To hate the whole 'Naughty Chair' method

[TheLeftFelanji]

My friend uses this for her child (4). It just doesn't seem to work and the whole thing is so chaotic! She calls him 'naughty' ALL the time and drags him and threatens him all day. Do you want to sit on the Naughty Chair????!!! Ok, THAT'S IT!!! get on the Naughty chair!!!!!!

I am starting to feel really tense before I go round, it's a battleground. Can someone please explain if this works and how it's supposed to work and if you use this method? ....without me reading having to read a ton of toddler handbooks.

Much appreciated xx

Fernie3 and Cory, I have no issue with 'time out'. My argument is purely about the naughty step. Of course you need the child to be calm and safe before you talk to them. (As you need to be, too!)

Any kind of public display of time out (hands on heads in corner) or labelling of the time out as a naughty chair or naughty step is unnecessary and humiliating imo though.

I'm quite happy that these methods may 'work' in the short term but any method which relies on a fear of a devised 'punishment' rather than a 'fear' of the natural consequences of his/her actions is logically not the best method for the long term because

1. You're failing to teach your child valuable lessons about how his environment works
2. You're drawing attention away from the child's own sense of regret and instead creating a situation where the child weighs up whether the behaviour is worth the punishment
3. You're putting yourself in the role of punisher rather than guide

But it's aibu and obviously people are going to carry on disagreeing.

I only used "naughty chair" once.

DD was about 4yo and one day was being a little so-and-so, tantrumming and playing up all the time. Eventually I got one of her little chairs, put it in the corner and said "Sit there until you are ready to be good".

Now, her childminder at the time had a naughty chair but DD (being mostly a good little girl) had never been made to sit in it. However, the little boys who were also there (including the CMs own DS) occasionally had and DD had seen this.

I guess when she realised she was in the naughty chair now in her own home she must have felt humiliated by it. I remember returning to see how she was doing about a minute later and she was sitting quietly in the chair with her head bowed sobbing. It still breaks my heart to think of it.

We made friends and I never did "naughty chair" again.

It doesn't work as a threat so it sounds like your friend isn't using it properly - watch an episode of supernanny...

The method is:

• first the child gets a warning
• if they continue with the bad behaviour they have to sit on the naughty seat - 1 min for each year old they are (ie 3 mins for a 3 year old)
• if they move or complain the time gets reset, might need to take them back to the step 30 times.

It has its uses.... in conjunction with other methods too. Useful when time out is required from a situation.

I would love to see some research-based evidence to support Supernanny's methods.

...

Wow, what a load of cobblers! I am a teacher in a very nice school in a pretty affluent area. However, I am beginning to witness some serious behaviour issues which stem from the exact crock of bullshit that is being peddled out in this thread.

You dont want to label your child 'naughty'? You dont want to punish them because they will be humiliated? Are you for real?! So are you saying that I am wrong to give out sanctions in my class (warning, name on the board, sent to another class) because I might humiliate the child in front of their peers?

There are children in my school and indeed my class who have been brought up in houses where they pretty much rule the roost. Kids need to be told what is what, what is acceptable and what is not, and given boundaries. If these are boundaries are overstepped, there needs to be consequences (and not just a 'chat'). I have been quite disgusted at the way that some of the children at school speak to their parents and their parents just take it, asking nicely for their children not to speak to them in that way. I have spoken to parents who cannot understand why their children are so badly behaved because they are not 'rough parents', when the answer is staring them blue in the face - you let your child get away with things when they were younger because you were scared of 'humiliating' them!

I amnot saying that smacking etc is the way to go, but I am genuinely concenred that this namby pamby pandering to children, because you dont want to 'damage them' (?!!!) will actually churn out a generation of rather unpleasant children.

Super Nanny uses it - that's good enough for me.

Samstown, a teacher giving out sanctions to school age children doesn't necessarily have a lot to do with a parent calling her small child "naughty" all the time.

