is he too young for naughty corner?

[fredd]

my friends 19 mo DD has started hitting and slapping. Is he too young to do time out/naughty step?

i meant DS!

god no

IMO yes, I would just suggest ignoring the behaviour

Dont see it as naughty corner! Nothing wrong with a bit of time out.

My ds is 21mos and would not get it, he would just get up and walk away without the slightest idea of what was going on. We do the ignoring thing for now.

....or moving to a quiet area depending on where we are.

My nephew is 20 month and completey understands being put outside (into hallway). He is told do not come back in until you have stopped crying and believe it or not it works. When he comes back in he gives you really dirty looks but if fine in a second or two.

He crys for a matter of seconds once the door has been closed over then sulks for a minute then comes in.

all three of mind used the naughty step at that age

I put ds (18mo) on the couch out in the conservatory by himself the other day for slapping me. I couldn't keep a straight face tho - cos all I saw was a little face peeking forward - looking bemused!

I put dd in time out and shes 18 months, if i didnt i would end up murdering her, i do it for me more than her, gives me time to calm down as well as her.

I think it that age it depends on the individual. Having said that, sometimes if never works and isnt a case of how old.

the concept is removal from attention.

IMO and IME it works from an earlier age than this.

bad behaviour = no attention for x amount of time

how about just holding him firmly for one minute - has anyone tried this? thanks for everyones posts btw

Spot on Twig

i would, but would depend how 'advance / developed' (if u see what i mean) the child is....
(i know some 18 months olds who would 'get it' where as a 2 year old i know probaly would STILL not really have a clue!
i would for 1.5 mins (1 min per year of age)

I always time out to the 1/4 of age.... ie 15 secs per 3 months.... so a 24 month old gets 2 mins, where as a child who is 2 & 3/4 gets 2 mins 45secs (approx!)

DD started hitting me in the face at about this age when she was angry. I very quickly realised that sternly saying "no" just didn't work, I was trying to be more and more angry with her and she was just hitting more and harder.

What worked for us was completely ignoring her, which meant not saying anything, putting her down or walking away and doing something else. On one occasion I walked away and closed the door behind me, then held it shut. She cried her eyes out, but soon forgave me!

This is useful - naughty step not working at all for ds (nearly 2) so we'll try ignoring next. Thanks MN-ers.

naughty step should be removal of attention though .. it is just the name of a place where you remove the child too .. it is the action of ignoring that is important whatever the teminology used

the naughty corner could be just down on the floor with you turning your back

i use a timeout bean bag for ds who is 21mths and have done this from 18mths. He knows what it is for as it is placed in hall and he gets a warning then if he carries on he is put on the bean bag for a min, told why he is there and we ignore him until i call him back and tell him why he was there. It is great as he understands it but also gives u that much needed min away to calm down iykwim.

I use the naughty chair for ds2 who is 20m (and 4 days) and it works for him. He pulls some funny faces but he knows what it is and he does stay there, better than ds1 or dd in fact. ds1 is 4 and screams when I tell him to sit on the 'thinking chair' but dd will do it for 10 seconds then keep getting off.

I put him on for 1 minute the first time he's naughty, if he does the same thing after, it's two minutes, then three etc, though I don't think that's really teaching him anything, he probably has no idea of the time he's on there for.

Agree that it's the ignoring bit that works but simply ignoring their behaviour might not sink in, e.g. if ds2 bites dd and I ignore it, he might think that I just haven't seen, or that it's ok, whereas putting him on the 'thinking chair' and then ignoring him tells him that I have seen what he's done, and that I will ignore him now because of it. Also, I use the term 'thinking chair' as dd and ds1 are old enough to know that they sit there to think about how their behaviour has hurt someone.

Also, I hate the word 'naughty'. I'm trying to teach my kids that 'naughty' is a label meant to make them feel bad, when they're not all the time. I'm trying instead to enforce that certain behaviours are unacceptable because they hurt other people.

My ds is 22months and I've been using a "naughty" step for the last month or so if he hits me, bites etc. He seems to get the message as it stops the unacceptable behaviour. If I simply say no he just gets worse. He is usually in quite an apologetic mood when he comes back from the "naughty" step so I think he's getting the message. I just hope he learns soon that he shouldn't do things like hitting and biting. I thought he'd broken my nose on Saturday because he head butted me!!!

I have two girls one is 4 years old and the other is 14 months old. I try to ignore them when they are been naughty. I also hate the word naughty and try not to say it. If you keep telling your child they are naughty you are labelling them that and they will keep been naughty. It is their behaviour and action that in unacceptable and cannot be tolerated. Get down to their level eye to eye and speak to them in an assertive and firm voice like NO, we do not hit or bite other people. You have hurt him. Get the child to say sorry and give a hug to the child he hurt. Give them a warning before doing the time out thing. I love the discipline method used by Supernanny Jo Frost. Show them different ways that they can be physical with you like kisses, hugs and gently stroking. Must praise and pay attention to them when they are been good. I hope this helps a bit.

If you think of time out as a place to calm down and be ignored so you realise that the behaviour is not acceptable rather than a punishment then 19 mo is a great time to start.

Having said that - for hitting I just used to say "no hitting in this family" for a first offence and then pop in cot if repeated.

Sometime he would instantly go to sleep, so it was obviously overtired behaviour. Sometimes I think he did it deliberately as a pre speech way of asking to go to bed.