Raising your voice to a child.

[Max™]

What is your opinion on this?

To clarify a bit on my case, I'm not just screaming at kids left and right.

I've been helping the neighbor out a lot since he's a 18 wheeler driver, and recently got custody of his son EJ. back from his super-flakey semi-crackhead mom.

The mom has been trying to undermine this situation while Art is trying to get into a job where he can cover the kids schedule appropriately (as it is, he often has to leave out at 4 am to make it back in time to be there when EJ gets out of school) and take care of the kid like he wants too.

Keep in mind, this was a late kid, the guy is 57, and EJ is 6, but a good dad is a father, and a great father is rare, so I was happy to help.

The problem comes in when the mom puts little memes into the kids head, to try and make sure that me and my girlfriend who take turns/help each other with the kid, will stop watching him, so she can get custody/that child support check back.

When EJ gets into one of these bullheaded moments, the thing I've noticed works, the same thing his dad does btw, is to use a stern, elevated voice, because he responds to a male voice, but in particular when you're just on the verge of actually yelling at him.

Example from Yesterday: They have a cute little pinscher, she's a sweet dog and likes to bring offerings when she sees you, except yesterday she has a cough drop in her mouth. I take it from her and set it aside as it can't be good. EJ grabs it and gives it back to her right in front of me. I tell him not to do that, and he says "My dad said she can have these."

Now, I've never heard Art say this, but I do know that odds are against it being safe for the dog, so I intercept it and set it back on the table.

Not two seconds later, he's got that look in his eyes, where he's kind of thinking and battling between two conflicting goals, the shit he does when his mom has told him to do something (like when she used to try and get him to ignore my girlfriend, even though he's very fond of her) and pops the cough drop back in the dogs mouth while insisting that he can do this.

I pick my voice up some, tell him "Stop! Get your phone, call your dad and go upstairs and change into your school clothes, now." (normally he can hang out for a while/eat breakfast/call his dad downstairs before he has to go change) He stops, gets the phone and goes to change.

Then on the way to school, he wasn't able to get a hold of his dad til we were in the car, and I hear him ask if his dad got the message he left about me. I ask him about it, and the kid tends to be straight up about stuff, so he says "my dad told me to tell him if you yelled".

Now, keep in mind that I've been there with his dad doing this, I've had to do this in front of his dad in a situation or two where he was doing something, about to knock over the TV and not listening, so I just picked my voice up and gave him an order, lo and behold the kid listens just fine.

He knows that I'm concerned with his safety and well being, I've told him as much directly, so any thoughts of the kid being scared of me can go ahead and be set aside.

He just doesn't respond as well (or at all sometimes, which is generally when I get louder) to a normal speaking voice.


Who's in the wrong here?

[Acturus]

What does the father think about your babysitting tactics? And have you talked to him in depth about what to do if the child rebels against your imitation of him?

[Izzy]

I think you handled it perfectly honestly. Just explain to that dad you used a stern deep voice if he even confronts you. I don't think he would anyways.

[Akun]

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse....s/beatkid4.jpg

Parent/Babysitter: whatever, close enough

I think you handled it fine, it's not like you went batshit crazy on him. Bit off-topic but, I hate this new trend of kids claiming abuse because they got punished. When I was growing up, if i mouthed off that like? Id get a nice crack in the face, and I knew not to do it again. lol

[Kurp]

You don't have to push the 'Enter' key after every sentence.

[Max™]

It's the same thing his dad does, and it's the simplest method of snapping the kid out of his bullshit.

Were I ranting and raving at anything the kid does, I'd feel I was in the wrong.

The tone I use, and me yelling are a bit seperate, and I'd reserve yelling for "GODDAMN DON'T RUN OUT IN THE STREET YOU'RE GOING TO DIE" type moments.

I watched his dad do the same thing with him. "Ej, calm down I'm trying to talk to them... Ej... Boy! Stop it! Pay attention!" *Ej snaps to attention*

His dad is cool with me face to face, just kind of seemed weird that he'd tell Ej to tell him, instead of just asking me, as I'd just tell him "look, it's what works, you know this too."

rofl@maddox pic, I would inform his dad that I can no longer watch his kid if I found myself actually angry, especially enough to hit the child.

Only thing he's done that actually pissed me off was a couple times last week when I was trying to hurry him out the door so we can beat traffic on a couple streets, and instead of getting his jacket on, he starts dancing, jumping up and hitting his little door mounted basketball hoop, doing semi-handstands on the back of the couch and ignoring me.

Just walked over, snapped my fingers in front of him and said "Hey, that will stop IMMEDIATELY, or we're going to have to find another person to watch you."

Kurp, would you rather read a huge unbroken wall of text?

