Are My Ideas of Discipline at Daycare Completely Inappropriate?

[Anonymous]

I've posted several times over the past month about my 5 year old hitting other kids at daycare. I've discovered that when he does it, they give him a three minute time out and then talk to him about "using his words" to express frustration. He knows he's supposed to use his words, and he does everywhere but day care.

I don't think this is enough for my strong-willed, impulsive child, and I've suggested that if he hits during recess, he be made to sit out the rest of recess. Instead of sitting up against the wall for 3 minutes, sit there for 20. Time outs stopped working for him 2 years ago and what works best is taking away privileges.

Is this too harsh or unreasonable for a day care? If it were any other type of behavior, I wouldn't care as much, but hitting is unacceptable.

[Anonymous]

bump - would love to hear opinions. TIA

[Anonymous]

What has the response been when you've suggested this? My guess is it may be a supervision issue - if your child sits out the remainder of recess, one of the teachers may need to sit with him the entire time, which means there's one less person to watch all of the other kids. Can you give a consequence at home? I know that made a difference when our daughter was going through a biting phase at two and a half - you bite your friends, we don't play Legos at home that afternoon.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What has the response been when you've suggested this? My guess is it may be a supervision issue - if your child sits out the remainder of recess, one of the teachers may need to sit with him the entire time, which means there's one less person to watch all of the other kids. Can you give a consequence at home? I know that made a difference when our daughter was going through a biting phase at two and a half - you bite your friends, we don't play Legos at home that afternoon.

Thanks. Their response is that it's not "necessary" to make him miss all of recess, and yes, thinking about it, it could be a supervision issue, which I completely understand. I suggested that they call me if he hits and I will immediately pick him up and take him home and it will NOT be pleasant (no TV, toys, outdoor play the rest of the day, and most likely sitting in the kitchen for at least an hour with nothing to do). My thought behind that was that it would be more immediate, and it's much easier for me to watch one kid 100% of the time than it is for them. They nixed that, and said taking him home would be rewarding him.

Yes, I have been giving consequences at home, but don't know if they are immediate enough to be effective.

I've started a reward system this week, which I generally dislike. He should just be good. But I can't tolerate the hitting. I am hoping this at least breaks him of his habit and helps give him the strength/self-control to see he "can" handle the situation differently.

[Anonymous]

You don't think time outs work, but you want him to have a longer rest of recess time out? That doesn't make sense to me.

If you think taking away privledges works with your son, then take away a priviledge every night he hits. A 5 year old can make the connection, even if it happens a few hours later.

[Anonymous]

Isn't 5 years old a bit old to be in daycare? Or is it a daycare/preschool type situation? Is he with other kids his age doing age appropriate activities?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You don't think time outs work, but you want him to have a longer rest of recess time out? That doesn't make sense to me.

If you think taking away privledges works with your son, then take away a priviledge every night he hits. A 5 year old can make the connection, even if it happens a few hours later.

They'd be taking away recess/outdoor time, which he loves, and which seems to be his trigger point.

I've taken away privileges for the past six weeks at home. It hasn't worked.

[Anonymous]

I teach in ES and we sometimes have students who miss out on part of recess walk up and down a path when they are in a time-out. They get some exercise which many of them need but they aren't playing with their friends at that time. It doesn't require anyone else to watch them b/c they do this close to the bench where the teachers are. I would bring up this idea to the staff. I have a strong willed son myself and every year, I have to "give permission" for his teachers to be harder on him. I think they are just nervous about using real consequences b/c of parents getting upset. I know my son and know that multiple reminders do not work. Consequences do.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Love the idea of walking laps! I'd actually suggested that to him to blow off steam instead of hitting. I was thinking inside, but this is even better. I'll definitely mention it. Thanks!

[Anonymous]

I'm not fond of any of these ideas although I get the necessity to stop the action and believe a firmer approach is needed. If my child hit (which he did) I recommended or did things like say he couldn't have so and so over until he showed me that he could get along at school for x number of days, would not be able to play with the blocks in the afternoon because he didn't share them that morning or the day before and hit someone, asked teachers prior to free play to have my son tell them the rules of the playground, etc. I also got him some outside help and read lots of friendship, sharing, no hitting books with him at home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I teach in ES and we sometimes have students who miss out on part of recess walk up and down a path when they are in a time-out. They get some exercise which many of them need but they aren't playing with their friends at that time. It doesn't require anyone else to watch them b/c they do this close to the bench where the teachers are. I would bring up this idea to the staff. I have a strong willed son myself and every year, I have to "give permission" for his teachers to be harder on him. I think they are just nervous about using real consequences b/c of parents getting upset. I know my son and know that multiple reminders do not work. Consequences do.

Watch out on the lap walking, I am sure some parent down thre road is going to call that corporal punishment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not fond of any of these ideas although I get the necessity to stop the action and believe a firmer approach is needed. If my child hit (which he did) I recommended or did things like say he couldn't have so and so over until he showed me that he could get along at school for x number of days, would not be able to play with the blocks in the afternoon because he didn't share them that morning or the day before and hit someone, asked teachers prior to free play to have my son tell them the rules of the playground, etc. I also got him some outside help and read lots of friendship, sharing, no hitting books with him at home.

OP again. I've tried all of that for almost 2 months now, to no avail. That's the problem. We've role played, I've taught him phrases to use to express his emotions and we've gone over those a million times. I've shown him several examples of my being angry and how I deal with it. We've got most of the "Learning to Get Along" series of books (which he actually enjoys reading). I've taken stuff away, including toys and privileges, for fairly lengthy periods of time. I've praised him for having his rare good days. It just seemed that anything I did at home was too far removed time-wise from the incident at school to have much impact. Which is why I've been focusing on what to do at daycare.

He seems to have some impulse control problems, so that may be why the consquences at home don't work very well to help him learn some self-control at school.

In any event, he's been good two days in a row. So I'm feeling a bit more hopeful.

[Anonymous]

2 months isn't too long to be working on this and some of the comments I made were related to what to do at daycare. Some teachers and daycares though are better at this than others. If they haven't been implementing much at the daycare to begin with, chances are that they are more comfortable with other methods of teaching than disciplining children. Since your child is already 5 I'm assuming he will be leaving this place very soon, otherwise I might look for a new place. I would just meet and have conference to discuss the matter, not blaming but offering suggestions and saying that you will offer as much support as possible. One of the preschools my son went to for instance had the children walk with their hands behind their back so there was no touching or hitting while walking from place to place. They also instigated the no share with the toy no play with the toy rule and things like that. My understanding of consequences is that they have to fit the crime so taking away TV privileges because your son hit someone doesn't relate very well, but not being able to sit with friends at lunch because he got into trouble the day before does.

[Anonymous]

Also, we kept going over during the summer that in elementary school the consequences were much higher for misbehaving and that he would have difficulty making new friends if he misbehaved. That plus the maturity of another year sorted just about everything out.

[Anonymous]

Thinking back again, in kindergarten in the beginning of the year there was one child my son had difficulty with and so I asked the teacher to put them together one month so they would have some more interaction and become better friends naturally working on academic work under her close supervision. It worked and that boy became one of his best friends. Not sure exactly how this would relate to daycare, but perhaps the teacher could work in a small group with the boys not getting along.