To wonder when children get manners

[PestilencialCrisis]

Just that really. At what age should children be able to remember to say please, thank you, sorry, pardon etc? Or remember to offer to share things or to automatically ask permission before doing something/taking something without being constantly prompted by adults asking "what do you say?" or "share nicely and offer one to x"

Any helpful tips on getting kids to remember these things themselves?

If they can ask for an icecream/drink or accept one that is offered they can say please and thank you. (SEN aside)

In general children copy how they’re spoken to. If you constantly say things to your toddler like “Darling, please can you pass me the salt… Thank you so much” you’re going to end up with a much politer child than if you say “Dc! Ffs can’t you see mummy needs the salt?!”

There’s no age, it’s part of teaching language. If they forget to say thank you, I never did the “What do you say?! What do you say?!” Because that isn’t how civilised people talk to each other. Instead I’d say something like “Love, I know you didn’t mean to, but when you forgot to say thank you, it made me feel unappreciated and that kind of hurt my feelings and made me feel like not bothering to help the next time you ask. I’d love it if next time you could try harder to remember to say thank you. Thank you.”

My child had incredibly polite manners (childminders said they’d never encountered such a well behaved child) until he started school and then obvs started copying the nasty way teachers talk to children and peers do to each other. But you can combat that with discussions about it.

I agree with @Justbefore with everything apart from the nonsense about teachers speaking negatively towards children, I don't know what she's on about here at all.

Thank you, will try that (the second paragraph that is - I'm already pretty good at not screaming FFS at them 😁)

My 7 year old is very polite, and my 3 year old seems to have grasped that adults seem pleased when she says please or thank you so she’s pretty good. My 4 nearly 5 year old hardly ever remembers, I just remind him and he’ll get there. They’re all different.

Mine always have. As babies I always used please and thank you when speaking to them and it’s been apart of their vocabulary’s since they started talking. It’s a non negotiable, and something I won’t budge on, it’s important. My youngest has speech issues and until recently could only say a few words, please and thank you were part of her limited vocabulary. In fact I always get comments on how polite my children are, not even a humble brag, full on boast from me, I’m very proud of how nice my kids are and how well they behave (with others, of course at home they have their moments) I’m doing this alone whilst being very poor, no support at all and caring for elderly infirm parents, so hearing positive feedback about them is such a relief!

My 2yo has been saying thank you since she was about 14m old

I don't negotiate on manners

Hearing the parent prompting is so much better than nothing, though.

Anyone who's ever had any dealings with kids knows that they don't always remember their Ps and Q's. But what's annoying is when the parents do nothing to remind them. It's so much better to hear a "Now, what do you say to the lady?" even if the child still says nothing, then at least you can exchange wry smiles with the other adult! It shows you're making an effort to teach your child manners, and that's the main thing. We all know it takes time.

I work with children age 3 to 5, the youngest ones when they begin never ever have manners. I've noticed this quite consistently. Even when they have extremely polite parents. Either they are a little young to model adults or they need to be taught, I don't know. We are very strict on this and by mid term they all say please and thank you etc when pouring a drink for example. If they don't say it we hesitate and ask them if they have forgotten something. We always say thank you to them and are careful to model too. We tell them if someone is playing in a way you don't like you say 'no thank you' not yell or hit, which is much more instinctive at that age. What I also find interesting is that many of them, even the articulate chatty ones, dont use words at lunch time and do things like hold out a cup and make baby noises indicating they want a drink. We pretend we don't understand and suddenly they are capable of asking.

My nearly 5 year old forgets some times, but has recently started saying please and then saying "I said please the first time" afterwards, so our many reminders seem to be sinking in.