[Akun]

His dad is cool with me face to face, just kind of seemed weird that he'd tell Ej to tell him, instead of just asking me, as I'd just tell him "look, it's what works, you know this too."

It's possible the kid just said that to try to get you not to 'yell' at him again.

[Max™]

It isn't like it's a new thing, he's not constantly putting me in this situation, but certain things he does I just step in and settle things down.

For a while he was being very disrespectful to my girlfriend, I'd say to stop doing that, he'd keep it up, get more agitated about it, I'd snap a "Quit it!" and tell him to come over here, explain what he's doing, that I know why he's doing it, and that as a general rule, you don't do those sort of things to a guys girlfriend while he's sitting there watching you.

He apologized and straightened up with that, he generally does, it's just when he goes over to his moms on some weekends and comes back with her crap in his head.


I did tell him when he did the ignore+dance/jump around like a fool bullshit, "If my kid did that to me like you just did, they'd probably get cuffed in the side of the head for it, it's disrespectful, irritating, and serves no purpose other than to agitate me."

[Norelco]

Sounds like a normal 6 year old who is testing his boundaries. Just set him straight like you have been doing. Using a louder, stern voice is just fine. I don't know if you currently do this, but maybe you can incorporate some positive reinforcement any time he does something right. Not saying you have to spoil the kid, but maybe giving him a piece of candy or changing your tone to a nicer one and saying "thank you very much, you're being a good boy."

[Shuemue]

There's a vast difference between raising your voice to get a point across to a child and actually yelling at them.

Be proactive, at the next suitable opportunity, raise the issue with the father. Demonstrate to him exactly how you're simply projecting your voice to reinforce a point rather than yelling because you're angry. That way you can be sure he's aware of your methods and if he has an issue with it, you can discuss other techniques for discipline.

You need this bitch:

http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/a...21_120731a.jpg

[Max™]

I'm not one to reward bad behavior, I've got 6 little sisters, I've dealt with a wide gamut of shit while helping to raise them.

The way I reward is proactively, you've been doing good, and were wanting to go to the zoo, so we're going to the zoo next week, good job.

You keep screwing up, I'm not going to be very likely to want to take you to the zoo, this is your decision now.

My girlfriend just reminds him of a talk she had a while back, all she has to say now is "choices" and he stops usually and goes "oh, yeah, I'm messing up huh."

It's when he doesn't simply respond to "Ok, that's enough we get the point" and worse when he starts trying to talk over you, lie about it, and the like.

His dad asked me about it once, because a while back as he was calling his dad, he kept kind of letting the phone slide and doing other things, then he starts playing with his dog, so I put my hand in front of his eyes to get his attention and point to the phone, the dog didn't see me and was startled cause I was reaching over the back of the couch, so she kind of scooted back.

He then starts going on about "why did you hit her, dad he just hit lucy, blah blah blah" and won't stop, I tell him look, quit saying that, I didn't touch your dog, you're now deliberately lying about me and it will stop now.

He looks at me for a second, then goes back into it, so I just bark an order at him "Hey, I said to Stop that! Now."

His dad can only hear me in the background a little bit so he asked me later and I just told him like it was.

[Bwelch]

Sounds like a normal 6 year old who is testing his boundaries. Just set him straight like you have been doing. Using a louder, stern voice is just fine. I don't know if you currently do this, but maybe you can incorporate some positive reinforcement any time he does something right. Not saying you have to spoil the kid, but maybe giving him a piece of candy or changing your tone to a nicer one and saying "thank you very much, you're being a good boy."

I wouldn't recommend giving the child a piece of candy at all, for obvious reasons. I'd suggest that when the child is acting appropriate the way you want to strengthen his behavior would be to give him negative reinforcement (meaning, there's a consequence for his behavoir). When EJ has done something that impresses you or he shows good behavoir, don't reward him with pieces of candy or a chocolate chip cookies, instead, take away a negative (something that he feels to be negative). Have you given the child a chore to do around the house? Empty bathroom trash cans? Pick up his toys? Keep his room clean? Make his bed? If you haven't given him any responsibilities already, you should be. Now is a great time to do that even if he's going to live with you temporarily. But as I was saying, you want to enforce his good behavior by taking away a negative. What would be a negative to him? Take it away for a day to encourage his good behavior.

[Izzy]

Sounds to me like this mother needs to be set straight more than her kid. I hate parents like that. Grow the fuck up.

[Krye]

Sometimes you have to be stern with kids to get them to listen.

I just moved in with my ex-step-dad. My sister that lives here half the week doesn't listen for shit. My ex-step-dad(who I'll call dad for simplicity's sake) just got a girlfriend(Arlene) and my 9 year old sister is going through a phase where she doesn't want a new authority figure in her life, so she's acting out and rebelling. I'm also told that my mother is spoiling her and encouraging this behavior, but I'm not sure of the validity of these claims.

