can you advice on how to sanction/punish/deal with bad behaviour of a 4 yo?

[PavlovtheCat]

She is not responding to the time out step.

She is doing the following:

throwing toys at DS. Not in anger, just seems like because she can, quite casual about it.

Throws her toys down the stairs/throws them generally.

hits DS with something, not hard enough to hurt, but enough to make him and me go

Ignores us, almost like she does not hear us. Not necessarily rudely, just chooses to continue doing something we ask her not to, or not do something we ask her to.

Shouts at her brother.

It has all started quite recently, in the last 2-3 weeks? just a minute ago I asked her if she could pass a toy to DS, and she started playing with it and pushed him away. i asked her again, politely to pass it to him and she threw it at him across the room (lukcily it missed him). I told her go and sit on the 'step' and she refused, casually walked across the front room, and stepped on each of her three small wooden dolls (from the dolls house), carefully, and on purpose.

Yesterday, she swung on a shelf in the front room which she knows she can't do, and it fell off, breaking several ornaments and almost landed on DS.

She is on the step and I have taken the dolls off her. She is now playing with a toy she has picked up, and is chatting away, seems not at all bothered, kicking at the wall.

It has been a tough few weeks in terms of tiredness in the pavlov house, but she gets plenty of (positive) attention. I expect it is all in response to how things are atm but I do not know how to get her to start behaving.

We have been using positive rewards for good behaviour, she gets a gold star for very good behaviour, such as eating all her dinner with knife and fork and not using her hands (a normal thing for her!) and not making a mess, for being kind to her brother, for being kind and lovely when we were poorly this week, that kind of thing. When she has 5 stars, she can get a small gift of her choice, out of two or three things (she wanted just a lollipop last time! but a littliest pet shop animal or something like that).

She responds well to this, but her negative behaviour is becoming increasingly out of control. Not sure how to address it, any advice gratefully received.

and also, to add, she is not horrible with any of it really, she is still lovely, just being 'impossible', i guess is how to describe it. She is not deliberately horrible, in that she does not have malicious intent when taking her brother's toys away from him, or hitting him with something, it is almost like she wants to see what happens.

bumping...

Ah, we have one of those kinds of 4 year olds. You have my sympathy. Lately, we've found the best way to deal with things is to establish boundaries first thing every morning and keep reminding him of these during the day, coupled with a zero tolerance of rule breaking. Sounds harsh, I know, but it's the only thing that's worked for us.

So, just to give you an example, this morning we woke him up and had a big cuddle, and while he was calm we talked about my expectation that he would have a day of being well behaved. I then asked him what were the rules - how does he show me that he's being well behaved, and he recited our three house rules (no hurting others, do as you're told first time every time, and respect for others and property - we've talked about what this means millions of times before, so he gets it). After he recited all the rules, I told him that if he broke the rules today, his toy monkey would be removed from his bedroom, and that further toys would be removed for more bad behaviour. I then asked him to tell me, in his own words, what would happen if he was naughty - he got a bit teary thinking about the removal of monkey (poor poppet).

The good news is, we had a really good day today - he earned back a toy that was taken away from him yesterday when we didn't use this strategy.

I know they tell you that you should give kids a chance to make things right before you punish them, but we have found this just doesn't work for our youngest, ever. We've even had to talk to his preschool about this zero tolerance approach, and helpfully, they're on board and are reporting an improvement in behaviour, too.

Good luck - I hope you get some other responses

I agree on talking about the behaviour you expect from her in advance, in a non-emotional atmosphere. I try to work on one thing at a time - currently doing what he's asked to do first time - and reinforce that I expect this from him before any situation where he might be tempted to break the rules, if that makes sense. I find talking about what behaviour's expected from him ahead of time, in a calm atmosphere, helps a lot.

It sounds like the main problem is you all being tired generally...
I know a lot of people would say I'm crazy but I would try and stay calm and wait it out - and try to sort out the tiredness thing. I find personally the biggest factor in this kind of behaviour is MY tiredness. When I'm awake and feel good, I make a game out of things, have creative ideas and both kids are carried along with it and things are much better. The trouble comes when I feel shattered, my back's against the wall and I'm just fire fighting - trying to stop anything awful happening.
Personally, I'd forget rewards and punishments and concentrate on a longer term thing of you all getting lots of sleep and doing some nice things together. I usually feel like I'm in a crisis so I know what it feels like, but I think the crises just have to be weathered while you look for opportunities to do something fun together.

I think she might just be picking upon your mood if you have all had a hard time recently. Can you lighten things up and have more fun/sillyness with her? x

neverendingstoryteller great advice there, appreciate that, I will give that a try. The thing is, when she is good, she is fantastic and the best girl in the world, and she just seems to get carried away with the million things in her own head, and forgets things instantly. flowegarden i agree, the boundaries need to be set when we are not upset with each other, then it will be easier to re-enforce this.

skybluepearl and simic I completely agree that the tiredness is a huge factor atm. We are working on that, a seperate issue with its very own thread(s)! But it is not likely to produce instant results sleep wise, so we do need a strategy in the short term, as we cannot ignore her hitting her brother or breaking toys deliberately. We let a lot go already. If it was just one day, I will most likely give her more of a break. I am not wanting to punish her so much, as help her realise that there is certain behaviour which is not ok and there will be consequences if it happens.

We do have plenty of fun, even with the tiredness, we would not cope at all with difficult times without some laughter in the house!

She does something fabulous, like, today, she passed DS some her toast and said 'come on little man, you need to eat and grow big and strong' then ruffled his hair' and then gently asked him to let her have her drinks bottle back. Then, two minutes later she was bumping on his head with a toy!