how far ahead would you withhold 'treats' as a punishment?

[lilibet]

Couldn't think of a good way to ask what I wanted to know, so the title probably doesn't sum up my question very well.
Atm, my boys (7 and 10) are having a week with no tv after deliberatley setting the burglar alrm off on Sunday morning to get me up when they know that I lie in until 8.45. Other 'punishments' are bringing bedtimes forward by 15 minutes, usually use this when getting ready in the morning, ie ' if your teeth aren't clean in 2 minutes you will go to bed 15 minutes earlier' This can lead to very early bedtimes on a particularly bad morning!
So, how far ahead can you go with this system? Or what do you do with children of a similar age? If they are little sh**ts again sometime this week and tv gets banned for another week and then they are horrid again and so on, I could end up banning tv till they are married! Neither has a tv in his room.
I do find it very hard to control them - the polite phrase is 'full of life' .Which means that they are the children you want to avoid if you go somewhere public! And other than giving in to all my basest instincts and clobbering them, I go with the deprivations theme.
no matter how much I try to explain the results of their actions in a calm and reasoned manner they still misbehave so much. A recent example being ' if you throw toys out of an upstairs window, they will break , you won't get replacements and as its dark what would you do if they land on the cat and kill her'?
10 minutes later, more beyblades being launched out of the window, result no beyblades!
How do people get well behaved boys?
aaarrgghhhhh!!!

[spacemonkey]

lilibet, wish i had an answer for you - just wanted to say I KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN!!!!

[SoupDragon]

I believe they trade them in for programmable robot boys who can be made to behave impeccably

[lilibet]

Where do I get them?
Can you do a link?

[hercules]

no real advice to offer im afraid but as a secondary school teacher i get a lot of parents who deal with misbehaviour by deprivation. my managers advice to them is always try positive action rather than punishment ie offering things if they behave over a period of time. i dont mean toys etc but more perhaps activities etc. taking away a childs things in her opinion isnt the answer nd shes been a senior teacher for 25 years. good luck. i must say when my eight year old misbehaves we threaten to take away x box! excuse one handed typing.

[Jimjams]

I would say pick your battles carefully.

Witholding tv for a week is a pretty big ounishment (and I would imagine a pain to carry out)- were you really really pissed off about the burglar alarm- what I mean is were they being naughty or mischievous?

Have to say I have absolutely no experience of 7 and 10 year old boys. This is just from experience of much younger children who cannot be reasoned with.

OItherwise I 'd go with soupys suggestion.

[charliecat]

I take things away, but in a more immediate way, like your beyblades. My kids cry bitterly even though they were warned before the removal of whatever. I find saying you can have ice cream after dinner, or watch a vid/play the playstation keeps my kids better behaved and if they do start acting like little s@~@:s then a quiet reminder of what they will lose out on if they dont behave works wonders.

[JanH]

Oh, lilibet, I love "full of life"! Mine are full of life too...shall we swap tomorrow?

Best penalty for 15-yr-old - the naughtiest one, can you believe it? - is removal of Champ Manager (not removal but not allowed). I wanted to stop him playing football once, but DH manages his team, and although he is not one of the best players they do need 11, so that was out. I also ban TV. They subsequently watch it anyway until I notice and come in and rant.

I used to be able to manage the dds, no problem. I don't if it's them being girls or because I was younger then...or more frightening...

On the whole I think I'd rather have full of life than robot children but it drives me nuts too so no help from me either!

[roisin]

Hmmmm.... Lilibet my eldest is almost 7, so don't really feel qualified to comment, but just wanted to say that my ds1 responds very badly to 'negative' behaviour-management stuff, it just makes him feel cross and angry, and he sulks and meditates about how unfair the world is.

On the otherhand he responds very well to all sorts of positive behaviour stuff: praise, rewards, stickers, pocket money bonuses, etc., etc.

You've probably tried all this anyway, but if not, maybe switching things round and trying to put a positive spin on things MIGHT give some results ...? If you brush your teeth well this morning without being reminded, you can have 15 mins more TV before bed. Or if you get yourselves ready for school sensibly and responsibly every morning this week, then I'll take you to the cinema at the weekend.

In terms of recording good behaviour, if they are 'too old/too cool' for a 'sticker chart' a friend suggested ticks on the calendar work well.

I nearly blew it tonight: After school ds1 was horrid, I wanted to ban him from going to Beavers, but dh&I discussed it, and we decided to give him a last chance. Dh talked to him that his behaviour had really upset me, and if he apologised he could still go ... and he's been great since then . If I'd kept him home we would have had a horrid evening, and we would all be feeling miserable.

Good luck!

