HOW. DO. YOU. MAKE. THEM. OBEY.

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Forum -> Chinuch, Education & Schooling

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thegiver

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 1:48 am

Clean up after yourself
Don’t touch that
Don’t climb up there
Don’t sit on my chair
That’s muktza
Don’t hurt each other
Come inside the house NOW

Smile

thanks in advance!

amother

Chocolate

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 4:12 am

As far as muktza, say it once then let it go until they're old enough to appreciate it better.
As far as the other requests, I've found parenting books helpful.

amother

Emerald

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 4:42 am

YOU. DON'T.

THEY make YOU be more ASSERTIVE.

gigi

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 6:41 am

Bribery

amother

Puce

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 7:10 am

Keep calm. Say it once. Consequences... (Muktza not applicable, it's a matter of maturity)

Zehava

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 7:30 am

Wish I knew
I’m over here just wingin it

amother

Seafoam

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 7:58 am

How did your mother make. You. Obey?

Alternative

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 8:05 am

You change mindset . Today's generation is not one to obey.
You want them to cooperate, to listen, to understand, to internalize values.
The word obey is all wrong. It connotes a power struggle and force.

amother

Lavender

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 8:08 am

amother wrote:

How did your mother make. You. Obey?

I'd rather my kids NEVER obeyed me than be the mother to them that my mine was to me.
Though I find clam and repetitive works every time.

Culturedpearls

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 8:12 am

Choices.
Give them a choice (either one should be ok with you)
“Would you like to come inside now or in 5 minutes?”
“You can put that down now and I’ll give you XYZ or you can go play in your room”
It doesn’t always work because often the child will choose another option he wants. You can restate that it wasn’t one of the options & either they choose or you will.
Giving the child the power of choice will usually prevent power struggles.
This will eventually become a habit for you. It does take a bit longer than barking out a command but it’s the long but short way.
Unless you’re dealing with serious behavioral issues like oppositional defiance you should see good results.
With muktza , like others said , state your piece & ignore.

bigsis144

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 8:21 am

I honestly don’t remember what my mother did or said, I was just a goody-two-shoes (with some eldest-child martyrdom sprinkled on top) who valued “being good” and “making Ima/Aba/HaShem happy”.

Sure, sometimes I still didn’t want to wash the dishes or I left my clothes all over my room, but deep down I understood that fighting with my siblings wasn’t nice, or setting the table for Shabbos made our home Shabbosdik, or sweeping the floor kept crumbs from tracking all over the house.

I get no indications from my children that I am worthy of their consideration, let alone their (ahava) respect or (yirah) obedience.

My kids utterly ignore my attempts at reason, even simple proactive reminders like, “I see you’re done with your [disposable] bowl and spoon - please remember to throw it in the garbage” will get DS to literally cry, “why do I always have to do EVERYTHING around here?!” (And woe betide me if I got distracted and have to ask them to clean up after they’ve already moved onto the next thing...)

On Shabbos, children were running around the house wildly despite my warnings and knocked over the entire very full garbage can (as I was clearing the table all by myself, naturally). “Natural Consequences” would mean an almost 9 and 6 year old should clean it up, right? *laughter turning into tears* yeah RIGHT. They both just blamed one another, cried that garbage is disgusting, ran away when I bent down to show them how to use a paper towel to shield my hand from the garbage and pick it up, ignored my point that “so should the garbage just stay here because you don’t want to clean it? We all keep our house clean together”, blamed each other some more (“I wasn’t the one who bumped it”, “he was chasing me!”, “I didn’t do it on purpose!”, “he should clean up, not me!”...)

Queen6

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 10:46 am

Join a parenting course. Get help. Sari Yaraslowitz is tops.
Kids can and should obey but keep in mind they’d are not soldiers and robots.

smss

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 11:39 am

Preschool age?

It's tough. Be as positive as possible and don't underestimate the power of distraction!

mommy201

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 12:17 pm

Blimie Heller parenting class ! Unconditionparenting@gmail.com

pause

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 1:58 pm

Alternative wrote:

THIS.
It's about your relationship with them.

I also noticed how most of your examples are "don't." It's always better rephrased as the positive. "Be nice to each other." and "It's Shabbos now." and "I'd like to sit on my chair; please get off."

keym

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 2:12 pm

Pick your battles. The muktza thing, I would say once and give it up.
Everything else, choices as much as possible (clean up red Lego or green Lego), bribes, and reasonable chores.
My rule is after supper they must clear their own plate before they go outside. I have gone out and pulled them in from their friends to clear their plate. They realize its not enough of a big deal to fight me.
I do a lot of cleaning their age or double their age. They clear their age at the shabbos seudah. So the 12 yr old clears 12, and the 3 yr old clears 3.

amother

Sapphire

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 3:22 pm

thegiver wrote:

Clean up after yourself
Don’t touch that
Don’t climb up there
Don’t sit on my chair
That’s muktza
Don’t hurt each other
Come inside the house NOW

Smile

thanks in advance!

If you want obedient children - they need to regard you an authority figure. Do they?

oliveoil

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 4:08 pm

I noticed on another thread from today that you wrote your kids are 5 and younger. To me this indicates that you have unrealistic expectations. Your kids are babies/toddlers/pre-school age. This is an age for teaching and being very actively engaged in making things happen. Expecting to bark out instructions and them to follow is just not realistic.

"clean up after yourself" - at this age a) you need to be doing it alongside them, and b) break the task down into specific instructions. Pick up all the magna-tiles and put them into this bin, for example. And them sit with them while they do it.

"don't touch that" - depends what it is, but it probably needs to be out of reach if it's really something dangerous or important.

"don't climb up there" - you take them down and say "no climbing" or "feet on the floor" or some such. The less words the better. Long explanations are lost at that age.

"don't sit on my chair" - redirect them to where you do want them to sit. "this is your chair. I sit here. You sit there."

"that's muktza" - they're way too young to be responsible for this. Put it out of reach of just ignore it.

"don't hurt each other" - you'll be dealing with that one for many more years...

"come inside the house now" - you may have to physically direct them/lead them/walk them inside while saying, "it's time to go inside now." Also try talking about what you're going to do once you get inside. Even if it's not anything particularly enticing, just having a list of what you're going to do next can be enough to get their cooperation.

pause

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 4:18 pm

For such young children, I've found Sara Jaroslowitz's methods very effective, the Hand over Hand and Separate without Comment.

amother

Brunette

Sun, Jul 22 2018, 4:25 pm

1-2-3 Magic! by Thomas Phelan.

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