Last week as we were coming back from San Antonio and I said to both children as they were behaving badly in the car, "If we had a choice, I would put you both in timeout right now and we wouldn't go anywhere, but the truth is that we have to take this trip and get on the airplane, so I expect you to give us our best behavior." Incredibly, they did. But I also afforded them the opportunity to run as much as possible in the airport before take off and in between flights. We also make it a practice to take games, books, food, coloring/drawing stuff on excursions like this.
The flight attendants complimented us on our well-behaved children. Did you get that? And the truth is, that they were. I think that sometimes children just need to test the waters.
Also, if I can make whatever is bugging them less, it helps. For instance, while hubby got the tickets, I had the children leap frogging around a small portion of the floor to see who could jump the furthest. In between flights, I did some movement songs within a contained area. Yesterday, while shopping, they got maxed out, and while spanking/disciplining them didn't help, singing a song about how hungry we all were did. They actually behaved better as we went through the check out line and into the car, and even discussed the best place to get food we all liked fast, and whether to call dad to join us there. Sometimes when I just playfully – or even if the situation warrants it seriously - accept where they are and don't make a bigger deal of it than it is, that in and of itself saves the day.
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