Where is your time-out spot?
For those of you who use "time outs"...I'm wondering where moms of toddlers (especially younger toddlers) put their babes for time-out, and how well it's been working.
I'm reading 1-2-3 Magic and although Audrey is a little young for this yet, I've used one time-out with her where I put her in her crib, and she seemed to get the picture. She's such a good sleeper, though, that I dont' want her to develop any negative association with her crib. Am I worrying over nothing? I know she's safe there.
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
We put fit throwing children on the bottom step to sit and cool off for a few moments. :D
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
Like the book suggests, I just use her room. For TO, I put her in her room and shut the door. I usually don't go the full two minutes though, because she's often hysterical and I can't stand to let her go that long.
The book also says not to talk about the infraction after the TO, but I find that DD often WANTS to talk about it. So we talk about it, but I don't say anything like "why did you do that?", I just re-iterate the message: we don't hit, we don't kick, we are nice to the doggie, etc.
HTH,
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
I put Arielle in her room for time outs. She has a saftey knob on the inside of her door so she can't get out, but I doubt she would try anyhow. The first time, she thought it was great fun and would just go play with her toys and not want to come out. Byt after the second time she got the picture that they aren't fun. I ususally wait about 2 minutes. Like Beth, I ususally reiterate what she shouldn't do ("No screaming" or "We have to listen"). I've heard people have a lot of success with putting their kids in their cribs for TOs, but like you I was hesitant to make it a negative place for her so I've never done that. Her room works well, though. I should add that if Daliya is sleeping in there at the time I'll put Arielle in the bathroom--she'd wreck havoc on our bedroom!--and that seems to work fine too.
-Rachel
Mom to Arielle Jill, 10/30/01
and Daliya Samantha, 10/27/03
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
Well DS is 25 months old and when he does something wrong I make him sit down (pretty much no matter where we are) hold his hands so he can't hit me (he tries!) and tell him he is in time out and tell him we have to wait until he says sorry. For now this works quite well and then he gets to make the decision on how long the time out is, usually less than 1 minute, a few instances it's more. He hates it and it has seemed effective to us. When he gets older and says sorry immediately I'll just change it to time out then say your sorry to the offender.
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
Well it used to be in her room but since she finds her room so much fun, we've moved T/O downstairs to a corner. Nothing like telling said child that she's going for a T/O in her room and her running up the stairs with a huge smile yelling "okay!". We've have actually had to resort to turning the chair into the corner and barricading her in with the infant carrier or bouncy seat because she just didn't get it. She'd get up, talk, think it was a game, never cry, etc...
And since we haven't had to do that many T/O's with her, the message has been slow to get across. However, we have had better luck with it lately.
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
We ask Elijah to sit down with his back against the wall in whatever room we are in because when we tried it in his room he had too good of a time playing! We haven't had to do too many, thank goodness. Sometimes he repeats the behavior immediately after the time-out ends, I'm sure as a way to test if he will always get a time out (for hitting or similar). When we send him right back into a time-out, he "gets it."
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
We use a boring corner of a hallway downstairs. When she was younger and didn't stand still, I used that corner and had her sit in her Fisher Price Infant to Toddler chair (don't know if FP still offers this chair) facing the wall. She didn't like that one bit. Now for time outs she can stand and stay in the corner facing the wall.
I tried her room upstairs in the beginning, but it was a trek to go upstairs to her room. Besides, she really didn't consider going into her room a problem because she has so much fun in there.
HTH!
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
Well I use DD's room. Normally this works but this weekend we had some potty regression and she started playing with all her toys! SO I took all of the toys out of her room and locked them up in the playroom and suddenly she realized that purposely 'forgetting' to use the potty was NOT a good idea. Yesterday was accident free and so far today is too! :)
In the past I have also used gated play areas and a high chair for time outs.
RE: Where is your time-out spot?
Sarah,
Thanks for asking this question. We've never used time outs with Matt, but after reading everyone's answers I realize that we need to! I was always wondering about what to do about Matt hitting, now I think I have a better idea.
Do you like 1-2-3 Magic? Does it seem helpful and practical?