If you don't shout at your children, what do you do when they don't listen?

[Ohmnomnom]

I feel like I'm destroying the relationship between me and Dd7 She's a well behaved, kind and sweet girl, but she does. Not. Listen. Every morning I'll ask her to go get dressed and this begins an endless stream of questions, faffing, distraction techniques, and doing just about everything except the thing I asked her to do. I'm also constantly repeating myself about putting rubbish in the bin, flushing the toilet, dirty clothes in the washing basket, etc.

Do I need to lower my expectations? I get so frustrated after asking the same thing over and over 20 times that I start to raise my voice. She's quite shy and sensitive and I feel like I'm crushing her spirit even more. Whenever I ask her why she doesn't do what I ask, she gets very upset and says 'I don't know'.

Is this just school days? Does she not want to go to school? I'm a believer there's a reason behind most behaviours and this sounds like delay tactics for some reason x

Whenever I ask her why she doesn't do what I ask, she gets very upset and says 'I don't know'

Yes, you need to lower your expectations - she is seven. That is why she does not do as you ask.

I learnt to a) ask very early b) be much more jolly than I am naturally c) be very patient.

You are right to recognise you need to address this - not to be harsh but I would not like to be your child!

She just doesn't want to go to school I think. I find the 'count to 3' really works.

@Ohmnomnom

It's difficult to ban screens as I have a ds5 as well, so banning cartoons in the morning would impact on him too and he's generally pretty good at following instructions.

DD gets to play Roblox at the weekend so I could take that away. I think I need to work on my patience levels and just keep repeating without getting angry.

Does he need it in the mornings?

Do you mean before school

I’d drop it for both tbh

@Hercisback

You'd only have to drop her at school in pyjamas once for her to get dressed in time.

I'd go for natural consequences. Not dressed = going out in pj's.

She's far too self conscious for that! If I forced her out of the door in her pj's she'd never recover from the trauma. Ds wouldn't give a toss.

She would recover and get dressed in time. You need a consequence that isn't you shouting at her.

They get cartoons before school once they are dressed but it's cbeebies and they are not that interested in it. We use it more as an alarm system. Brush hair during octonauts, coats on for numberblocks, out the door before love monster starts.

@Ohmnomnom I wouldn't use a consequence that is too far away or for too long. Roblox at the weekend would be too far away even on a Friday morning. Children cannot really think that far ahead and by the weekend will have forgotten and therefore cause more issues with behaviour or have little impact. I get it with the cartoons as its the same here it impacts my younger dc. There will be something else that motivates her, even if its natural consequences eg no time to get her bike out to ride to school because she messed about getting ready.
I'd not be allowing screens before they are fully ready anyway. Get them dressed etc before coming downstairs.

One of my friends uses fun and humour and has literally never shouted in her life. She's the best parent I have ever met. I don't know how she keeps it up. She is a positive person by nature. I do try take a leaf out of her book and it does work but its a habit you have to get into and it doesn't come naturally to us all.

@Ohmnomnom

It's difficult to ban screens as I have a ds5 as well, so banning cartoons in the morning would impact on him too and he's generally pretty good at following instructions.

DD gets to play Roblox at the weekend so I could take that away. I think I need to work on my patience levels and just keep repeating without getting angry.

Repeating might not help.

I think in some cases you need to be more specific. For example in getting dressed you could either offer her two (reasonable and suitable choices) like "right DD what are you wearing today? Leggings or jeans?" If she picks,great off she pops to put them on, if she faffs you just repeat leggings or jeans? It gets boring pretty quickly. Repeat for top if she doesn't automatically pick one, a lot of kids will keep going once starting.
Try with other things as well, two choices and being specific. For some kids it can be very overwhelming to have an open ended request and rather than asking what they should do,how,what clothes to wear etc they'll just avoid the task.

Try and end a request with a thank you rather than please. It works quite well(most of the time) .

Pick your non negotiables,like flushing the toilet. That's where you follow and nag every single time. "Don't forget to flush!" , "did you flush?" etc. until it becomes habit.

Teeth, make it part of the morning/bed routine. Again follow and nag for a while until it becomes ingrained. You eat breakfast ,first thing you do is brush teeth. You've had your pudding (even if it's fruit) first thing you do is brush your teeth.

Pick your battles . Decide what is really important and she must do and what you can let slide.

Clear,reasonable,immediate consequences when needed.

A lot of praise and rewards. Again praise is best to be specific ,so rather than "you're a good girl" use "thank you/well done for getting dressed so quickly" , "thanks for flushing, it makes it so mych easier for me to clean the toilet" and so on. Rewards can simply be attention, getting to pick what's for dinner , or with a job she likes to do, going to the park etc.

It's exhausting and hard work but you should see an improvement. I guess some examples might sound bonkers,but tailor them to your/her needs.

Getting dressed was linked to a sticker chart for my ds6. Started with literally everything listed and he got sticker for each item now he has get dressed as 1 sticker reward.
I've also done a timer to get dressed- race against the clock.
But I do resort to ok, times up you're going like that. Then get in car. He never did it again which showed he was capable!

If you can't take screens away then manufacture a treat or privilege that can be taken away.
So no park after school, no special game, book, story, whatever you do routinely each day that they love.

Oh also the loss of screen time works better with siblings. 1 gets a reward 1 doesn't so has to leave the screen room.