[aloha]

Tend to agree. If there's a big punishment it's tempting to think, oh well, might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb and do something even worse. In any case, if you are constantly confiscating you all end up miserable, but if there are always treats to look forward too (pick a movie you quite fancy too, with popcorn and ice cream) then you always have the prospect of something jolly and you can all end up happy!

[lilibet]

it is just so difficult, I have done promising treats but it doesn't seem to have the same results. I did try a tick a morning if they could be ready for 8.30, rahter than the ususal 8.45 with a promise of cinema at weekend but they didn't get one!
The other thing is of course with having two, last weekend I ended up taking ds2 to the cinema and leaving ds1 at home, which is not an easy thing to do, especially if its for something that happened days before.
I didn't expect any answers or miracle cures just fancied letting off a bit of steam. I love them to bits but they do drive me to distraction.

[mrcheese]

I agree that you want to avoid sounding like a non stop nagging machine (like I feel sometimes)
and have realistic punishments hat you and they believe will happen.


How is you praise criticism ratio?

have you agree on a cobtract type thing where they do their part and you do yours.

I.e I have a lie in till 845 (realistic?)and I will cook you a bacon sandwich.
Or you get ready for school I make packed lunches and drive you htere...
No tv till you are dressed for school int he morning....

I would avoid punishments that are too far in the future and would explain clearl y that you will only ask for something to be done twice before you take away a quality time type activity that you coule all choose together at the beginning of each week. swimming or whatecver.

[lilibet]

The one thing that all my children know about me is that there are no empty threats/promises. If I say that somehting will happen, barring an act of God it will!
I hope that I praise them enough, always kiss and hug them loads and we have non embarrassing shortcuts for them as they get out of the car in the morning so there is no smoochy stuff!! They squeeze my hand as hard as they can to tell me they love me! sometimes I think that I'm going to have to drive straight to casualty. I'm pretty soppy with them actually especially after all the crap they have been thru in the pst year - I just wish that they would bloody well listen to me!!

[mrcheese]

its tough isnt it...

Kids ....tsk

[lilibet]

they never teach you any of this at ante natal classes!

[mrcheese]

I know - you just whitter on about labour -
GOD!

[tigermoth]

yes, I'd like to know how some people's boys seem be well behaved all the time.

I ban things like beyblades and gameboys, but the punishment is immediate - I put the offending item in my handbag or on a high shelf usually.

I find promises of treats work, and I bargain quite a lot with my son as in 'you do this and then we'll do that'. This works OK if the treat is immediate.

I find a middle way is probably the most effective though. My son gets £2.50 pocket money on a Sunday evening. He is really into pocket money becuase he likes buying packs of yugio (sp) cards.

I chose Sunday because he then has to be good on all weekend to get it. The pocket money amount starts at £2.50 but it is subject to revision throughout the preceeding 7 days. If he is very good at school or at home, I'll add £1.00 to it ( or even up to £5.00) If he is bad, I'll take £1.00 or up to the whole lot away. He always gets a warning if he's about to lose pocket money so he can't say it's not fair. If he is only slightly naughty he might lose 50p if he is really naughty he will lose it all.

However it doesn't end there. He has the chance to earn it some or all of it back if he is really good. ( unless he has been really, really bad).

Same thing applies to the banning of the gameboy etc. It gets banned for 2 days, but then he can earn it back sooner if he is very good. And I ask him to do things over and above being OK ie doing his homework early, doing something extra nice for his little brother. So his punishments don't paint him into a corner and he has a way to redeem himself.

My son seems to find this system of punishment fair (which is half the battle really) and it keeps our tempers just this side of OK. The drawback is that we have endless sessions of bargaining - my son will say, 'if I do x,y,z, will you give me back my £2.00 - or £1.00 then ' or he'll suddenly do something very nice out of the blue and then demand money for it!

[aloha]

Well, they might grow out of it soon, then! Or they'll eventually leave home. One or the other, eh?

[juniper68]

Hi Lilibet,
just wondered if you're kids eat many sweets or drink cola etc...
I ask as my eldest son (6) doesn't behave as well if he has too much sugar and probably E no.s and as for cola!!!!! arghhh
Juniper

[StressyHead]

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[mrcheese]

yugioh i think

[StressyHead]

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[StressyHead]

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[JanH]

yugioh - like pokemon - what tigermoth mentioned!

tigermoth, I am v impressed at your pocket money strategy but how on earth do you keep track? Do you write it down? I am amazed by your brain power!

[StressyHead]

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[Beccarollover]

I think alot of it depends on age - for my DD (4) if I ever make the mistake of witholding something in the future - she learns nothing from it and is a waste of time. For example - if I stopped her going on a special trip it would never work as a) she would forget what the punishment was for and b) forget that she was ever meant to be going on one!

I think immediate withdrawl of something nice they are doing or want to do works much better.