is nose-to-wall timeout too harsh?

[Anonymous]

for a 5 year old? our usual consequence is a time-out for 5 minutes (one minute for each year he is old)--few months ago he got into this habit of trying to talk to his sister, engage, etc. during his time out so DH made him face the wall and touch his nose to it and do the time out that way...and it kind of stuck. Now if he's trying to get attention or whatever when in time out we just say nose to wall and it stops that--but it seems kinda mean.

[Anonymous]

No problem. But vary the punishment according to the offense. Else you would have to escalate it to the next stage the next time there are further issues.

Pick your battles. Sibling fights are still small in my opinion compared to lying and talking back rudely to you the parent etc.

[Anonymous]

Would be considered inappropriate or excessive discipline in a child care setting and the daycare would be cited for it.

[Anonymous]

Put in a spot that he cannot engage anyone and tell sister to stay out of it or she gets a time out. If he engages or misbehaves the time out starts over again.

[Anonymous]

That sounds insane to me. I do timeouts, but they're in the kid's room and they can come out whenever they want as long as they are ready to be calm and kind. It's intended as an emotional reset, not some sort of ritualistic humiliation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That sounds insane to me. I do timeouts, but they're in the kid's room and they can come out whenever they want as long as they are ready to be calm and kind. It's intended as an emotional reset, not some sort of ritualistic humiliation.

This. A million times this.

Nose to the wall equates to being hit with a ruler in a 1950s classroom to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Would be considered inappropriate or excessive discipline in a child care setting and the daycare would be cited for it.

did OP indicate she was running a daycare?

[Anonymous]

I didn’t think so on daycare. She mentioned DH so clearly it’s a family setting. Not sure where that poster was coming from.

[Anonymous]

Sounds over the top cruel to me.

[Anonymous]

PP was saying the discipline being used by OP at home would be considered excessive in another setting. Presumably to help OP with the decision of whether to continue it.

[Anonymous]

It’s humiliation. Not okay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That sounds insane to me. I do timeouts, but they're in the kid's room and they can come out whenever they want as long as they are ready to be calm and kind. It's intended as an emotional reset, not some sort of ritualistic humiliation.

This is how we did it. Let them decide when to come out, when they are ready to interact in a reasonable way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That sounds insane to me. I do timeouts, but they're in the kid's room and they can come out whenever they want as long as they are ready to be calm and kind. It's intended as an emotional reset, not some sort of ritualistic humiliation.

Plus 1. I have well behaved 14 and 11 year old DCs and we used the method described above. You want to teach your kids to self regulate, and I can’t imagine op’s method accomplishes the goal.

[Anonymous]

It’s fine. It is only for 5 minutes.

[Anonymous]

This is why your kids are out of control. As long as it’s not happening every day, it’s fine. When they don’t like the consequences, they will think twice and learn. Time outs in a kids room “until they’re ready”? Is this their room with all their stuff in it? What’s the incentive not to do it again. You’re worried about them being “humiliated”? As long as your rules are fair and not capricious, let them feel bad about breaking them.