Sadie was playing at her sand table a few days ago when she decided that the sand looked much better on Nani’s porch than it did on the table top. The conversation that followed went like this:
Me: “Sadie, you know the rules. Keep the sand on the table.”
Sadie: Looks up and makes sure I’m watching before dumping another cup of sand on the deck.
Me: “Do you want a time out.”
Sadie: Turns back to the sand table and then stands still for a second before saying in a very clear voice- “Yeah!”
Me: “You want a time out?”
Sadie: “Yeah!” She then turns and looks at me.
Me: “You like timeouts?”
Sadie: “Yeah.” She then goes and walks over to the front door. When Paul opens it she goes inside and stands in the corner with her hands up to her face against the wall. I follow her inside.
Me: “What are you doing?”
Sadie: Stands silently against the wall, waiting for a timeout.
Me: “Okay… one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.”
Sadie: Continues to stand against the wall. Most of her timeouts are twenty seconds.
Me: “Sadie?”
Sadie: Turns around and giggles and runs back into the living room the play.
So… timeouts are fun… I think I’m going to have my hands full before two long!
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
1 comment:
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Take my advice with a grain of salt, but here it goes. Usually time outs should be a minute per year of age. For example, two years old two minutes or six years old six minutes. If Sadie thinks it's fun, it could be that she views it as a counting game. So I would set a timer that you can't really hear. Don't know though. Like I said, it's advice you can take or not take. It's just the standard day care discipline fare for you.
ReplyDeleteI hate giving advice to other parents unless they ask for it so I really debated about the suggestion. But it seems that you're struggling with trying to get her to realize that this is a punishment so I thought I could at least say something. Again, you don't have to follow my advice.