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Behaviour/development

Talk to others about child development and behaviour stages here. You can find more information on our development calendar.

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Original poster

Shrieking!

14 replies

Berrie · 28/12/2004 12:19

My 13 month old has started making ear splitting screeches whenever he doesn't get what he wants or if he wants it. Is there any way to train him out of it as it is relly wearing and I find myself shouting at him which isn't nice?

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Donbean · 28/12/2004 12:25

Mine did the same from about that age and i simply ignored it and walked away. he stopped after a couple of days. He does it occassionally now but i ignore it. Makes your ears bleed doesnt it!

NewbarnsleygirlWalliams · 28/12/2004 12:28

They should come with warning labels about this! DD is doing the same. The advice I was given was to ignore them if you can (LOL), distract them with something else and give lots of attention to someone else either other sibling or dp.
Does he throw himself on the floor or smack you? DD has started this with me. Hv said if there is no improvement after xmas she would suggest sending a nursery nurse round to do a behaviour managment programme!! Ahhhh Nightmare!

Donbean · 28/12/2004 12:34

Ds throws himself on the floor occasionally but to be honest i cant be bothered with it so tend to step over him and go and wash up or something. The trouble is of course when he comes to me with real tears down his cheeks i just cant not cuddle him. I think this some how reinforces that daft behaviour will be rewarded with cuddles. At the age he is at (17 months) i think that allot of it is frustration as he cant communicate what it is he wants and i cant get through to him that no he cant have the bread knife or the kettle! I just go with the flow and hope for the best.
I definitely would not agree to any kind of behavioural management at this age. How old is your DD?

NewbarnsleygirlWalliams · 28/12/2004 12:50

14 Months. Hv also said that she seems advanced and is going through terrible 2's early. I just find it a bit upsetting when she smacks. It's one of them things I hate to see children do. I'm starting her at a playgroup in January so that may help.
Sorry to take over your thread Berrie!

californiagirl · 28/12/2004 17:32

Oh dear. DD has just started shrieking. She's almost 10 months! Sometimes it's frustration, but mostly those bouts, although piercing, are short. Some of it seems to be some sort of tired/hungry/frustrated with the universe thing. Most of it is just hard to understand. When she's shrieky, it's no longer good enough for her to be touching me; nope, now I must actually be holding her. Then she wants to stand up and dance, but only while being held. Does anybody have any idea how to deal with a shrieky 10 month old and retain your hearing and some semblance of sanity?

tillykins · 28/12/2004 17:58

My baby does this when he is pleased to see someone - awful noise

heavenlyghost · 28/12/2004 18:40

Aaaah, that old shrieking chestnut ...
Yup, we are in the midst of it too (DD is nearly 11 months). We were out for lunch yesterday and I could see all these other diners wincing whenever DD shrieked ... it was rather embarrassing . She does it to get attention if I am ignoring her (ie talking to anyone else) .... I can't bear it and can't remember DS doing it but I am sure it is a stage ...

Kittypickle · 29/12/2004 08:59

Another one here. DS is 15 months and makes some horrendous noises whilst throwing himself on the floor and rolling around dramatically. He also tries to smack me . I think the terrible twos is a myth - it starts earlier and goes on much longer ! I do the ignoring thing and when he tries smacking me, I firmly hold his arm, tell him no then put him down and walk away. Seems to be very slowly working.

fisil · 29/12/2004 09:07

All sounds so familiar! We try to see all of this stuff as it being ds' job at this age to "test the boundaries" by coming out with all these revolting behaviours. And it is therefore our job to set the boundaries in return. We find ignoring works wonderfully. If not, the naughty step has worked since before he was one, and time out is so incredibly effective that we've only had to use it a couple of times in the last year.

Now ds is nearly 2 we can explain reasons to him and know he is understanding them (cos he goes away repeating them, or we hear him telling his dolly how to behave!). Out of interest, we went to France when ds was 18 months for a fortnight. Last week dp mentioned something about France, and ds came out with something that had been said a lot that week, but that he couldn't pronounce at the time. In other words, he had completely understood at the time, even committed the phrase to his long term memory, it's just that he couldn't actually say it. From this I would guess that your pre-language toddlers are actually understanding a lot more of the explanations and reasons why that you're saying than you would ever believe!

Original poster

Berrie · 29/12/2004 17:39

Thanks for the responses. I've noticed today that he does it a lot more when dh is around. I think then it must be an attention thing. How did you go about getting a pre 1 year old to sit on the naughty step fisil? I've seen it working really well with older children, I can't understand why they stay there!

OP posts:

fisil · 30/12/2004 08:36

Berrie,
I think that the key to the naughty step working is the calm communication. I really do believe that they can understand a load more than we think. We have always done naughty step in the following way:

the "crime" is nearly always the fact that we have asked him to stop but he has willfully carried on. So we ask him to stop again, stating clearly, in a calm, steady voice, that if he does it again, then he will have to sit on the naughty step.
when he then does exactly the same thing again we go down on his level so that we have eye contact and still in a very steady calm voice we say "I asked you to stop that but you did it again, so now I am going to put you on the naughty step."
pick him up firmly and take him and sit him on the step without a further word and then walk away.
ignore him completely for 2 minutes. Sometimes this is easy - you just get on with something. Sometimes we find we have to sit on the sofa in the other room and conduct a fake conversation! If he gets up off the step we just go and sit him back on it without a word or without eye contact.
After 2 minutes go back. When he wasn't talking we would say sorry for him and give him a huge cuddle. Now we ask him to say sorry.
Go and play with him, and really give him attention and have fun with something positive (and completely different to what caused the friction) together.

As I say, this has really worked for us - so much so that he gets his dolly and other toys on the naughty step - including every single step above! HTH!

Original poster

Berrie · 30/12/2004 09:50

Thanks for that, we'll give it a try!

OP posts:

fisil · 30/12/2004 10:01

Good luck. DP just gave ds the warning - and ds just got up and took himself off to the naughty step!

highlander · 30/12/2004 17:09

My neighbour's DD (1 year) has been doing this since she was 6 months and shows no sign of stopping. I've banned her from the apartment as she either upsets or wakes up my DS. I feel like such a cow but it does my head in.

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