time-outs for young toddlers

[chipper26]

Why are they so popular? I am not completely against them overall, but my dd is a week shy of 18 months and I don't see the value at this time.

I just had a conversation with someone about this and I said my dd is too young to put the the time-out and the thing she isn't supposed to be doing together. Maybe I'm wrong or not being completely honest. Maybe she is old enough to put the time-out with the behavior, but I just don't want to do it. I feel like the impulse control isn't there and I can't expect much control right now. Also, I think I need to redirect or tell her what she can do instead of the "no, don't do it" and then send her to time-out. It jsut seems do negative at this point, to separate her and make her feel "bad."

What are your thoughts on when time-outs become appropriate (if ever)? I would think it would be better to sit with the child during the time-out... or is that a "time-in"? So confused.

[ILovePie]

DS is 21 months.

I say we do timeouts, but I don't do it as a punishment. We don't really punish him at all. He doesn't have much impulse control - he rarely does things he really knows are not allowed. At this extent, the way we discipline is by saying x is going to happen if he hasn't done y by the time we count to 3. Something like that.

Anyway, the point of timeouts for us is to calm down. If he's losing it and can't be calmed down, he goes in his room for about 10-30 seconds, then he's ready for a hug.

I've put myself in timeout for the same reason a couple of times :chuckle:

[ssh]

You are right about the time outs and the lack of impulse control. I think people just want to feel they are doing something and redirecting doesn't give them that feeling. Also so many people end up in adversarial relationships with their LOs. The problem with not using punishment is that most LOs aren't going to have enough impulse control to behave nicely most of the time or have their good manners falling into place until close to 4 or later and alot of people aren't patient enough. Having a positive, pleasant co-operative relationship is worth the wait. I also think children who haven't been punished or treated rudely for the sake of 'discipline' end up better behaved than those who learn to behave out of fear of being punished.

Removing a child from a situation they are having trouble with and holding them or sitting with them for awhile is a 'time-in'. It works really well when a LO is persistently trying to do something dangerous or is trying to hit/bite/grab another child. I think using time out as a cooling off strategy for an older child is appropriate, but not as a punishment. For example telling a 6 year old "you seem in a rude mood, would you like to go to your room and play or read until you feel better". Also some families have a comfortable quiet place for their child to calm down. When my 4 year old is being rude, just asking her if she's angry usually helps. If she stressed painting seems to really help her unwind.

[JL83]

We didn't do "time-outs" at that age (well - we still don't do them). But we certainly found that DD was past the basic redirection stage. Simply redirecting her just made her really really really mad. So we needed a physical separation from the area that was causing the problem.

We'd go sit somewhere together for a few minutes until she was able to calm down. It was necessary for her to be removed. Especially if it was a sharing problem with a friend. (I know that sharing is really hard at that stage, but if there's another kid over she can't just grab everything out of their hands.)

[JL83]

Originally Posted by ssh

You are right about the time outs and the lack of impulse control. I think people just want to feel they are doing something and redirecting doesn't give them that feeling.

Some kids don't respond well to redirection. It worked very rarely on DD, mainly it just made her mad. It's only starting to work well on her now and she's 3.

[sapphire_chan]

Redirection does work, you just have to redirect her to something farther away than other people do with their kids.

[alicia622]

I am not a fan of time outs at all. Never have been. However we do use them when DS is being aggresive and we also use counting to 3 to get his cooperation. That works amazingly well and we don't ever (knock on wood) get to 3 befoe he cooperates. DS is 4.

[The4OfUs]

Everyone else already covered the whys of why people do time outs, and why traditional time outs aren't really appropriate for or beneficial to young toddlers, and how traditional time outs can actually backfire...


I'll just add that for some kids, time ins aren't great either - my kids do NOT like to be comforted/collected/contained when they're mad about being thwarted . They also do not like to talk things out in the moment. They just need to get out the emotion and move on. So sitting with/hugging them is not great in this household (which we learned the hard way), except on the rarest of occasions, which I can gauge pretty well.

When they were toddlers, mostly we just removed them from whatever room the situation was in and started another activity if they weren't able to be redirected. In the past year (DS will be 6 this month, DD is 3-1/2 - so this started when she was a little over 2-1/2), we've also sometimes moved them to their room and told them they needed to play in there for a while (to calm down, or because they weren't playing with X safely/kindly, or whatever reason). It's never a timed thing, and we do it in a "Calm down and find something else to do" type of way, not a "you were bad so you have to go away" way. In the past 6 months or so I have also been known to have the kids come into the room I'm in and sit on their butts across the room from other for a few minutes when they are getting crazy together (I work from home so can't always redirect and get involved in another activity if I'm working - I also do this if I'm cooking dinner and they go nutsy).

We reserve the "removing" for physical or intense verbal escalations, or damaging objects...basically, when things are escalating beyond what a discussion could fix. For everyday nonsense, we just address it as it comes with other techniques. I think that can be a problem with traditional time outs, they start being used for everyday problems, and being threatened to gain compliance, instead of as a break from an intense situation (i.e., taking some time out from the situation). At least that's the way I've seen them used by acquaintences in the traditional "do this or you'll go in time out" fashion.

