Teaching your child to say Thank you

[Bbq1]

A 'Parenting Expert' has apparently come up with a 'new hack' to teach your child to say Thank you. It involves handing something over to your child and lightly holding onto the item until the child says Thank you. You then release. The article says this is a new technique that nobody knows about... My son is 18 and this was something I would do automatically when he was young to remind him to say Thank you. Only having to hold the item for a couple of seconds. Am i wrong in thinking that most parents do this automatically and it's not a new idea?

It’s learning the habit of polite social exchange. It also applies, I think, to thanking someone for a gift, whether it’s in person or otherwise. It used to always be a letter, but now a text or call is acceptable. I stopped buying gifts for family members who never acknowledged the gifts I sent. It’s impolite to not respond when someone has done something for you.

Parenting a child with speech delay and selective mutism really made me rethink forcing manners.

DD was unable to say thank you. She would freeze. So I just used to say it on her behalf. A lot of the time she was able to give a quick smile... other times eye contact was also out of reach.

Fortunately most people picked up on the subtle clues that she couldn't speak rather than wouldn't.

Shes 12 now. It still happens occasionally. There's probably people who do think she's rude. But most people pick up on the non verbal stuff.

I've met a lot of other children like her!

I don't think that's a change. That's just one of the techniques for teaching manners that parents have been using for millennia. Modelling behaviour has, by it's very nature, always been the main method for teaching children how to behave. Verbal and physical (holding on to an item) reminders are just used to reinforce the modelling.

I really can't understand why people think it's something new.

The thing is, I never had to hold onto anything. I wouldn't sit there in some demented game of tug a war with a toddler. After a couple of times of saying "Thank you" a certain way while handing them things, toddlers just say it. It's just about consistency. It feels so basic to me, I'm genuinely surprised that everyone doesn't do it.

You'd be surprised how many kids don't say thank you. I work in a school (in a very nice area) and most of the kids don't say thank you.

@TheCompactPussycat I ask because I remember the first time one of my children (as a toddler) thanked me for (of all things!) cutting their nails for them - that’s not necessarily something you’d expect a thank you for, let alone insist on, so it really surprised me that they thought to do it unprompted. I was genuinely wondering, if you relied on “hacks” like holding onto an object until you got the right response, how you go about fostering something approaching genuine gratitude. I totally agree with all the comments here about the importance of giving thanks whether you mean it or not, but heartfelt gratitude is surely still something to aim for.

@TheCompactPussycat Also - I absolutely take your point that the “holding on” thing is used alongside modelling, but the impression I get from the way the OP is phrased is that the parenting expert in question is presenting the “holding on” method as so revolutionary that you’d think either the expert or the intended audience had never thought of modelling either.

(That was a really clumsy sentence, sorry - hope it makes sense!)

Manners are important yes, but they’re pointless if the child doesn’t actually mean please/thank you/sorry.

Good manners are for the benefit of the other person. If somebody hands me a pen, I generally don't feel deep gratitude but it's important that the other person feels like I've acknowledged and appreciated what they did. When I'm asking for a 'cappuccino, please', I'm not really pleading or desperate for my coffee, but I want the person serving me to feel respecting. To say there is no point if the person saying it doesn't mean it is just silly. The whole point is to be respectful to the other person, or at least appear to be.

Sorry I haven't read the full thread. Not trying to put the boot in with something other people have mentioned. I hate that. Sorry.

That's too cute!

I've never actually done the 'holding on to things' method but I think it's a legitimate method. I've only ever modelled appropriate behaviour with the occasional prompt with my own children though (who are beautifully polite young adults now).

Heartfelt thanks is certainly an ideal but I think it's something that develops later. Not all thanks needs to be heartfelt (e.g. I'll say thank you to a cashier in a shop but it's not really genuine gratitude; it's more a simple acknowledgement). I don't think you can teach genuine gratitude. It's a feeling you get when someone has done something genuinely kind that makes you want to express your gratitude. However, you can talk about it with your children when they are old enough to grasp the concept of wanting to say thank you because they recognise that someone has done something nice for them rather than being just what's expected.