Is it normal for a 4 and a half year old to be completely oblivious to the consequences of his actions?
I have tried to google this and all I seem to be able to find are tips on how to deal with defiance or how to deal with a child that doesn’t listen.
DS is a very placid and compliant child, in that if he is told to do or not do something in the moment, he will/won’t do it (ie. does exactly what he’s told). Hes not defiant and he does listen, in the moment. He’s kind, loving and sooooo helpful, but I’m finding him massively frustrating at the moment because he just does not seem to understand the natural consequences of his own actions. Examples of this are things like; he will break a toy, either just by playing with it too roughly or by throwing it. If he’s caught in the moment and told not to throw the toy he won’t do it. I will ask him to explain to me why he shouldn’t throw his toy or play roughly with it, and he can articulate well the reasons for this. If the toy is fixable, he then has to deal with the natural consequences of not being able to play with it until someone can fix it for him, if it’s not fixable he loses the toy.
Once he gets it back he will do the same thing again, or he will do the same thing to another toy he is playing with.
To clarify- he’s not doing it for attention, it’s in the normal flow of play. He’s not doing it intending to break his toy, sometimes he can be absent-mindedly fiddling with things and they break. He’s not throwing things violently, it’s stuff like launching a car from the sofa ‘because it’s flying’.
This is just one example, there are a few others I could give, not all including breaking toys.
Help!