Naughty Corner?

Before you ask, I’ve had my pudding.

We use the naughty step / toy box at home and it works well for us and have done for 7 years with 2 kids. Our nursery, who used “time our corner” has been aquired by a new company

Now, theyve chosen to stick up 3 A4 pages of text on thier notice board explaining they don’t use the naughty corner concept, as its “psychologically” damaging and can “make them feel like a bad person” which apparantly reflects poorly later in life, although no details about that.

Anyone know / have thoughts on this?

Safe space for snowflake?

Yay! **** tidying up!

Babybgoode’s nursery have the thinking corner where the kids are invited to go and reflect on the situation in an age appropriate way.

I prefer that concept to a ‘naughty’ anything…

What’s wrong with just a good telling off for the naughty brats?

Velcro.

It keeps them on the step longer.

dannybgoode – Member

Babybgoode’s nursery have the thinking corner where the kids are invited to go and reflect on the situation in an age appropriate way.

I was going to say what I think about this, but as I don’t have a thinking corner I couldn’t.

.

After 7 years it is probably time to move your kids onto school.

So that’s why I never stand in the corner of the room. I just thought it was a boring place to be….

Babybgoode’s nursery have the thinking corner where the kids are invited to go and reflect on the situation in an age appropriate way.

Whats wrong with locking them in a cupboard with 20 woodbines and not letting them out ’til they’ve smoked them all?

3 A4 pages of text on thier notice board explaining they don’t use the naughty corner concept,

3 pages to write ‘nobody puts baby in the corner’?

Clip round t’ lug ‘ole.

Load of bollox. At some point children need to learn right from wrong and that reward is earned and not given by default.

Life ain’t fair, life is hard and to me a important step is for children to realise consequence of actions (or lack of action). The thinking corner/naughty step is a good method of developing the understanding of discipline.

I make myself sound like an overbearing parent and that’s not the case, thinking corner is used very sparingly , but it was / is extremely effective in steering the wee fella back in towards the boundaries of good behaviour when other methods have been tried and not worked.

Time out is not a good thing. It’s a complex area of ‘care’ with at least five separate definitions of how it works operationally. I just wrote an article with a colleague for a journal defining the spectrum of these.

I really don’t like the naughty step concept. I do like children knowing and experiencing boundaries in the form of good parenting.

Too many beers after tonight’s ride to provide a proper response but will try to tomorrow.

Fisha for president!

Disappointed this isn’t one of the following:

* a new technique for cornering which is a bit cheeky
* a new name strava users have given to straight-lining
* where straight-liners go for punishment

Label the action not the child, where possible get the child to take responsibility and explain what was the right choice. If you are using time to reflect no more than 1 minute to their age and only use if they have put themselves or others in danger. It’s hard work trying to get things right be it a parent or carer.

You wrote an article on it? I am with fisha – time out is an exceptionally good thing if used appropriately.

I also wonder at what point raising kids turned into science rather than common sense

Breaking the cycle of poor parenting is important and can change outcomes for the most vulnerable families. So articles will be written.

True but an article won’t make a shit of differance in the aforementioned vulnerable family’s and just for the record my missus works with Homestart helping those family’s with those issues and when you have 3 feral kids an alsation that shits where it likes and a single mother full of legal highs the naughty step is amazing progress

The article will help professionals and help guide future good practice. So information sharing is a good thing and will develop how we interact with children in a positive manner?

There are presumably at least 3 sorts of children.

Firstly, those who are parented scientifically by parents who read articles about the naughty corner. These children will have therapists.

Second, those are are feral. They will first encounter the naughty corner after their first TWOC’ing, and will have parole officers.

Third, all the rest who are raised by people who are tired but basically decent, and ahave limited attention spans for articles about the naughty corner.

🙂

The naughty step method works because it takes the child out of the situation where correction is needed. Children are hugely ego-centric and in their own wee world. Where there is behaviour that needs corrected, you need to break through that self-focus and get them to look beyond it. A quiet corner to think on their actions is very effective in doing this. It focuses through in the right direction.

To me, in very general terms, there is a drifting towards too much namby pamby teaching and parenting. As above, children need to learn in a structured way the benefits and merits of good discipline and also failure. I really don’t subscribe to never fail theories. All you is get children through school and into the real world having never failed at anything. When it comes to getting a job or losing a job, along comes a massive fail and its a massive fall off a cliff experience. Learning to deal with such things at younger ages through school experiences is far better for teaching life experience skills. Exams I think are a good thing. No reward without effort.

