What “consequences” can there be for a 3.5 year old for not listening?

[mamariama]

My daughter is 3.5 and her latest favourite thing to do is to look at me straight in the eye when I tell her not to do something, and then proceed to do it again. For example standing up on a chair, trying to go outside with no shoes, turning the taps on repeatedly. Or the other thing is, when I say to do something she will do the opposite, like I’ll say to put some shoes on and she just refuses (regardless of whether I phrase it as “let’s put your shoes on” or “time to put your shoes on: red or blue?”) or sit down at the table instead of running around or she’ll run away when told it’s time to go brush teeth / wash hands / change a dirty t shirt / I try to get something she shouldn’t touch out of her hands. Example: she enjoys grabbing her dad’s phone and running off with it, when caught she will throw rather than give back instantly when asked to.

I try to discipline her by having consequences like “you can either sit at the table during dinner whilst we eat (she doesn’t have to eat anything off her plate but can pick what she eats from that plate) or go straight to bed” or “if you don’t stop dipping your teddy in the porridge, I’m putting him away till the evening” but in all honesty there’s not many joys I can take away as a consequence. She won’t mind staying home too much because there’s toys, so I can’t always say if you don’t do X we won’t leave the house (if anything that’ll punish me more than her). I do threaten to take toys away but surely that can’t be the punishment for everything. There’s times of day where I can’t just say “stop doing X / do Y or we’re going to bed”. She barely has screen time, maybe 1hr per month if that and only when I need her to (for example I’m at a dr appointment and need her to not run out of the room), so it’s not a reliable punishment because she doesn’t really have it. She has friends and enjoys playing with them but won’t be too affected if I say “we won’t see Fred today!”

I know lots of people will now say that consequences aren’t helpful and I should just validate her feelings and explain mine. Gentle parenting where I just ask her to use gentle hands and not climb on chairs from afar, tell her that all her feelings are valid etc won’t work - she’ll smile at that and proceed to do what she wants.

Stop giving her choices for a start.
”It’s time for dinner now”
”It’s bedtime, time to get your pyjamas on” etc.
Be firm. Don’t ask, tell, and if necessary make her sit down and put her shoes on.
And if you do threaten, make sure you carry it out, every time.

There's lots of words in what you're saying to her.

Obviously be very careful of tone but try putting the instruction word first.. stop, no
Then try to to use only 3 words to explain.
Eg " Stop. Phone mummy now"

If she is struggling to process being only 3 she's probably only hearing your first 4 words at best and if they are not instructions she may well have not understood your meaning.

You can play lots of fun "Stop" games where you reward and have fun for her stopping..like freeze or dead lion games.

Best to you and your very little one.

Reading this, what comes across is the relentless focus on negative consequences. Sure, they have their place but have you tried positive reinforcement. E.g When you’ve put your shoes on, we’ll go and play with Freddy. Or try and make things fun/a competition. E.g I wonder who can put their shoes on the quickest? I bet I can etc. If she’s running off from the table, I’d just say, oh it looks like you’ve finished and take her plate away. Just some ideas, but I empathise as threenagers can be a menace!

What you describe isnt "not listening"
It's defiance and boundary testing.

I remove items or physically remove her or move us into a different room.

Getting out in the morning I mostly do " who is going to be first? Lets beat daddy! Can you beat mummy? Who is the slow coach? Yayyy you are so fast!" Etc
That includes shoes

How are we going to go to the party woth no shoes?!?! Then I count to 6 to give her a chance to respond.

If it all goes tits up with Shoes i say "okay fine" and carry her to the car and bring the shoes shes normally got with the program when we get where we are going

That’s exactly what I’m saying. Whether I phrase it as a choice or as “you’re doing this”, she will say “no” / run away, just not do it. And if I physically put her in the chair she would scream and immediately climb out

This is more than not listening as PP said, she's really testing you.

You need natural consequences as much as possible. "it's time to go, put your shoes on by the time I count to 10" start the countdown, at 5 "remember, it's shoe time, if you don't put them on, you'll go out without shoes". Continue the countdown and go. She walks out with no shoes, seconds later she will want them on.

Yes I think I should maybe try more positive things! But also, quite often if I say “when you’ve put your shoes on we can go and play with Freddie” she just… wont. She’s happy playing at home, she’s happy going to see friends. She’s happy to go see her grandparents or not see them. Doesn’t mind the park or the garden. If I take her plate away then she again doesn’t mind. Complains about being hungry later / not getting to have a nice snack when the rest of us do in a little while, but it doesn’t appear to affect her much and she just does it again.

She's too young to link taking her plate away with being hungry later. Encourage her to eat in a positive way instead. Eg "bet you can't finish before daddy" or "how many peas can you get in your mouth?". The consequence needs to be pretty immediate.

And if she doesn’t ask for shoes on?

Then put her back on the chair, every time. It’ll be exhausting for a while but she’ll get the message fairly quickly.
There might be some manhandling involved but I promise she won’t hold it against you when she’s a teenager.
she needs to realise that you are in charge, not her or your problems will get worse as she gets older and bigger.

Let her carry on. She won't be physically hurting, if she was, she'd ask for them. Eventually she'll ask.

Re the chair example, put her back every time.

Have you read How To Talk So Kids Will Listen? For some reason, the one that really worked for me was using a toy to do the instruction. So she would fight me to the death if I said to put shoes on, but go and do it straight away if toy rabbit 'said' it in rabbit's voice. Maybe that or one of the other suggestions in the book might work for you!

