Teaching Your Toddler Manners

Being a Toddler is so tough. You have just learned how to walk and now your trying to learn how to talk. As you start to pick up the language, your mom and dad start trying to introduce their version of manners.

It all starts with words like "

taa". Mom has my drink, say 'taa' she says, before giving it to me. Aw, mom, just hand it over. You want taa - ok - ta, ta ,ta ,ta I am going to give you ta all day.

All jokes aside, language development starts off slowly but you would be surprised at how quickly they pick up on things. For the parent, this is the perfect time to introduce some of the concepts of manners.

If you as a parent use phrases such as 'please' and 'thank you', your child will automatically start to add them to their vocabulary. Habits learned at this young age are habits that will stay with them for a lifetime.

Being able to set a good example helps to establish behavior patterns. Simple actions like grabbing something from a toddler will only serve to teach them to snatch. If you use the gentler method of saying please and gently removing the item, the child learns to be gentle themselves. Even at a young age it is important to communicate. If a child has an item that needs to be removed, explain why they should hand it to you.

Setting examples should go beyond your interaction with the child. Using manners when dealing with the rest of the family is of utmost importance. The toddler can start to see that this is the norm, the standard within the family.

Once your toddler starts to repeat this behavior you can start to prompt with gentle reminders when they forget. Repetition is the key along with creating a pleasant atmosphere. Under no circumstances should you punish a child when they forget. At this age forgetting manners can be attributed to excitement, being overtired or just in a hurry.

Once your toddler begins to say 'please' and 'thank you' without prompting, praise them each time they remember to do so.  Positive reinforcement makes them feel good about themselves and provides a great incentive to repeat the action.

As your toddler gets older and starts to interact with children their own age, bad habits will start to creep in. They will inevitably display rude behavior that they have observed in others. Toddler and small children do not understand the power of words and much they can hurt people's feelings.

When your child displays this behavior you need to step in and explain why that type of behavior is inappropriate. One positive response is to try to get your child to see things from the other person's point of view. This is far more effective than punishing the child.

One of the cutest things in life is to listen to a well mannered young child. To hear that softly spoken thank you makes such a contrast to the world we live in. The pure innocence is something which at times I wish we could bottle and pass around to the rest of the world.

It takes time and a little persistence, most of all, it takes a good role model to instill the art of good manners. It is well worthwhile the effort when your toddler begins to use good manners as an automatic response. The reward is to see your toddler grow into a well mannered individual - it can be so uplifting to hear others comment on the good manners of your child.

Oh - and thank you for reading this :)