Do you have a 4-year-old? Well, in this video, we're going to be talking about
how to stop bad behavior in 4-year-olds. I'm Nicholeen Peck. I'm a parenting expert and
author and in this video, I'm going to tell you what I know about 4-year-olds.
4 years old is this magical age when your child starts to really transform. They're switching from
being a toddler into being a young child. In fact, there are big changes that are happening in their
brain at age 4. By the time there's 4 years old, they have more synapses in their brain than any
other stage in their life. Which means they are putting pieces together. But here's the thing:
Their prefrontal cortex of the brain, the front part that does all of the logical processing for
that 4-year-old is actually still pretty small. But they do problem-solve using opposites and
cause and effect. So, if you have a 4-year-old, they can learn cause and effect and we're going to
keep that in mind as I talk about the ways that we can help stop bad behavior in these 4-year-olds.
I'm going to share with you 7 things that you can do to help stop the bad behavior in your
4-year-old. Number 1 is you've got to be diligent and consistent. You've got to nip things in the
bud now. So, people often think, "Oh, they're just young. They'll outgrow it. Oh, they're just
4. They're 3. They're toddler age. I don't need to handle it." But no. You need to handle it now more
than at any other time. During this time when they are forming so many synapses in the brain,
they need to know what's right and wrong, good and bad, true and false. They need to know where
their boundaries are. They need to know who the leader is. They need to know they can't
get away with stuff. They need to be able to see cause and effect in their lives. So, you have
got to do the teaching consistently. And I know that's so hard because they're learning so much
so quickly, it seems like we're talking and training and correcting non-stop. But it's
so important. I want to share a quick story with you. One time, I was at a home, I was at a
dinner party with some people. And one couple was there with multiple small children. In the middle
of a conversation, all the adults were sitting there talking. In walks this little 3-year-old
and he starts scaling the bookcases on the main decorative wall in this house which was
vaulted ceilings went up really high. I looked at the parents of this young toddler and they looked
over at the child and then they looked back and just kept carrying on with the conversation. I
was shocked. They saw what was happening and they decided they weren't going to address it. Instead,
they just wanted to have a fun time being with friends. And I get that. But we don't ever stop
being a parent even when we're at a dinner party. So, because no one was addressing the situation
and our host family looked noticeably concerned, even though they were trying to be polite,
I thought, "Well, I can be the adult, I guess and nip this one. So, that we don't have to
keep handling situations like this throughout our dinner party. And this child needs to be taught."
So, I went over to the child and I took a hold of his waist gently. I lifted him
down from the bookcase and said "This is a no answer. We do not climb on the bookcases. So,
you need to go find something else to do and don't come back and touch anything on these bookcases,
okay?" And the child completely respected me. Looked at me very calmly and said,
"Okay." And walked off. They were just waiting for someone to tell them where the boundary line was.
We've got to nip things. Otherwise, our children become wild and actually entitled too. We don't
want entitled teenagers. So, why would we create entitled 4-year-olds and 3-year-olds. Number 2,
you need to pre-teach the proper behavior. In fact, at this time when the prefrontal cortex and
all those synapses are growing so rapidly, you've got to do lots of training and pre-teaching. So,
teach your children the skills that they need, teach them how you will correct the problems.
Teach them how to problem solve other situations and you do this all ahead of time. So, for
instance, if you're going to teach your child how to treat other children kindly when they go to the
playground, then before going to the playground, you talk about what types of activities,
what types of communications they might be involved in when they're at the playground,
you might also talk to them about what mean things other children could do at the playground and how
to handle those situations. So, you prepare the child ahead of time. It's even beneficial
to practice role-play practice situations before they are ever in those situations live. Children
respond really well to this type of training and they remember what it feels like to be in
that role played situation when the real situation comes up. So, do your child a service and yourself
a favor and definitely do pre-teaching of all positive behaviors before they're ever needed.
Number 3, point toward calmness. Teach them every skill can be done calmly. And when things don't go
their way, they can also be calm too. Sometimes we have to tell our children no for things. Sometimes
they earn negative consequences. They need to be able to be calm in any of these situations. So,
how do you teach them calmness? Well, it's really important that you teach them the skill for how to
be calm. You've got to analyze with them ahead of time what does a calm voice sound like; what
does a calm body look like; what does a calm face feel like and look like so that they can duplicate
those things in the minute. Now, here's another important part to pointing toward calmness.
When they have tantrums, don't just react to the tantrums and power struggle with them. Instead,
use your calmness skills that you have already planned to use ahead of time in that moment. If
you don't have those calmness skills, there is a great place that you can learn those skills.
So, I have a calm parenting toolkit that is completely free that will get you started
on learning the skills of calmness and the skills of self-government. It's completely
free. There's a link in the description below this video. So, click the Calm Parenting Toolkit
link. I think it's the top link in the description. It will say Toolkit
and go and get that free toolkit so that you can start developing these skills. But what you want
to do is use them in the minute. The child needs to know because of pre-teaching how you will
handle out of control behavior and how you will bring them back to calmness. And that you will
stay calm at the same time. Yes. It is possible. Just the other day on my teaching self-government
support group where I answer people's questions every week, there were multiple parents talking
about 4-year-olds. One person had some 4-year-old twins another person had another 4-year-old.
