Conflicts are part of learning. It helps to remember this when you are faced with a preschooler who is acting up! This article is geared to adults working with children 3-5 years old in a group care setting, but is helpful for other care providers too!
Making Positive Rules
To create a safe climate for learning and an effective approach to disciplining your preschoolers, make simple and clear rules that are based on safety. Preschoolers are able to understand simple rules, and should be expected to follow them. Here is a sample list of rules based on safety:
- Walk inside. Run outside.
- Use kind words and touches.
- Be kind to our things.
- Listen while others are talking.
- Put away toys when finished.
When creating your rules, always state them in a positive way. Instead of telling your preschoolers what they shouldn’t do, encourage what they should do. For example, say, “Walk inside” instead of “Don’t run’” say “Keep your feet on the floor” instead of “Don’t stand on the furniture;” and say “Keep your food on the plate’ instead of “Don’t throw your food on the floor.” Research has shown that small people (and adults) typically remember the last word or idea they hear. When you say, “Don’t run” to your preschoolers, they may only hear the word “run!” You don’t want to give them any ideas!
Including Your Preschoolers
Preschoolers are more likely to follow rules when they take part in the rule-making process. When teaching or caring for a new group of preschoolers, sit down as a group and create your rules together. Guide your rule-making session so that all important safety rules are covered, and make sure they understand that class rules are based on safety. You may discover that your preschoolers’ ideas match your list of rules! A sense of right and wrong is developed at a very young age, and preschoolers will often know rules before they are ever spoken.
As the rules are decided, write them on a large piece of paper and read them back to the group, pointing to the words as you read them. Leave room to the left of each brief rule for drawing or gluing a picture that illustrates the idea. Before preschoolers can read words, they “read” by understanding the meaning of pictures. Label your rules with pictures to encourage your preschoolers’ literacy skills. It also helps to read the rules daily during your large group time.
Encouraging Appropriate Behaviors
Rules are meant to train children to be kind, respectful, and safe—all skills necessary to be social and participate in society. You must do your part to train the children in your care. The following approaches will encourage the behaviors you want:
- Create an environment that allows for safeexploration. An ideal preschooler environment is organized, has no wide-open spaces (open spaces invite running and rough-housing), and has clearly defined areas. In the early years of brain development, many pathways are formed. Some of these pathways are created by our interactions with the space around us. Children in messy, disorganized spaces feel stress, and this stress can make them misbehave. Create separate play areas in your classroom to decrease behavior problems and increase your preschoolers’ ability to learn. Bookshelves, tables, chairs, plants, or easels can be used to separate one area from another.
- Redirect misbehavior.Get to know your preschoolers, and be alert to the warning signs that always come before trouble starts. Warning signs include a sudden increase in noise level, an increase in physical play, or any display of restlessness or tension. At these moments, change the mood by engaging the children in a song, reading a story, or providing other alternative activities.
- Give a lot of positive attention to your preschoolers when they are behaving in ways that you like.Studies have shown that children will repeat behaviors that attract the attention they want and need. Remember, children often misbehave just to get attention.
Correcting Misbehavior
Of course, your preschoolers will make mistakes and misbehave despite your best efforts. After all, they are just beginning to learn how to become little citizens. It is important to address your preschoolers’ misbehaviors. When your preschoolers misbehave, practice the methods below. Remember, when handling a child who is misbehaving, it is best to be clear, firm, and kind.
- Follow three steps when talking to your preschoolers about their misbehaviors. When your preschooler has misbehaved, (1) firmly identify the inappropriate behavior. For example say, “you hit your friend.” Then, (2) tell her why her behavior is harmful or unsafe. For example, say, “Hitting hurts her. You may not hurt our friends.” Then, (3) give her another behavior option, and restate the appropriate behavior. For example, say, “I can see that you are very upset. If you need to hit, you can hit this pillow or the couch. When you are finished hitting, you need to sit and calm down before you can play again. You may not hurt our friends. If you cannot follow these rules, then you will need to play by yourself. Everyone deserves to be safe in our class—including you.”
Remember to talk in simple language to your preschoolers about:
- How she has been harmful or hurtful;
- Why her behavior is inappropriate, and
- What the correct behavior is. Give her a better way to express her feelings, and remind her about the consequences for breaking the rule.
- Be consistent when delivering consequences. You must be consistent with consequences. It is the only way your preschoolers will learn that their behaviors are not acceptable. Consequences, like rules, need to be logical and related to maintaining healthy relationships and safety. For example, if a child is harming another child, the consequence is she needs to play by herself until she can get along. Of course, in this scenario, you need to be sure she knows howto play and interact with others. If she needs more training, then shadowing her a bit and offering coaching may be necessary. If he’s wreaking the art area, then he can’t play in it for a bit. Then you’ll try again later or tomorrow, and if he still wreaks it then he needs to be removed from the area until he can choose to be appropriate. (If you have a preschooler in your care who continues to be a threat to others after several attempts over time, she may be in need of more direct attention from a mental health professional or behavior specialist. Consult your family or school doctor.)
