talking about, so he’ll respond with, “What?” His comment
may even be a little ornery.
That’s good—make him think a little. You pause, then say,
“School clothes.” If your son then goes off to his room in a huff
to change, fine. You probably don’t have to count the huff. If,
however, he yells at you, “Why do I always have to change my
idiot school clothes? Are they made out of gold threads?”Pop quiz: What should you do now?
You got it! You say, “That’s 2” for Testing Tactic 2, temper.Getting Started: Rehearsing Your Routines
These are some of the tactics you can use to help set up your routines
with the kids. The better a routine, the less aggravation and the less
motivation is required when the kids have to produce the required
behavior. The sign of a good routine is that your prompting and
nagging are minimal, and your comments mostly involve positive
reinforcement.
It’s a good idea to practice the routines once you’ve defined them.
Simply defining a routine and then expecting the kids to comply
without any rehearsals is the Little Adult Assumption at work in your
brain again. Kids need to see, feel, and remember how the particular
routine works. So make time for some leisurely dress rehearsals of
your Start behavior routines—before the procedure actually needs to
be used.
With the little ones (under five years old) you can use a model-
and-pretend method for practicing. You say something like this:
“Let’s practice getting ready for bed. Isn’t that silly? The sun is still
shining! What do we have to do to get ready?” Then reinforce the
kids’ positive answers.