how do you get your dc to do as they're told?

[losenotloose]

Dc are 7 and 5. They do as I ask some of the time, but other times they ignore me.

I've been looking after my 10 month old dnephew today. He gets distracted when I try to feed him so I told dc I was going upstairs to feed him and not to come up. Of course two minutes later they were up. This happens frequently and I'm fed up of being ignored!

What do other people do to deal with disobedience?

For a while I tightened up and used time out.

Give them a reason to stay downstairs eg stick the tv on or get an activity out for them. Tell them you'll be right back. I'd I want mine to do something, that's the route I usually take ie encouragement.

Forgive me if you already do this, but I am always astonished how many parents don't.

Ask them to do wherever it is respectfully and appreciate that they might well be doing something (to them) FAR more important.

When they've done it, notice and thank them effusively.

And if it's not how you'd have done it, please try and resist redoing it, with martyred sighs, until they are out of the room!

TBH in the example given I would possibly have set the timer and said you can watch TV or do x y z until the timer goes off and you're not to come up before then. They do like have the timer to watch - handy for taking turns at stuff too

Thanks for replies. I thank them for doing things that are a bit "extra" like bringing me their plate, but things like getting dressed, I kind of think they should just get on with it and not expect praise! Timer idea might be good, but I really don't want them to only stay quiet or leave me alone for ten minutes if the telly's on, surely they need to learn some self control? Or maybe I'm expecting too much?

I don't think you are expecting too much, but they have little concept of "10 mins" unless they have a timer tbh.

I didn't actually tell them ten minutes, I just said he needs to feed alone so don't come up. At 7, I just thought ds1 should know to just do as he's told!

It's other things too. Like when dh is sleeping (he works shifts) trying to keep them quiet is impossible. It's not often it happens, so they're not constantly having to be quiet. It makes me feel a failure and totally disrespected. Like they are out of my control. Or maybe they're just typical kids?