Traveling in the car is a kind of half-public, half-private experience
that can present parents with some extremely difficult and even
dangerous situations. Parents often feel like an unwilling captive
audience to their children’s misbehavior in the car. And making
matters worse, moms and dads know their discipline options are
limited when they’re behind the wheel.
Have you ever driven on an interstate with your left hand on the
steering wheel while your right hand is waving madly through the
backseat, trying to grab the kid who’s just been teasing his sister for
the fifty-seventh time since you left the last town? Vacations are
supposed to be fun, but this kind of routine is not fun. I’ve had many
parents tell me that they pretty much stopped taking vacations
because of nasty and repeated scenes like these.
Counting is very useful while chauffeuring the kids around town.
The question, of course, is what to do at 3. Time-out alternatives are
one choice. One couple, for example, didn’t allow anyone to talk—
including Mom and Dad—for fifteen minutes after the kids hit 3 for
behavior like teasing, fighting, or badgering. Other families have used
fines (money taken off the allowance) at the rate of so many cents for
each minute that would have been included in the child’s normal
time-out.
But being in the car doesn’t prevent you from doing a good, old-
fashioned time-out. Where is the time-out room? You’re riding in it!
Your car is actually a stylish, gas-guzzling time-out room. Over the
years a very effective tactic for many of my parents has been to count
1-2-3, then pull the car to the side of the road for the rest period. This
strategy is dramatic and has quite an impact on the children. Parents
can either sit quietly in the car with their children while they’re
serving the time-out, or get out and take the opportunity to stretch
their legs a bit.
For some reason, counting the kids in the car and having them
serve the time-outs when they get home doesn’t work as well, unless
marcin
(Marcin)
#1