calling M. Foucault, M. Foucault come in please

[metaphortunate]

Mr. E had a visit with a friend of his this week. Said friend has kids older than the Junebug, and as they were talking shop, as parents will do, the friend asked if we had any thoughts on discipline. Because at this point, apparently it is hard to take the kids over to anyone's houses because they do not hear the word "no" and that turns out to not be very much fun.

This is not a situation I want to find myself in four years from now. But I don't really know what to do about it. This is one reason I've loved the baby stage: you don't have to discipline a baby. Babies do what they gotta do. Older kids, I know you have to actually train and stuff - but I have no idea how.

Parents of kids older than babies - what have you done about discipline? Has it worked? Did you try different things? What did you start with, and when did you start, and how has your approach changed as the kids have gotten older?

I'm turning on anonymous comments on this one.

Comments

[rivkat]

Initially: Physical removal from situations where the kid couldn't control him/herself. Later (possibly by around 2, though it's hard to remember) time-outs. Still later, loss of privileges, though that was/is usually when there was a privilege coming up soon because otherwise it doesn't make much of an impression given their time horizons.

Our two kids had/have very different levels of testing boundaries. The time-outs took a long time to make much of an impression on our daughter, but I think they eventually worked. But it's hard to say--so much seems to depend on the particularities of the kid.