The Naughty Corner - is there a place for it?

Dear fellow users,

A few friends of mine have asked me lately how I deal with negative behaviour of my toddler son, should it arise. My toddler will be two in July. They have never seen him

grab a toy from another child, reach for food without asking, push another child or run ragged up and down corridors or through the house etc. I'm not saying that my son is an angel, he is not, but as soon as he tries a behaviour that I do not want to encourage, I stop him. And he usually does try everything for the first time at home. It doesn't matter where we are though, I am not scared of what other parents will think of me for disciplining my child. I guess that's because I believe that my discipline is fair and respects my child's dignity. My study to become a teacher has also helped me with this I think.

I use a combination of positive and negative reinforcement. I think about the future, and whether or not the actions that he does now which might be funny (such as putting a bowl of cereal over his head) would still be funny if he continued to do it. If I can imagine that his behaviour will be undesirable in the future, I do not laugh. And this is not to say that there is no laughter in our household! There are plenty of tickles, funny faces, wrestles, games of hide and seek and boo, to name a few.  

I try to remain aware at all times of what my son is doing, so that even if I haven't managed to stop him from drawing on the lounge in time, I have caught him straight after the act, and this is when I will point out what he has done wrong, and tell him that he is only allowed to draw on the paper. He also knows that when I shake my head he has done something to upset me. He may not always understand my words, but he understands the tone of my voice and my body language. I do not discipline him straight away. After all, he is still learning what is and is not acceptable in this life, how would he know if I didn't teach him? Would he respect me if I made him feel bad for something he didn't even know was wrong? I believe he wouldn't. I also believe that if I did discipline the first time he upset me it would lead him to rebel more often if even just to try to sort out his own confusion about my reactions to his behaviour. If he attempts a second time to act out the same unwanted behaviour, I count to three to give him a chance to stop. He usually does. If he doesn't, I  send him to the naughty corner. I could call the corner anything, and some people think that the word 'naughty' is wrong, but one word has to be chosen to reflect an unwanted behaviour, so that is my choice.

In public, I have not used the naughty corner yet. Instead, I take him away from the activity he is enjoying, and sit him with me. It is still a time out, just not in a spot away from everybody. That way, he does not become embarrassed in front of anyone. I don't know if he actually would feel embarrassed as he is so young, but in the future he will, so I want to make sure I carry on the same consequences in the future. If he won't stay still, I would just leave the area with him and go somewhere he can not get into trouble. This happened to me once in Church. He was trying to stand on the pew so I sat him on my lap but he wriggled so forcefully he got out of my arms. I caught him and took him outside. We looked at the flowers in the garden, the cars, and traffic, went for a little walk then returned to the Church. This example also brings me to the point that I try to imagine things from his perspective too. Sitting for a long time as a toddler is extremely boring! So there has to be a little give and take. 

I have seen 'time out' pads for sale, but for the naughty corner, I just use the timer from my microwave, and I give him 1 minute for each year of his age (which equates to almost 2 minutes now)  to sit in the corner (I read this timing strategy somewhere before, but I can't remember where from sorry!) I started this practice at a very young age for my son...when he started the unwanted behaviour, such as tearing a page from a book (at about 12 months). He didn't understand it at first, he just sat there and looked at me. When he tried to get up, I just sat him back down until the timer went off. I stood with him, I didn't walk away. It didn't upset him at all, and he didn't know then that the naughty corner was a consequence of his behaviour, supposed to be an undesirable way to spend his time. However, I stuck to my plan, thinking that in the future, this would work. He wasn't playing with his toys, and no-one was interacting with him. ( I also rely on support from my husband. It don't think it would work if my husband didn't agree with this or share my values). Eventually he did start to become upset when he was placed in the corner. Loving my son and not wanting to see him upset, and at the same time remembering that sometimes I have to be 'tough' in order for him to learn what isn't acceptable in our house, I combined love with punishment. Once the time is up, we have cuddles and kisses. I play another game with him, to show him that he is still deserving of my attention and praise. I forgive him straight away, regardless of whether the unwanted behaviour was only a little or a lot distressing to me. I find that his behaviour improves markedly when I employ this technique. The unwanted action is hardly ever repeated.

Where possible, I try also to match behaviour with consequence. So if he throws anything, I make him pick it up. 'Making' a toddler do anything is difficult! But I find that if I sit with him and help just a little, praising him for every time he does the right thing, he actually wants to help fix the problem.

It is a very deep belief of mine that if you provide enough attention to your child and if you are a good role model, cleaning up your own messes, saying sorry, showing affection to your partner and your child and giving your child the respect to make their own decisions, guiding them gently but firmly when they make mistakes, they will always want to please you. Keep posted in the future just in case that changes because I have no idea if this will work when he is a teenager! However in all my years of teaching primary school aged children, the most dificult of students have always seemed to improve when the consequences of their actions have been carried out with me right there with them, instead of walking around with another teacher at lunch time or sitting in the office, feeling humiliated. Taking an interest in their lives too, always seemed to help them to feel comfortable with me. I guess if I'm interested in their feelings, they're interested in my feelings too. So I apply the same with my own child. I respect him and I hope that in turn he respects me.

In summary, I do believe that there is a place for the naughty corner, my son is very well behaved at home and when I take him out (most of the time!) so it has worked for me. I also believe though, that more importantly, there's a place for love, trust and respect.