- Encourage your preschoolers to “use their words” and to solve conflicts between themselves. When your preschoolers are first learning to solve conflicts, help them by giving them appropriate words to use and a lot of support. Ask each child to tell the other child or children what happened (“you hit me”), how that made them feel (angry, hurt, sad, or confused), and ask them to state what they don’t like. For example, “I don’t like to be hit,” “What you said hurt my feelings,” or “I don’t like it when you take my toy.” Encourage the child who has caused harm to shake hands or give his friend a hug. Giving children who have caused harm an opportunity to behave kindly helps them cope with guilty feelings.
After several months of helping your preschoolers solve their problems, step back and encourage them to solve these problems on their own. Encourage them by saying, “Remember to use your words. Tell him what you want him to stop, and how that makes you feel.” When your preschoolers have some practice solving their problems, your encouragement can be a brief reminder, such as, “Use your words! I know you two can work this out with each other.”
Solving conflicts between preschoolers may be messy at first. Remember, your patience and consistency is vital to helping them develop good relationship skills. Teaching your preschoolers to solve their problems on their own is important to their development and to kindergarten readiness.
- Immediately stop harmful or unsafe behaviors. If a preschooler is causing harm to himself, another person, or property, you must immediately stop the harmful behavior. Walk your preschoolers through the three steps outlined above, and implement a cool-down time for the preschooler who is causing harm. The purpose of this cool-down is to restore a safe environment quickly, and to help the child calm down. Place a comfortable chair or bean bag away from the play area, and expect the child to stay there until calm (if possible.)
Cooling down or time outs should only be used when a preschooler is endangering himself, another, or property. Many teachers and parents use time-outs as punishment for a wide range of misbehaviors. While this kind of punishment works with some children and for some unwanted behaviors, it does not teach or encourage the right behaviors, and it does not work for all children. Children who receive only punishment (instead of positive discipline) when they are misbehaving do not learn to make better behavior choices. In addition, they typically wait for an outside force to stop them from making bad choices, instead of trying to solve the conflict on their own.
- Use redirection and positive discipline. The redirection and positive discipline strategies discussed in this article are much more effective for stopping and correcting unwanted behaviors, and should be used as much as possible. For example, if a preschooler hoards toys and refuses to share, he needs to learn that if he continues to do this, no one will want to play with him. As a result, he might feel lonely, and miss out on the fun of playing with others. If he is immediately sent to “time-out” for this behavior, he will lose the opportunity to learn from other children why this behavior will hurt him in the long run.
Children truly need to understand why misbehavior is a bad choice from both a personal and a social perspective. Your preschooler will learn to make better choices when faced with real-life situations during play. He will learn a great deal more when you step in and lovingly help him to understand that his behavior caused his friends to leave him alone. At this point, you can offer him new ideas for playing.
- Avoid spanking and yelling. Spanking and yelling are other forms of punishment. Again, these techniques are not as effective as guiding your children though natural consequences. Adults must show children the behavior they want before they can expect children to behave in appropriate ways. Spanking is especially not recommended, because it teaches that hitting is an acceptable way to solve problems. A child who is spanked learns that when he is angry or has conflicts with others, he can hit them. By finding other ways to discipline your child, you are doing your part to teach nonviolence.
- Avoid giving stamps, stickers, stars, or treats for appropriate behaviors. Although many children will behave well for short periods of time so that can get a goody, studies have shown that children often become bored with these rewards. A teacher or parent will always need to provide a new-and-improved treat to top the last reward. Otherwise, children will repeat the unwanted behaviors. If an adult is not present to give a reward for good behavior, many times children will misbehave—they have to have a reason to behave well when an adult is not around!
Disciplining a child will be more effective if the child struggles with making right choices based on natural rewards—rewards like the feeling of belonging when his friends invite him to play because he shares, says kind words, and uses soft touches. When a preschooler learns appropriate behaviors based on natural rewards, he will often choose to behave well with or without the direction of an adult.
Positive Discipline in Action
Ernest has just told Marco that he’s stupid. Marco is crying. Here is an example of positive discipline in action:
- You see Marco crying, and Ernest laughing and pointing at Marco. You go over to the boys, and squat down to their eye level. You ask Marco why he is crying. He may point, gesture, or use words. Give him a chance to let you know what happened. If he is too upset to use words, say, “you are too upset to talk right now. I’m sorry that you are hurting. Try washing your face in the sink. That may help you calm down. When you feel better, we can talk. Would you like a friend to go with you?” If he can tell you what happened, reflect back to him, “Ernest said you were stupid, and that hurt your feelings. Those are hurtful words! I’m sorry he did that.”
- Turn to Ernest, be firm and kind, and say, “You told Marco he is stupid. That is a hurtful thing to say, and you may not hurt our friends. I will give you another chance to use kind words with your friends while you are playing. If you cannot use kind words, then you will need to play by yourself. You may not hurt our friends.”
- Encourage Ernest to help his hurt friend feel better by using his words, shaking hands with Marco, or giving Marco a hug. This last step helps the child who caused harm to make up for the hurt caused.