Bill Corbett

Eight year old Sarah is playing a board game with her brother. Everything is going along well until the boy wins. Sarah gets mad and a meltdown ensues. In another common scenario, five year old Tommy is watching a cartoon on his mother’s iPad. Mom tells Tommy that it’s time to leave and she shuts off the iPad. Tommy throws himself on the floor and begins screaming. Before I go further with this problem, please take note that this or any of my other articles are not substitutes for family therapy. They contain basic parenting advice for common situations. If your child is demonstrating serious challenging behaviors it is always a good idea to seek out the advice of a behavior health professional. Start with your child’s pediatrician to determine appropriate next steps. From toddler to school age, the kind of behavior I described in the first paragraph can drive parents nuts. Their first response is often scolding, sympathy, or even lecturing. I’ve seen many parents go rig...

When a young child throws an object, it’s a parent’s reactive response to scold the child and take that object away from him. He may then pick up another object and throw that one, pushing the adult to anger and frustration. And if he doesn’t do it again right away, his fear of the parent may stop his actions for the moment, only to have him do it at some point later on. A parent asked me for help with her child throwing a toy at the ceiling light in his room. Another one asked me how to stop her son from trying to get his socks and underwear hooked on the fins of the ceiling fan in his room. In each of these situations, the parent’s first response was to punish the child by making him pay for damage to the ceiling light fan or even emptying his room of all objects. Melissa and Doug Sunny Patch Verdie Chameleon Beanbag Toss I’m certainly not going to advise allowing children to continue this destructive behavior, nor am I going to suggest punishing the child. We’ve been train...