Nobody will do anything about it. Arlene will tell my sister to do something, my sister will straight up say no and Arlene will say a bitchy little comment and walk away.

The other day we were going out to dinner and we stopped to get gas on the way. While Arlene was inside paying, Arlene's 14 year old daughter slapped my sister because she was being intentionally annoying and my sister started freaking out and crying excessively. I told her to switch spots with me so I could sit in between them and in her new defiance, she says no. I call up our dad thinking that she'll listen to him, but she tells him no too. Finally, I get fed up, snatch the phone from my sister and hang up, then yell at her to, "MOVE THE FUCK OVER RIGHT NOW!"

And she listens.

Now some of you may think of this was out of hand, but I had to put up with shit like this from my brother and I don't want to put up with it from my sister now as well. My brother wouldn't listen to anyone, and I made it clear to him that if he fucked with me, he was getting hurt. Now obviously you can't do that in your situation, but I'm just saying that certain steps have to be taken to let children know who has the authority and rolling over and taking it certainly isn't one of them.

[Max™]

One time, keeping in mind that she doesn't have full visitation rights, only the weekend ones begrudgingly granted by the courts because she contributes basically nothing financially.

She had called him, was talking too him, and he goes into the other room, she asks "are you alone?" and since me and my girlfriend were in the other room he says yeah. She tells him to wait, and she'll be right over.

Then gets here, parks at the street and calls telling the child to come outside.

Mind, she knows we're here, but she was just trying to get him upset, if I thought my child was left alone somewhere, I wouldn't be parking outside at the street (legally off the property), I'd be kicking down the door if I had too, and taking them somewhere safe.

She sits out there while we try to get a hold of his dad, and as much as it sucks have to tell EJ that he can't go out there because she didn't tell his dad, or us, that she was coming over, she just shows up and sits there with her door open looking at the house.

Doesn't come up and knock, doesn't try to initiate a conversation, just tries to call and tell him to come outside, knowing what a FUCKED up position she was putting us, his guardians at the moment, in.

Yeah, she does need to grow up, and the kid has improved a lot since he hasn't been over there around her other kids (thugs and ho's, as Art puts it, though he uses nicer terms, to date I've NEVER heard the man utter a curseword) getting influenced by them.

She doesn't want the kid to grow up and make something of himself, she doesn't give a damn about him, the only reason she started fighting was the child support check being taken away.

[Norelco]

This guy is 57? How old is the mom?

[Max™]

I think she's in her 40's, she has a couple of "grown" (used loosely) children, and a couple just a little older than EJ, with several different men.

Art says she is as sneaky as the devil himself, that the biggest mistake he ever made was taking her into his home, and given the way she tries to use the innocent love of a child for his mother as a tool, I am inclined to take the mans word for it.

The funny part was, and I don't mean to really offend anyone here, but Art Ej and his mom are all black, so after not talking too us, conniving and scheming, trying to show us to be bad guardians by letting the child wander out of our care, the cops show up (art had my girlfriends dad call for him) and are talking things out, they have her come up and explain that she'll see Ej on Friday and whatnot.

I notice how the times I've seen her before, she was acting completely different from the humble "yas'm, nossir, yassir, Imma do that right now" parody of herself when the cops were there.

[Draggy]

There is nothing at all wrong with raising your voice in that way, with young children especially it is one of the few ways you can actually get them to listen and think about what they are doing, they need to learn that you are in charge, not them.

My son is 4, and i dont scream & shout but do raise my voice at him when he is out of order. Also use ways to encourage good behavior. still want to go to the park? we can go tomorrow if you are good, or if you continue to be naughty then no we wont be watching this film later.

little stuff like that, but over time it encourages them to -want- to be good.

anyways, rambling o.o

and dunno whats up with the mother >.>

[isladar]

The firm, strong, uncompromising tone (regardless of volume) will ALWAYS do better than the hysterical "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING". I say this generally, because I've found it effective with young children and adults in equal measure. I've made guys with 150+ lbs on me back the fuck down by direct eye contact, dominant body posture, and a firm tone.

As someone else pointed out, he is in a stage where he's going to push boundaries. Especially since he's receiving such conflicting contexts from his authority figures. Children flourish with consistency, and unfortunately, he's not going to get it with his mother acting as she does. You and your girlfriend are doing an immense favour by providing that kind of constant, loving discipline along side his father, but it won't be easy.

[Max™]

Yeah, was saying something to my girlfriends mom about it, and she was making it sound like I was getting angry at the kid.

Being stern and to the point isn't being angry, and I wouldn't really let on to the kid if I was getting angry except about the stupid dancing thing.

Isladar in '08, vote or get Steel Cycloned!