And by the way, it is perfectly possible to exercise authority over your children without relying heavily on punishments. My parents never smacked, rarely used time out and in fact very few sanctions at all. Yet they had far more authority than some parents I see around me who shout out threats of sanctions and send their children to the naughty step fifty times a day. To me, it's not about a fear of crushing a child's spirit (tbh I think you would have to be quite a cold uncaring parent to manage that): it's more the thought that using sanctions too often cheapens them.

Well runny ; a large adult dragging a small child to a step and shouting or whatever is humiliating for the child whoever is watching. I also don't like the "go to your room " kind of discipline.

Surely they should be happy to go to their rooms?

So many parents seem to ignore the psychology involved esp in 2yr. olds. Iam not a perfect parent but often the child is tired or hungry or getting a cold in which case they're being punished for something that could be helped, with a bit of organising and putting yrself in the child's place, Children have feelings too.

How many times do we have to go over this on here?

Not liking a word like "naughty" and choosing not to use arbitrary punishments does not automatically mean that you have no boundaries and let your children get away with anything. It's not black and white - there are in betweens. I realise that some parents do have a complete lack of discipline but I am sick of parents who follow "gentle discipline", UP, TCS etc being lumped in with them.

"Children have feelings too"

Oh, please. Children rely on parents to tell them what's right and what's wrong. They learn right from wrong from an early age and being told they are 'naughty' is not going to mess up their little lives for the future.

Your sort of softly, softyly parenting has led to feral kids running amock all over the country and ending up with pensioners being scared to death of kids who terrorise then because they were never disciplined as kids.

So samstown are you the type of teacher who tells off normal 5 yr. olds for acting like 5 yr olds?

As a supply teacher i've seen some very dubious discipline in schools. a number of staff literally screaming at the children; that's probably the example that those children have learned from who were shouting at their parents.

Supersmartmum; my dcs are adults and are totally responsible;not on any form of drugs have good jobs etc. and do not run round in a feral way.

It tends to be the dcs who are parented in a haphazard" slapped round the head'" for answering back kind of way. who are the bullies 'cos they've been bullied from the year dot.

If corporal punishment actually worked society would have no problems would it?

'So samstown are you the type of teacher who tells off normal 5 yr. olds for acting like 5 yr olds'

Eh? When did I say that? So by giving out sanctions I am not letting children 'act like children'?

I make it a point to only shout at the kids in my class very rarely as otherwise it has no effect. However, when needed I will give out warnings and put their names on the board. And yes, I imagine that some of them do feel humiliated when they have to go to the class next door and explain to their teacher why they have been sent in there. But it is a lesson learned by them, and actually it means that I dont have to do it all that often!

Carmen how on earth can you reason with a screaming toddler . There is nothing humiliating about a naughty step or corner in your own home where nobody else is there. Its not like you are parading your dcs around town with a sandwich board saying Ive been naughty today, I thew a tantrum as I could not get my own way'

Samstown, your opinion is the correct opinion. The others are wrong and are actually starting to act like the bullies their kids will grow up like if they're not disciplined as children.

Carmen children have to realise when they have done wrong and that there are consequences to their actions, and that naughty behaviour is not accepatable, how else are they supposed to learn

I have issues with the Supernanny methods being so commonly used.

I think that people see them working and think that they are great - but they forget that on TV they are being used as an intervention when the situation is already out of the parents control. I personally don't like the methods but I can see that when things have gone wrong they can be useful to give the parents back that control.

That doesn't mean that I think its a good idea to use them as your discipline method of choice from the start.

But then I'm on the enforcing boundaries without punishments side of the debate so probably not the 'norm' view.

Ok, I am genuinely interested here. How do you enforce boundaries without any sort of punishment? What if the child oversteps the boundary? What is the consequence and how is it not a form of punishment?

Ooh I like Samstown. Esp her 18.27 post.

