Many adults experience frustration when children display tantrums during playtime. A youngster may act out and injure other people or destroy property, such as toys that other children appreciate. This situation can sometimes cause great inconvenience and distress to many people.
If tantrums persist despite your best efforts to correct the situation, it remains wise to seek professional help. Many factors can potentially cause tantrums. It’s a good idea to start by taking the child to a doctor who specializes in children’s illnesses in order to rule out a physical cause for the behavior. A trained pediatrician can help direct you to additional appropriate services, such as professional child counseling, if those are required to handle the issue.
This article will address non-ongoing tantrums, the kind of occasional outburst of temper that occurs when a young child older than age two in good health misbehaves in a misguided effort to manipulate. Those type of tantrums should respond to firm, consistent discipline.
Handling Tantrums: First, Go to a Safe Location
Children will occasionally attempt to embarrass adults by staging noisy playtime tantrums in public places, such as playgrounds. It can be extremely vexing when this happens, because an angry youngster may dart into the street impulsively, or even injure other children.
If the child tantrums in a public location, the first step must be making sure that the child is collected by the parent and transported to a safe place. Do not permit the child to return to the site where he or she staged a tantrum until you are confident that this unwelcome behavior will not occur in the future. This may require you to restrict visits to friends homes or backyards for a certain period of time, or to cancel further fun playground activities for your youngster temporarily. Let older youngsters know that their temporary loss of access to a location resulted from their outburst.
Time Out For Tantrums
It is important to speak with your child while they are behaving well to let them know that “time outs” will be enforced by using a mutually agreed upon spot, such as a blanket, pillow or chair, as the location for them to sit when they misbehave. Enforcing time out effectively requires an immediate punishment.
When tantrums occur during playtime at home, parents can effectively punish these behaviors by taking out a time out blanket or pillow and asking the misbehaving child to sit on it for a designated period of time (no longer than 30 seconds per year of age). If the youngster refuses to move to the time out location, pick the child up gently and firmly place him or her in the previously designated time out spot. Then stand close by to enforce time out if necessary. Efforts to leave early begin the time out period anew.
Using time out consistently resolves many misbehavior episodes. It remains important to enforce time outs right away, just as soon as a tantrum begins.