And both of these families were talking about how their 4-year-olds were really strong-willed and
how they were constantly having tantrums, going out of control, not listening. Even balking at the
parents, talking back to the parents. Those things can happen at age 4. Especially, if they have not
been reigned in before that time. Well, now's the time to rein those in if you haven't beforehand.
And there is a way. So, what I spent my time talking to these parents about was something
called a calm down spot and unmodified rule of 3. So, we teach something called the rule of 3 for
parents of older children. But it can be modified to use for 4-year-olds. If that child is a really
smart strong-willed 4-year-old. Most 4-year-olds just need something called a calm down spot. This
is not a timeout. That's very different. Calm down spots are trigger spots. Places where they
can remember, "Oh, I need to get calm." And they only stay there until they are calm. And then the
teaching moment and the consequences happen afterward. I do some talking about this in
the calm parenting toolkit. So be sure to get that free toolkit so that you can have those resources.
Number 4, your children need skills for success. So, we teach the children 4 basic skills. These 4
basic skills are for children of all ages. But at age 4, they can master these. And they will become
patterns for their entire lives. So, you are doing this teaching at the perfect time. So, what are
the skills? Following instructions, accepting a no answer and criticism, accepting consequences,
and disagreeing appropriately. Yes. They can learn how to disagree appropriately with you. They don't
need to whine and pout and get physical. They can learn to use their words. Now, sometimes,
you have to tell them exactly what to say to you to disagree in order to train the skill. But they
can learn it and they can master it in that age 4 year for sure. In fact, I've seen many 2-year-olds
disagree appropriately with their parents. So, if your child's pretty verbal, they can do it even
before age 4. So, each one of these 4 basic skills has a skill set attached to it. That means there's
specific things that you have to do to accomplish that skill. For instance, to accept a no answer
there are four things that you do. You look at the person, keep a calm face voice, and body,
say okay or ask to disagree appropriately, and then drop the subject. So, you'll want
to teach your children all 4 of these 4 basic skills so that they can learn what they need to
communicate better with you to get their way to be calm and to solve their problems. Number 5,
parents should not mock their children. Which means if they're doing something disrespectful,
don't take a picture of it and put it on Instagram or whatever social media platform that you use.
Don't mock your children's bad behavior. This actually shows them that it's noteworthy,
that it's done something. It also makes your relationship have a bit of a distance in it.
It feels abusive and it can be very damaging. So, I know it's really tempting to take a picture or
a video of all of those tantrums and show them to everyone and talk about them or to make fun
of your child in front of other adults. To tease them or to be sarcastic. Don't do that
because that is not good at helping your child see what needs to be fixed. You need to have a calm
face, voice, and body yourself and you need to correct them in a way that describes what happened
in a respectful manner. Describe what they should have done. Tell them what they've earned,
practice things the right way. You can help them learn to fix the problem better if you handle
things respectfully. Number 6, parents shouldn't power struggle. Do you know what a power struggle
is? Hopefully, you do. There are multiple ways that children power struggle with their parents.
When they're 4, they often whine to power struggle. Sometimes they pout,
sometimes they complain or cry. They can also get angry, get attitude problems, not talk to you at
all, go and hide, be mean to their siblings. Those can all be things that are not being
calm and that means they're power struggling with you. So, sometimes you might feel like,
"Oh, they're so pitiful." And you want to coddle them. That would be you engaging in the power
struggle. So, don't do it. Don't cuddle. Don't get angry. Don't get an attitude problem yourself.
Do not engage in power struggles. If you are going to help them conquer their bad behaviors, you've
got to make sure you don't have bad behaviors of your own. Which means you have to be leading out.
That's your role as the parent. You've got a lead which means you can't be engaging in what they're
doing that's wrong. If you're not going to power struggle, that probably means that you need a
skill. So, what skill are you going to use instead of your go-to power struggle tactic? If you don't
have one, you can learn one. In fact, I teach a lot of them on teachingselfgovernment.com. And
if you get into that calm parenting toolkit, it'll start teaching you some of those things. To learn
more about the skill of correcting children and making sure that you do it with calmness yourself,
you're going to want to probably get into that calm parenting toolkit. That'll get you started.
And teachingselfgovernment.com has lots of courses and resources that can take your training to a
really good level so that you feel confident in what you're doing with your family. Number 7,
don't take things personally. Parents should not take things personally. So, just because your
child is whining and complaining or because they won't do the instruction that you told them to do
and they're having an attitude, that doesn't mean that it has anything to do with you. It doesn't.
So, don't choose to be emotional about it. In fact, if you choose to be emotional then you will
engage in that power struggle and they will think that they are powerful because they got a reaction
out of you. You have to decide that it's okay that they're 4 years old. That it's okay
that you have to help train them on these behaviors. It's fine. Just accept it. Accept
your role as parent. In fact, feel empowered by it. And don't take things personally.
This should help you a bit with your 4-year-old but there is so much more that I could teach you.
In fact, if you've liked this video, I'm pretty sure you're going to love my next video which is
How Does Parenting Style Influence Child Development and Behavior? Click on it now.