It's difficult to explain because you have to tailor the response to the actual circumstance. It's not just a formulaic response, like "Warning, then time out" or even "Have a cosy chat about behaviour" every time. Say the boundary is violence towards other children or adults. The response would obviously vary depending on the age of the child, but also depending on the situation. It might be that separation of the children is needed, or a change of activity, e.g. if they are winding each other up.

There is an old thread somewhere with lots of examples, I will dig it out in a bit, but I need to take DS up to bed now.

we use the time out method and ds3 sits at the bottom of the stairs, ds2 takes himself to his bedroom and gives himself time out when he needs to calm down (he is 7)

interestingly my mum used the naughty step for my little sisted and it was the only thing that worked, she was a hugely physical child and could never be still even for a second so just the threat of having to sit in the 'naughty chair' (which was a fluffy blue chair and very cute and comfy) was enough to stop her from misbehaving.

ie when she was three she had to have an operation to remove alump from her foot, when she came round from the anaesthetic she was all drowsy etc and the nurses said to my mum that she may as well go get herself a drink, freshen up etc. so my mum did, only to come back 30mins later and find my little sister running up and down the ward driving the nurses into a panic, they didnt know what to do with her, said that normal children would still be sleeping the anaesthetic off and that she needed to rest her foot etc.

my mum looked at my sister and said, if you dont get into bed and do as the nurses say i will call daddy and get him to bring the naughty chair to the hospital, she hopped straight back into bed

she is 27 now and remembers the naughty chair fondly, it certainly hasnt scarred her for life.

i guess with all these things it depends on how you use them? for us we dont call it the naughty step, but we say that they need to have time out to calm down, think about their behaviour etc.

eldest is ten and dont use it with him anymore, middle two are 5 and 7 and it is still used with them, tho not that often.

little one is two tomorrow and we have yet to use it yet, but i am sure we will.

it can be effective and work if used in the right way

I disagree BertieBotts and would say that a formulaic response is actually the best way, particularly for young children. They need to know, this is the boundary, if I overstep it, this will happen. If you are 'tailoring' it to the situation, then surely the child will not know whether they are coming or going!

Also, if a child is being violent towards another child then yes, separating them or changing the activity is the thing to do initially, but what is going to stop the child doing it again? Where is the message to say this is wrong and you shouldnt do it again? If the consequence is just they are separated from the person they are hurting then that does not go far enough in my opinion and there is no real detterent to stop them doing it again.

Works here, DS is one of the best behaved and easiest going children I know and I am assured by his teacher that he is just fine at school as well.

We tailor to the situation and always have, DS has different "currencies" for different situations.

He "got" stuff pretty early on and is very responsive to The Look. Also sending him to his room when he is in trouble doesn't seem to have caused any conflict with his room. He will quite happily play in there of his own accord but it is still annoying for him to be sent there when he is being a snot.

We have always made a point of never ever making a threat and then not following through, sometimes this is a PITA but having kids is.

I have found the old thread with examples now. Loads of info and different examples and even results here I am sorry that I left out the explanation part but I assumed that would be par for the course - if you did time out etc, you would explain, would you not, "You are going on the naughty chair because you hit X. We do not hit our friends." (etc)

I would say in that example, you would separate the children and explain "If you can't play nicely together then you must play apart" which firstly solves the immediate problem of them fighting, but also gives them a way of managing it in the future by voluntarily separating themselves. Of course that is not to say they will be perfect and automatically go off and play apart the minute they get frustrated with each other in the future, but then time out etc rarely works after just one time either. The goal with the children fighting is to teach them more acceptable ways of venting their frustration, or not letting it build up in the first place. I don't think that additional sanctions are particularly helpful or needed, in this instance, they are a bit of a distraction from what you are trying to get them to learn and can cause resentment against the other child. I would probably also follow up on it by talking at another time about how hitting or hurtful comments can make other people feel.

It is an interesting point about being consistent with very young children, because I hadn't thought about that angle. The only thing I can think of against this is that it doesn't seem a very natural response - do you react exactly the same way every time your DC make you feel happy, or proud?