Your mom rocks! Does her advice work with toddlers? I tried telling some kids at work they’re “big kids” when they were tossing stuff. They said “no I’m not.” I tried not to laugh; what might your mom suggest for a different affirmation?
it’s so funny that you ask this, because I’m actually a children’s librarian by day, meaning i spend a LOT of time wrangling toddlers!!! here are a few techniques i use for group management, with the obligatory disclaimer that your mileage may vary for all of these:
- i try to phrase my instructions by simply stating the rule, because it implies that the kids are already on your side (“we always wear our shoes at the library!”)
- give reasoning for the rule whenever possible (“we don’t throw our toys because they might break, and then we can’t play with them anymore. that would make us feel sad.”) this one is super effective, because kids often don’t draw that line of logic on their own. when they understand why we do things a certain way, they’re much more likely to comply
- everyone says it, but praise good behavior whenever possible to reinforce it (“thank you for being such great helpers cleaning up our crayons!” “this table is waiting so patiently for their craft supplies! that’s amazing!”)
- building on that, single out a kid following the rules for praise and praise others as they fall in line (“i love how gently katie is playing with her toys! she’s taking very good care of her things! oh, now danny is playing with his toy gently too! great job!”)
- ask the kids to make sure their friends are following the rules (“can you look beside you and make sure your neighbor is listening?”)
in practice, doing all of this is admittedly exhausting and we all have our off days. but hopefully it’s a good starting point!!!!
also i can’t get over the kids being like “we’re not big kids what are you talking about???” that unpredictability is what makes this sort of work so fun 😂😂😂