@Rewritethestars1 That's the parent I wanted to be! Funny, calm, patient and jollying the kids along with a joke and a smile. Unfortunately I'm tired, stressed, single mother snapping at the kids to get dressed so I can get to work on time

My boy at that age (and still now at 12 tbh) also very easily sidetracked but also couldn't seem to follow more than one instruction at a time. If I said get dressed he'd be lost as it was too random an instruction for him. So I had to really download out each step and kind of create a morning drill which started as soon as he woke up: socks on, vest on, trousers, . . . Teeth cleaned etc. He got used to doing it in the same order and still does it now. I still sometimes find myself saying 'please for the love of Geoff leave the cat, alone and get your shoes on!' But not very often thank god

I think some children are just blissfully (painfully for us!) In a lovely little world of their own.

Try not to get frustrated - just regiment it so she can still be in dreamland WHILST putting on the socks etc.

Good luck

The rubbish in the bin/not flushing you make her do them, do not do them for her. Simply say you did not put your washing into the wash basket so you need to do that now.

But you need to ask her what would happen in school if the teacher asked her to do a task and she ignored the teacher. Get her to think about why she will do that in school but not at home. Explain it to her that it makes you frustrated, she knows what is expected of her and she needs to do it. Ask her what her punishment should be if she chooses (important word to use for her) chooses not to get dressed when she is asked.

And no, don't think she is only 7. Toddlers pick up clothes and put them into a laundry basket. You start now and build on the chores so that when the teen years roll round you don't have a child who has never had to do things and suddenly is expected to do lots. Just like in school, at the end of art they clear everything away, they don't just sit there and let the staff do it on their behalf.

Re her not listening if you have asked once and you get no response or non-compliance you get down to their level, get them to look at you and repeat what you said. Ask them to repeat it back to you. Remind them of their chosen consequences for not doing as they are asked.

@Ohmnomnom yes me too. I'm pretty calm and laid back but like most I do have my moments of frustration and lose my cool. She is just wonderful but it may be a combination of her childrens personality, her personality and her situation (im sure she has stressful stuff but maybe not as much as some i don't really know). What i do know for sure is that your also a good mum and doing your best because if you weren't you wouldn't care enough to post here. Give yourself a break lass.

“It’s time to get dressed. Do you want to wear the red dress or the yellow dress?”

“This is a lovely yellow dress. Can you get dressed now or do you need me to help you? What do you need for me to help you?”

“You did excellent dressing, and so quickly! How do you feel right now? Good and proud? Im proud too, I love it when you dress that quickly.”

But also… you’re trying to deal with the behaviour without understanding why she’s behaving like that. What’s the root of it all and how can you help her with that?

It sounds like she doesn’t respect you OP, or defer to you. I hardly ever shouted, but I did have a quiet menacing hiss and an air of authority!
I just made it clear that some things were not up for discussion, like getting ready for school in the morning.
Weekends and holidays were more relaxed, and I allowed more leeway, and both DDs were always praised for positive behaviour.
Wherever possible I allowed them choices, and encouraged their independence and opinions, but it was not negotiable when we were on a deadline.
As a widowed single parent from when they were babies, I had to be both mother and father to them, and as a busy hospital doctor I didn’t have time to faff about. They always knew they were loved unconditionally, but they also knew we all had to pull together to manage as a family.

Interesting that the "lower your voice" and "get down to their level" works for some people. Some children don't care about the consequences or potential rewards and just want to do their own thing at a particular time above anything else.

I once put DS in the car in his PJs and said I was taking him to school like that.

He screamed at me to let him out to get dressed. I did, and he did.

Pretty much never had to nag him to get dressed in the mornings again.

I just dress my 6 year old before she has even woken up properly- less stress all around. At the weekend when we have more time she dresses herself.

My kids are quite a bit younger but i always say “do you understand” after I’ve asked them to do something. Maybe not the first time but if I’ve asked them to put shoes on and they’re faffing then I will stop what I’m doing, look directly at them and say “I want you / need you to go and get your shoes on now, do you understand?”
It must focus them or make it less like a request but an order lol

I also count to 3 but I appreciate this is probably only going to work whilst they are quite young still.

I will often use incentives or bribes if I’m in a real hurry.

I do think that building extra time and following them around would be effective but I’m thinking from the perspective of them getting pissed off with me hovering over them the whole time nagging - so they’d soon learn just to get on and do it unless they want me overseeing and commenting on every second of their day

What is DD doing before you ask her to get dressed?

DS was the same and we changed his routine round. Get up, get dressed then come into wake us/ go down for breakfast. Won’t be fed before he is dressed and won’t see anyone to be chatting to either!

Making a step by step time specific list really helped too (a new clock would be a great incentive or watch).

We then used reward system of small amounts of change that he could save and spend. You can’t take any money away and each event is a fresh start so no chance for a downward spiral.

DS has some ADHD tendencies relating to task focus and self care (but can read for hours and focuses very well in class) we looked at ADHD based approach and it was a life changer.

I would also warn her about the change to routine to give her a few days to get use to the idea.

Sounds so much like DS. Best of luck

I saw something (not sure how true it is but it changed things for me) saying that children get very caught up in their worlds, even though they can vaguely hear us. So you repeat yourself 4 times then shout and it seems to work but they get used to waiting for the shout to do things. Instead you can get down on their level and look them in the eye, I sometimes whistle or turn my request into a jokey song as it's that same kind of atmospheric change but not negative. Yes, they may wait for it the same way but I don't find myself getting irritated knowing it's just an age thing.