I am at a loss with my four-year-old daughter. Spanking isn’t working. My husband and I agreed that we would spank only for lying and defiance and set ground rules and expectations with my daughter long ago for that. Here is the problem, spanking tends to make the problem worse. Example: she was told tonight that she was going to pick up her room before dinner. She responded by throwing a hard, plastic toy at me, so I spanked her. She cried, she screamed and then walked out of her room and threw the same toy at my head again. I spanked her again, again with a firm “we don’t throw things”. I also took the offending toy away. At this point, she began to throw all of her things, pillows, blankets, toys, everything, out of her room at me. I spanked her again, feeling useless, and removed everything from her room. Everything. It fixed the short term problem, as she no longer could take her anger out on anything if she has nothing, but I am so afraid that this will not be effective in the long run. What do I do when this strategy doesn’t work? She is bright and cooperative at school, deserving only an occasional timeout, so why is it that she lashes out at my husband and me?<\/p>\n\t
It appears your daughter is picking up some bad habits from the daycare you are leaving her in. It is hard to establish good habits when poorer habits are tolerated or overlooked when she is in another environment.<\/p>\n
I usually don’t recommend spanking for lying because you are using the severest punishment when milder punishments can be equally effective. Many children go through a phase where they “try-out” lying. Often the lies are ridiculous and transparent. They need to be punished and should be punished immediately. But a good way of handling such lying is to figure out what the child is hoping to gain from the lie and then remove the benefit. For example, if she tells you she is going to bed, but then stays up, she not only goes to bed immediately but bedtime just became earlier the next day. Just remember, though, that delayed or long term punishments aren’t effective with a four-year-old. Their memory isn’t that long yet.<\/p>\n
Spanking for violence and defiance when the child knows she is being defiant is effective if consistently applied. It doesn’t matter if you have to spank her ten times in a row, children are smart. If they see that each act of violence (throwing a toy) brings the same result (a spanking), she’ll give up.<\/p>\n
From your description, I’m left with the impression that you were allowing yourself to get angry and impassioned while she was having her temper-tantrum. Thus you gave her what she wanted. She was mad, and she got you to join in. You’re taking things too personally. She chose to be violent. You delivered an appropriate punishment. It ought to be done calmly and firmly — each and every time. It isn’t about you, it is about teaching her to behave properly when things don’t go her way.<\/p>\n
In this particular case taking objects away for her to throw doesn’t really teach her restraint. If she throws a toy at you, then spank her. Put her down and repeat your order to pick up the toys. When she does it again, do the same thing. Don’t take the toy away because you then picked up the toys for her! I also notice that you let her leave the room without picking up her toys. It would have been better if you just picked her up and put her back into the room. You are bigger than your four-year-old, so I’m sure it isn’t that difficult to insist that she do as she is told. Again, it should all be done in a calm, matter-of-fact, but firm manner. And when she does start to do as she is told, reward her with some mild praise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Question: I am at a loss with my four-year-old daughter. Spanking isn’t working. My husband and I agreed that we would spank only for lying and defiance and set ground rules and expectations with my daughter long ago for that. Here is the problem, spanking tends to make the problem worse. Example: she was told…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[20,1031,1028],"tags":[665,29,107,108],"class_list":["post-18434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","category-childhood","category-parenting","tag-child-rearing","tag-parenting","tag-raising-children","tag-spanking"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":13968,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/im-embarrassed-that-i-spanked-my-daughter-for-skipping-classes\/","url_meta":{"origin":18434,"position":0},"title":"I’m embarrassed that I spanked my daughter for skipping classes","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 24, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I am a recently separated mom of three children ages 13, 10 and 8. The older two are girls. My thirteen-year-old really started to act up this school year, only a few months after her father and I separated. She was caught skipping classes twice earlier in the school\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Adolescence"","block_context":{"text":"Adolescence","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/parenting\/adolescence\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":33128,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/i-want-to-compliment-you-on-your-answers-on-spanking\/","url_meta":{"origin":18434,"position":1},"title":"I want to compliment you on your answers on spanking","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 6, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Sir, I wanted to compliment you on your answers on spanking. I am not a believer in any faith, but I have my own feeling about morality and social beliefs. I keep hearing about \"all these religious people who beat their kids.\" Well, I was spanked as a boy,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3709,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/did-i-go-too-far-in-spanking-my-daughter\/","url_meta":{"origin":18434,"position":2},"title":"Did I go too far in spanking my daughter?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 15, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I am a recently separated mom of three children ages 13, 10 and 8. The older two are girls. My thirteen-year-old really started to act up this school year, only a few months after her father and I separated. She was caught skipping classes twice earlier in the school\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8929,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-i-tell-my-mother-what-i-have-done-knowing-that-it-will-lead-to-a-spanking\/","url_meta":{"origin":18434,"position":3},"title":"Should I tell my mother what I have done, knowing that it will lead to a spanking?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 5, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: As I said I was just playing around on the net and I do not know just how I ended up on your site other then I was just clinking on links and so on and then out of the blue I ended up on your site in an\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9002,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-do-you-handle-a-16-year-old-who-acts-like-a-5-year-old-when-it-comes-to-a-spanking\/","url_meta":{"origin":18434,"position":4},"title":"How do you handle a 16-year-old who acts like a 5-year-old when it comes to a spanking?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 15, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have visited your website and agree with your position on biblical correction. I commend you on your willingness to actually give advice on spanking and not dance around with politically correct or over-cautious answers. I do, however. have some doubts in my mind about how we are handling\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14004,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-we-tell-our-children-not-to-mention-to-other-people-that-they-get-spanked\/","url_meta":{"origin":18434,"position":5},"title":"Should we tell our children not to mention to other people that they get spanked?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 24, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have greatly enjoyed all the information and insights that you share on this page. My husband and I are raising three sons. We use spanking as one of our disciplinary tools with the boys, especially for the 3 Ds - deliberate disobedience, disrespect, and dishonesty. Recently one of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Childhood"","block_context":{"text":"Childhood","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/parenting\/childhood\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18434\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}