Siblings - Dyersville,IA

Explain to her that SHE is saying something "stupid" when she expects a four-year-old to know everything she does. I'm sure she's learning this "conversational style" from other kids at school, and she knows it's hurtful and unfair when she's on the receiving end. She needs to know she is not at fault when she makes an innocent mistake, and her brother is not at fault when he does either. She is, however, responsible for her own respectful behavior - and you would be really proud of her if she could teach the other kids a better way, too ;). It takes away that little superiority feeling the "duh" gives them when they realize they are actually being kind of foolish, and it shields the victims from the sting to know it too.

Hi V.
My son was the same way with my daughter and I could not get it to stop no matter what I did, until I read the book The Five Love Launguges for children and relized I was not spending the quality time my son needed from me when I knew what that was it stoped immediataly. Good Luck in this struggle as a parent :)T.

Wow, this was like reading my life story!! I have a 7yr and 4yr too! But my son is older and my daughter younger....still extremely snotty though! I have started just putting her in time out every time she gets that way. I do home daycare and she can just get plain nasty with some of the other kids.(it is quite embarrassing I must say!) I have tried all the same tactics but to no avail so we are just doing the whole seperating and time out thing for now. I will be interested in some other responses!

Hi V.,

I suggest that you take away something she really likes. It can be an activity she likes to do, or a toy she loves. Make an impression, but remember to be consistent, and follow through.

Good Luck!

C.

I agree with many posters, its probably sibling rivalry, and she might need some special time. But I wouldn't give up on the discipline either. If she's doing this to her sibling, she's probably doing this to classmates and friends if she's not getting her way.

At our house, the kids get an allowance for small chores and special rewards, birthday money etc. Even our littlest keeps an allowance/money jar. Whenever anyone in the house, including the "big people" say hurtful or insulting words, bad words, tattle-tales, or gossips, we get fined and have to "put our money where our mouth is" and pay the person we hurt out of their own money. Usually .50 cents for bad word or insult. In addition to the "fine", the person who said the offending words must then apologize to the person they insulted, and later on do a small "report" to the whole family on why their behavior was bad. I usually give the kids a little extra time to put their thoughts together. For the older children, the "report" consists of 3 or more sentences on why the words were bad, and how they hurt people, and why they wont' do it again.

For the non-reading and writing set, we let them draw a picture and in their own simple way explain what happened, why, and why it was bad.

This activity/punishment usually winds up being looked forward to by everyone, and quite hilarious when the little ones do their "report", and that's okay. The activity is very effective for us, and seems to really reinforce thinking outside of themselves, and how their actions affects others. They seem to learn alot.

Between losing money towards toys from their spending accounts and the "reports", we hear very few mean and bad words around the house. They may roll their eyes when they older, but I'm sure what they learn now will be in their memory banks later.