed so that might be something to try if your child is just being a bit difficult in terms of behavior maybe look at what's causing that behavior.

3- Using Delayed Gratification

my children love knowing that good work and good behavior pays off and they love a little reward star they love reward charts so something that I been doing a lot recently especially since my son started nursery and he's been coming home with like stickers and stars saying that he did good listening and kind hands and things like that I've been introducing that at home as well and it makes a huge difference so my son James really responds to that and I'll ask him to tidy up his toys he won't give it a second glance if I say to him if you tidy up your story is your toys you will get a golden star for good tidying he will do that immediately for getting that star and I can see that it really means a lot to him to get that gratification to know that that means something instead of just you're being told to tidy up your toys because mommy told you so delayed gratification is something that we do in our house.

4- Remove Shame From Making Mistakes

that is something that we have always done from day one and the way that we do it is we make ourselves look silly or funny if we make mistakes so that the kids feel like they can be like that as well they can be free to make make mistakes and there will be no shame in making a mistake so you know if I put the wrong shoe on the wrong foot or you know different pairs of socks the kids pick that up and they say Oh mommy we've got the wrong socks and I just got all silly mommy got the wrong socks and now they've picked up that I can make fun of my own mistakes so they can make fun of their own mistakes and if they spill a cup of water because you know they were just being a bit clumsy it wasn't something that they were doing to get attention it was an honest mistake they just got all silly me I spilled the water and they know they won't get into trouble for that I would just tell them you know just to be more firm with your hands hold it tight you need to eat your food so that your arms get stronger so you can hold your cup really tight.

5- To set a time limit for time out

Make sure to make sure that it ends so in our house we use the thinking step whenever there's something behavior-wise that were not happy with we tell them to go to the thinking step and stay there and then we'll come and talk to them but I've never really thought about time and how much time they say on this thinking stepping for them what does it mean when do they know that they're going to get out that's never kind of crossed my mind I just thought that I know when they're ready so you know that's all that matters but reading up about this today made me really think that actually you need to know that timeout ends and they need to know that they're not going to be there forever and young children don't have a very good grasp of time their concept of time is not that sophisticated to know that you know when mummy`s ready I'll come out so one thing that I will be introducing from now on is a little timer it's some kind of way I thought about an egg timer because you know it's a fixed amount of fixed amount of time it's something that can be quite intriguing for them and just say when the timer goes off mummy’s going to come and talk to you about what you did until then you stay on the thinking step so that they know that it always ends and it always ends at that same point and then we can talk about what they did and say sorry and whatever not but I thought that was a great idea.

6- To Mean What You Say So If You Say No Stick To It

but make sure you can be sensitive to your child's feelings at the same time as being assertive and sticking by what you said I've done a video before about saying no to your kids and how important that is to them as well so I'll leave that linked below but in our household with two toddlers sharing toys is something that causes a lot of friction and that is something that I have to stick by we don't allow snatching toys in our house if your snatch you've got to give it back and say sorry but I am sensitive to the fact that my eldest he has toys that he likes he's got favorite toys my youngest not so much she hasn't quite got like a lot of preferences but James does he he does have like a few favorite toys and I try to be sensitive to the fact that even if he snatches one of these toys I will say snatching is not good it's not okay you've got to give it back and say sorry and then later on when I have alone time with him I will talk to him about it and I would say you know if you want to play with that toy because I know it's your favorite maybe tomorrow we'll leave it in your bedroom so that you can play with it here by yourself and Bella can play with something else so that's a way of kind of listening to their feelings and knowing that you know that toy means something to him but also being firm and assertive that snatching is not okay and he can't do that even with his favorite toys so it's something that we try to practice as much as possible obviously there are times when that doesn't work but most of the times I think I'm able to do that and kind of stick and be firm whilst still trying to be sensitive to the kids feelings.

7- Use Positive Language to Encourage Positive Behavior

the use of positive language is so important and it's so easy to do once you recognize what negative language is so for example instead of saying don't walk in the living room with your shoes on trying to say take your shoes off before you go into the living room or don't throw your clothes on the floor say take your clothes to the washing basket and if you start to change your the way that you bring things and to adapt everything into a positive language you will notice a difference in your child's behavior I read a book called the secret which is very famous when I was a teenager and the one thing that stuck with me about that book was when it talked about positive language and how the universe attracts positive language instead of negative language like saying things like I'm going to I'm going to walk on a straight line and not fall if you're going down you know like a catwalk or something and you're worried about falling instead of saying I don't want to fall I don't want to fall that's negative language which then attracts a negative result and I'm going off on a massive tangent but what I mean is that positive language encourages positive behavior and that works with adults and kids as well .

8- Give Yourself a Break Practicing Positive Discipline

I recommend that all parents do is to give yourself a break practicing positive discipline can be quite hard time consuming energy consuming because you're training your brain to do something that's not the easy choice that's not the easy option obviously it's easier to just shout and get what you want but to try and be reasonable and sensitive and to be a gentle caring loving parent all the time it's hard and it can it can make you feel quite exhausted and depleted and just you know lacking in patience for anything and anyone else and everything else because you've used up all of your time and your patience and your effort to be that parents that you want to be and although we know it's worth it and it pays off being the way that we want to be as a parent it is tiring and you need to look after yourself and give yourself a break.