As Little Piñata grows and learns more and more words, we really want to train him to be a kind and polite child. As a teacher who has taught in all levels (PreK-High School) I have worked with a lot of children who consistently whine to get what they want and/or do not speak respectfully, so it has become a top priority for us. So, even though he is just 18 months old, we are already working on Little P’s manners.


Ready to use my polite words at breakfast!

Is he always perfectly behaved and polite in public? Certainly not! You probably read my most popular post so far, Strangers & Tantrums in Public, and know that’s not the case. But, I recently read that if your toddler obeys you 60% of the time that you’re achieving consistent obedience, and I definitely think we’re at least at a 60% level! So I consider our strategies to be an overall, but not perfect, success.

ADVERTISEMENT
Here is what we’re doing that seems to work:

1. Encourage the use of the word “please” from the beginning.

I started practicing this with Little Piñata even when he had very few words. When he would reach for something and whine, I didn’t want to reward the whining by immediately giving him what he wanted.  But, I did want him to continue communicating with us and certainly didn’t want to punish him for the whining since it was his form of communication. So, I would tell him, “Say please” and it worked! Of course it didn’t start out sounding like please, but it started out sounding like something other than whining, so I encouraged it! Since then it turned into peez, mo peez, and has now been combined into meez (more and please pushed together). Although we encourage the vocalization of “please,” we don’t make him say it to get what he’s asking (because we’re interested in his polite communication rather than perfect word articulation). And as he’s learning more words we’re asking him to be more specific when possible, like down please, out please, etc. The key here for Little P is not giving him what he wants when he whines for it, but only when he asks using words. I really think this has cut down on whining in our home and even at school too. His teacher has even commented to us a few times that he’s very polite with her and with the other kids in his class.

2.  Encourage the phrases “thank you” and “no thank you.”

I know we all want our kids to use polite words, but I really think it’s possible to teach this sooner than most people think. When Little Piñata doesn’t want to eat something, he has always let us know right away. He used to yell, throw his food and/or cup off his high chair tray or scream, NOOO!! But, we found this to be a very disrespectful habit so we started teaching him to say no thank you when he didn’t want to eat something. And once he used that term instead, we would quickly move from one food to the next. If he said no tay too to all the food on his plate, we asked him if he was all done? And if he repeated or nodded we would end his dinner for him. He quickly learned that if he said no tay too to a food that we would move on and try something else faster than if he screamed or threw things.

Of course, as a toddler this is nowhere near the 100% level since some days he’s crankier or pickier than others. But, I would say that this overall works so much better than responding to rudeness at meals. Also, this is more of a manners lesson, not a lesson on getting your child to eat more or varied foods. In an attempt to teach manners and quickly move from foods he didn’t want to teach manners, there have been meals where we have probably given him too many options, which isn’t a great idea to do for the long term.

In addition to encouraging him to say no thank you when he want doesn’t something, we also ask him to say thank you when he has gotten something he did ask for. We also model this by quickly saying thank you whenever we ask him to bring something to us and he does. We also encourage him to say thank you to his teacher when leaving the church nursery or school and to us after dinner time. This is probably my favorite piece of manners right now because it’s adorable when he says tay too to us, especially now that he often does it without the reminder!


Tay too for my yummy dinner mama!

3. Praise Good Behavior!!

When Little Piñata uses his polite words instead of whining, we make a big deal out of it. Just like we do when we tell him no and he listens, or when we ask him to do something and he does it (such as go get your shoes). He really loves it when we clap and make a big deal out of him obeying and being polite, and so we just keep on doing it. He really enjoys clapping for himself when we’re clapping for him! If all we did was correct the whiny behavior and never praised and rewarded the good behavior it would be confusing to him. But, this way he’s really starting to learn that using his words will get him faster and better results than whining and screaming.

Again, does this mean he never whines and screams? Of course not! But, we’re moving in the right direction. It’s very hard for me to not immediately respond to the whining because I really, really hate it and always want it to stop as soon as possible.  But, I feel like the only way to avoid whining in the long term is to teach him not to do it. If I give him what he wants when he whines, he will quickly learn that it gets him what he wants and that’s the opposite of what we want him to learn.

I’ve found that these same strategies work with my 3 year old students as well. I always ask them to repeat their requests if it’s asked in a whiny voice and work much faster to get them what they ask for when they ask politely the first time. I know that we’re just at the beginning phases of teaching obedience and respect to Little Piñata and that this process will continue on all the way through high school. But, I really think that the sooner we have consistent expectations for him the better. We are grateful that he is also pretty verbal and I know the process can be longer for those children whose language skills are slower, (which is one reason I believe that sign language for babies can be so rewarding) but I think once there are words coming that teaching these skills can be quite beneficial to good manners!

What about you all? What are some ways you encourage your little ones to use good manners?