Bad manners

[tinka77]

After some advice...have a mindee who is coming up for two years. His vocabulary is delayed (used to have a dummy constantly) so had a word with parent and agreed that he's only have it at nap time when with me. His understanding to instruction is fine ie take you coat off/shoes, can you pick up x you. His manners however are atrocious! I have looked after him since 11 mths and can count on one hand the amount of times he has said ta. I've tried bribery (treats) say ta and you can have this, refuses point blank. Anyone else come across this?? If so, how did you correct it?

[MessybutHappy]

You could try stopping asking him! Say it for him by all means, but if insisting won't achieve anything just now, stop asking for it. With you and everyone else modelling, he'll start soon enough I'm sure!

[FloraDora]

Children naturally say 'thank you' , 'please', 'sorry' if they grow up in an environment where everybody uses it, then they are just words that everyone uses, naturally say it. I am amazed how many adults do not automatically use this vocabulary ...why should children be expected to automatically use this vocab when the adults they live with don't !

[Rubybubbles]

Children naturally say 'thank you' , 'please', 'sorry' if they grow up in an environment where everybody uses it, then they are just words that everyone uses, naturally say it. I am amazed how many adults do not automatically use this vocabulary ...why should children be expected to automatically use this vocab when the adults they live with don't !

Agree completely! Today I said,"no thank you " to my mindie (25 months) as he was poking his fingers out of the raincover (just been replaced as last one ended up ripping due to this) he pulled his fingers back in, said "hello ruby" (he knows this makes me smile) then went "sorry ruby" with no prompt.

I have only ever had manners problems if they come to me as older children lol!!

[chris goodyear]

Agree with messy but happy. I had a boy like this and if he wasn't polite I did withhold the treats after he had been given the opportunity to say thank you/please, and I don't think that comes under the heading of depriving him of food!! However I would stop asking for a week or two and then try again and as others have said with good role models it did finally happen.

[dawn100]

I just model good manners and praise them when they use them, at lunch the other day I had a 20mth old at snack time asking for some more fruit and said please (please has been a bit absent since Christmas) made a big fuss and praised him with that the 14mth old said please for the first time ever and smiled because he was doing it to please me. I personally prefer positive reinforcement to encourage manners.

[amylouise867]

You could try stopping asking him! Say it for him by all means, but if insisting won't achieve anything just now, stop asking for it. With you and everyone else modelling, he'll start soon enough I'm sure!

Totally agree.

Bribing him at such an early age will only teach him if I don't do it they'll offer me so & so in a min too.

Model it constantly as I'm sure you do anyway & when him or other children use their manners praise them.

He is still young & if his speech is delayed too - he will start when he is ready :)

Good luck :)

[bunyip]

The combined wisdom of Messy and Floradora sum this up nicely.

I'd use the 'polite' words and let them soak it up, but without pressure.

Too many children appear to ostensibly have good manners. But all they've learned is that certain words have an almost mystical manipulative effect on adults to get what they want. It produces the sort of child who, when told "no" will scream "...but PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZE...." at the top of their voice for the next 40 minutes. Or the ones who quickly learn any behaviour is acceptable, since the only consequence is uttering a "sorry."