A little background, first, namely that A has never, ever been a napper. She is infamous at daycare for being a non-napper. It is her misfortune that one of her current teachers is what I consider a Nap Nazi--if A doesn't nap, NN considers herself a failure.
Me, I'm happy if the child just lies there quietly for the requisite two hours. (Which is a hard thing to ask a non-napper to do, but rules is rules.) Lately, however, she's been acting up big-time. First, she looks to make sure someone's watching (and being told that made me feel like a stellar parent; sure, she's getting enough attention at home!), and then she proceeds to use the cot as a trampoline, play in the water fountain, hide in the cupboards, etc. They've actually assigned one teacher (keeping in mind that it's a class of 19 and there are 2-3 teachers in there at a given time) strictly to police her at naptime. They were somewhat tolerant of that until she started deliberately waking up the other kids at least an hour or more before they should have been.
She was not the most popular child at daycare that day, I will note.
Of course, my view is that they should have brought me in sooner than they did, which wasn't until the breaking point: that if she pulled the same antics the next day, I'd have to pick her up and take her home for the rest of the day. Yikes.
My mother is the one who actually came up with the (thus far) winning solution. (And I haven't yet pointed out to A that Nana is the meanie, not mommy. Yet.) Which is to take all of her beloved Wall-E merchandise (see post below)--the "computer," the books, and most importantly, the DVD--and put it all in a box in the morning. I do this very ceremoniously, by the way; I should don epaulettes or something for the routine. Anyway, I then announce that unless she has a good day at daycare, the toys/books/dvd stay in the box until she does have a good day; Wall-E is in jail until she can spring him for good behavior.
The first morning we did this, she looked very surprised. Then fairly pissed. Now, it's part of the getting-out-of-the-house drill. And proof that it works came yesterday, when she started to act up and her teacher (not NN), whom I've kept in the loop, simply said, "Wall-E," and A said, "Oh, yeah," and rolled over and went to sleep.
Huh.
I don't expect it to last, mind you. I'll have to come up with some other hapless inhabitant of the B'burg version of Gitmo. But in the meantime... Wall-E's mine, baby.
3 comments:
Good, glad that's working for you. Maybe you can give her one thing back after she's good for x days so you can reinforce the behavior over a period of time (hence it becomes habit) as opposed to giving back the loot at once. Don't "they" say if something is done for 2 or 3 weeks staight, it becomes habit? By giving back stuff a little at a time she's "earning" it back which is postive reinforcement for her good behavior. Just a thought.
Just make sure Eve doesn't show up and blast Wall-E out of the hoosegow. Not a bad idea. We've tried similar things with Hannah, with plenty of success. Charlie, is another matter. He's very much a two-year old. He doesn't recognize the whole incentive/reward thing.
Hm, good point. Although she's really only taking back one item--the DVD--out of the box when given the chance. I just bought some new books, so when they arrive, maybe I'll work on a new incentive program. (And now I officially feel like I'm back in marketing...)
LOL re: Eve, good point. I agree--we did try something similar about a year ago and she was too young for it. I'm sure there's a study out there somewhere that tells you when they start comprehending such things. (And I can't believe Charlie's already two! Time, she doth fly.)
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