[Addy's Mom]

Originally Posted by The4OfUs

I'll just add that for some kids, time ins aren't great either - my kids do NOT like to be comforted/collected/contained when they're mad about being thwarted . They also do not like to talk things out in the moment. They just need to get out the emotion and move on. So sitting with/hugging them is not great in this household (which we learned the hard way), except on the rarest of occasions, which I can gauge pretty well. .

Totally agree with this. We used time outs from about age 2 to 2.5 just as a measure to calm my whirlwind son down. Holding him would only make it worse. Now that he's got a better vocabulary, we can talk these things out better and don't use time out much at all (can't remember the last time). And holding him is actually working "better" now than it ever did, although I can see why that may never work for some kids. For us the miracle has been my son's growing ability to talk and reason. It makes discipline so much easier.

[The4OfUs]

Originally Posted by Addy's Mom

For us the miracle has been my son's growing ability to talk and reason. It makes discipline so much easier.

Except when they think their reasoning is WAY better than yours Or maybe that's just my kids.

[phathui5]

We do use time-out, but I don't see the point in starting it before 2 1/2 or 3 years old.

[flower01]

We just recently started using timeouts. DD is 2 1/2 and we had to do it because she was being too physically aggressive with the new baby so she just had to be separated. Now we've been using it more for moments when she is being deliberately defiant. She never sits in timeout for more than a minute - if that and it's definitely helping to sort of reset her. The thing thats hard for me and DH is to use the right terminology. I don't want it to be seen as punishment, but it's hard to not threaten a timeout.

[Umpqua]

My DS is 19 months and the couple of times I've put him in a chair (really to just redirect him and try to distract him from whatever he was doing), he thinks it's the funniest thing in the world. It honestly has no impact on him at this point and so there's no point in doing it. We just use redirection. But that could change in a few months. Now, my 3-year-old hates time outs and they are very effective in his case. We use them sparingly, and usually I only have to give him 1 warning that a time out is coming and he'll correct whatever he's doing. I think it's a conceptual thing, and I'm not sure how much younger toddlers understand that.

[Llyra]

I think the primary value of timeouts at that age is not to teach better behavior, but to contain genuinely out-of-control behavior when it occurs, so that other people and other people's property are not being damaged. I think another value of timeouts at that age is to give YOU the parent a minute to collect your patience again.

But I don't think the the standard punitive timeout serves much purpose at that age. I do use them, but starting closer to 2 1/2 or 3. My twins will be 3 in a few weeks, and we're only now starting to use them, mostly to deal with inter-sibling violence.

[olien]

My Lo is 17mo & we use a playpen in the kit to contain him when the dogs eat. I didnt want to do it, but he gets out of control running from dog to dog & reaching his hands in their bowls taking food. Our dogs are OK with it, but it could be dangerous somewhere else.

I tried redirecting - no luck. I've been doing it for about 1.5mo now. It IS helping the situation. I tell him that if he touches he will have to go into his playpen. he understands. Now,about 75% of the time he just sits right next to the bowl & points & talks to the dogs. I always remind him of the play pen if he tries to touch.

I do not just leave him in there. I am in view & we talk & sing & he has books & toys in there. I also use it if he starts to get rough with them which is more & more often I let him know that he must calm down & be gentle with the dogs.

Even though he is so young, I do think in this case the time out has helped with the dogs eating. I hope it works as well him being rough/hitting them too.

So I agree with others, but I do think in possibly dangerous situations it may be of some help.

[unschoolinmom]

Time outs didn't work here either. However, counting does work. I start to count to 10 and they stop and listen. In the beginning I had to do it tons, now I don't which is good.

Another thing that I use instead of time out and yes it sounds crazy, but my kids love it, I give them something to clean. I hand them a broom or cloth and send them to clean a part of the house. It gives them time to think and relax.

[Materfamilias]

DD is 17 mo and I honestly don't think she would get time out at all. I mostly just remove her from whatever is the problem. She's not terribly pleased, but since I always warn her first I don't feel too bad about it. She's very hard to redirect or distract. She has laser focus.

[cmhermes]

We do time-ins to talk about what happened and listen and try to identify the emotions they are feeling and how we can do it differently. This works at times with my 3 yr old, but most of the time she just needs time to cry and scream.

[frontierpsych]

My son is only 16 months, but I don't think we'll be using time outs, they just don't seem to mesh with our family's discipline style. I think a lot can be said for taking that time to offer comfort and explanations. It still removes the child from the situation and prevents it from escalating, but it uses that same time as a learning and bonding opportunity instead of punitive punishment and abandonment.

[phurryjenn]

I generally have a stronger belief towards using punishment that fits the behavior. For example, If I tell a child "don't grab that cookie yet" and then they do, the punishment (consequence) would be something along the line of not getting to eat the cookie. Obviously the consequence would change as needed to the situation, as well as the child's age.

My DS is only 17 months, and while he does not get "Time Out" as a punishment, he does get "Time to Himself" when he shows unfavorable behavior. I find that when I give him around 10 minutes to himself, he comes back to the group with a much better attitude. I think once and a while he just needs to re-center. I'm sure it would not work for all children, but it's working out great for us.