Go the other way, DS has a marble jar and has done since younger than your DC. Write up a list clear and colourful stick it on the fridge or in her room, things she gets marbles for, might be getting ready for bed on time, standing still so you can brush her teeth, not getting out of bed and running around at bed time, using her listening ears etc. When she does each thing she gets a marble in the jar, when the jar is full she gets a small prize (we often use comics or small sets of Lego because DS is obsessed) marbles can be lost as well as earned.

So the first ask is DD please put your shoes on now we're going out, Remind her, DD I have told you to put your shoes on now please, DD if you don't put your shoes on straight away you will lose a marble from your jar. Follow through with it. DS' list has changed over the years and he now has daily jobs like making his bed, clearing his plate and cup from the table etc (6). Use a clear jar and colourful marbles of different sizes. If ds is spontaneously helpful I'll give him a bonus one and pick a big one. It's really visual and children seem to respond well.
Also timers DS has a yoto player and it has a few, a tidy up timer, a toothbrushing timer etc, but you can probably get them on your phone

😂 I do this "DS time for a bath", "ugh I don't want to". (I go and get the schleich orca toy and put on a surprisingly deep voice) Come on DC I want a swim and I'm not allowed in by myself, it makes him laugh

I'd be saying 'ok maybe your too little to do it /forgotten how to do it yourself,il do it for you',and do it for her,if she's just wanting to check her boundaries take the fight out of it and don't make it a battle,shel soon be 'no I can go it im a big girl'.

My 2YO DS is exactly like this. We have implemented the time in step and bedroom. And manhandling. Sometimes he will throw something dangerous or not listen about climbing etc. I ask him and tell him, if you don't get down you have to go on the step. And then I pick him up and physically put him on the step. If he messes about on the step or starts having a tantrum then I'll say "no thank you, we don't want to see this behaviour, go in your room and calm down. Shout of mammy when you've calmed your body". Seems to be working 🤷🏻‍♀️
If he won't put shoes on then he doesn't go out. If he won't sit on the chair then he doesn't have his tea. Which means no dessert so eventually he sits in the chair 😅 we're struggling because of his age so he isn't properly talking yet and I can see he's frustrated with it. But most of his behaviour is choice and pushing boundaries. I have to be so consistent or it falls quickly behind. It's exhausting. Does she have much screen time? I find the defiant behaviour is worse if we've had a big bout of watching screens.

I ask once, Making sure she's looking at me in the eye so I know she's heard. Then I count to three which usually gets her to do the thing. If I get to the end of three I physically help her do the thing, or we do it together. E.g. I will take her by the hand to where the shoes are and start putting them on. Yes sometimes she's kicking and screaming but that's the consequence. Won't put shoes on herself, gets them put on by me.

I read once that the more you ask thats the minimum they will come to expect. So if they know you'll always ask ten times they'll just wait while you keep asking u til you get cross. DD knows I only ask once but I've been doing that since she was tiny so it's drilled in!

Mine is the same age. I say “Hmm. Seems you don’t want to do X. We can’t do Y then, what a shame.” Then I wander off. He always wants to do Y and so X gets done. This is backed up by him knowing that it absolutely will get done because I’m more stubborn than he is, but ultimately he wants something and so he has to do something to get it.

“I don’t want to go to bed!”
”you can get your pyjamas on a read 2 stories with me, or you can go straight to bed with no stories at all”
He picks the stories then goes to bed.

“I don’t want to brush my teeth!”
”That’s a shame because if we don’t brush our teeth we can never have things like biscuits because they would rot our teeth if we never brush”
He brushes his teeth.

“I don’t want to tidy up!”
”Alright. We can tidy up together or you can do no tidying at all and I’ll go find something to do by myself instead of going to the park like we planned.”
He tidies up with my help.

We do a lot of this with some success.

There are definitely times where there aren't such obvious natural consequences though like OP said that we really struggle with too though. Its a tricky age in some ways because they are starting to assert their own independence.

Using a toy to ask them to do things like another PP mentioned helps often too. That How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen is a helpful book, it's not a magic bullet but there are some good ideas in it worth trying.

In terms of natural consequences for going out etc maybe it's harder for your child if they're happy to stay at home though. My children have all always hated being at home compared to being busy out and about so not going somewhere, or leaving somewhere, are probably the most impactful potential natural consequences for them. They're also highly motivated by screen time which is daily but limited and usually tied to doing something else first, often tidying up. Same for dessert.

Definitely will vary from child to child what they’re driven by. There are days where my son would say “well I want to stay at home anyway” as he loves a day pottering at home. It’s not a gotcha though. He can stay at home but he still won’t be allowed to do anything that he wants to do if he doesn’t meet me half way with whatever it is I’m asking of him: brush teeth, get dressed etc.

Toys can stay in their baskets, we won’t be baking cakes if you ask, no I don’t feel like building duplo houses with you if you’re not going to do as you’re asked… and so on.

I don’t recall a single time my son has been able to not do something he’s been asked to do by me. But it’s backed up by him knowing that fun things only happen when we work together and I am absolutely willing to sit the pair of us in a room and do nothing until the thing is done anyway if it’s a complete non-negotiable. I come and go fairly with most things and I think that’s important too. Kids push back if they feel like their days are nothing but a string of demands from adults.

All of this will vary from child to child and with language ability too but I think the basic approach works.