As I say, I sound over bearing, but really its more that I think that enforced guidance such as the naughty step and similar approaches has its place in the development of children where its used appropriately.

We’ve got to the stage where, if the offspring is misbehaving, she removes herself to her room. Often to read a child psychology textbook 😉

Making her bedroom door non-slamable was a great move.

I’d be interested to read your article Ian.

I suspect that the issue is that some naughty corner use is based around withdrawing attention from the child

e.g. if your child is mean to a sibling then they get your attention (a telling off) whilst the victim is largely ignored. Kids crave attention so in some ways that rewards the naughty action. So you use a “naughty corner” instead to remove attention from them, ignore them and give the victim your attention. Makes sense.

But I guess there is a danger that by doing that you are also teaching them your love is fragile and conditional.
Which doesn’t sound like a good lesson.

Parenting is hard!

Sounds like they need a damn good hiding.
No doubt there is some nonsense eu rule about not being allowed to do that these days though.

Label the action not the child

true

So you use a “naughty corner” instead to remove attention from them, ignore them and give the victim your attention. Makes sense.

So is this.

I spend much of my professional life doing much the same to 16-18 year olds who behave remarkably similarly to toddlers most of the time! I think the key is that once the punishment/reflection time is over there is some sort of ‘ritual’ that indicates that normal service has been resumed and the air is cleared. And you’ve got to internalise that and believe it yourself too, giving them an opportunity to be ‘good’. Ongoing resentment (both ways) is where it all goes wrong.

We use the naughty step, we use it sparingly, and I think it is useful because it breaks children out of the behaviour they are following which is getting them in trouble! Also because it gives you and them a couple of moments of space to calm down! Anyone who says their children can’t wind them up beyond belief is a lier 🙂

For the record I am a teacher, my wife lectures child development and psychology to degree level, but when it comes to our own children we still reckon we just about muddle through and make loads of mistakes 🙂 All that matters is that overall your children feel loved and valued……. Easier said than done after 3yrs broken sleep at 3am

We also use the naughty corner sparingly, mostly when tantrums arise. We ask (tell) the kids to sit in the corner for X minutes and think about thier actions behaviour. Removal from the corner is a level conversation discussing what they did wrong, what they’d do to correct it, an apology to the victim/for the action and lots of hugs.

In the main though it serves as a verbal deterrent. For example, for slapping KJ01, KJ02 would be told it was not good to slap her brother, told it was a naughty action and she was to apologise to her brother which in the main she would. We’d also say that if she did it again she’d recieve her minutes on the naughty step. Our naughty step is on the bottom stairs in the middle of the house so although we don’t engage with them whilst they are there (and the telly is not in line of sight) we are in sight and around them all of the time.

Most of the time we never get there though. I’d like to think our kids are pretty polite and responsible as kids go, and most of the “naughty” actions are an outcome of natural kidology – for example accidentally kicking a ball against a window outside – which although deserves explanatory warning I believe in not limiting kids ability to play and have fun.

Phil40 makes some good points – it’s about them learning boundarys and responsibility progressively in accordance with thier age, but feeling lived and valued and able to have fun. As he says none of us are perfect parents, we can but try!

My son is perfect so we dont have to use the naughty step because we are amazeballs parents!

My son is perfect so we dont have to use the naughty step because we are amazeballs parents!

And because you live in a bungalow.

surely doing something is massively better than doing nothing

I also wonder at what point raising kids turned into science rather than common sense
…
those who are parented scientifically by parents who read articles about the naughty corner. These children will have therapists.

People in this country have had enough of experts. 🙄

#antiscience

I have no kids but I remember a woman at work explaining about her son’s first experience of the ‘naughty chair’

Her : Did you enjoy your first day in school (nursery I think)
Him : Yes, I made a new friend Adam
Her : That’s nice. Which one is Adam?
Him : That one
Her : Oh, he has a big plaster on his head
Him : Yes, I hit him with a chair and got to sit in the naughty chair all day. I love school

Ben C – can I have details of the non-slamable door and also, blueprints for anti-stomping floor boards while you’re at it 🙂

Ben C – can I have details of the non-slamable door

The door catch is recessed with a long lead-in ramp, so the catch has time to slow the door down. I think that’s what did the trick 😉

No idea about floorboards, but I always laugh at her when she stamps her feet, and she really hates being patronised, so that’s mostly cured itself.

Good stuff – I’ll look into it 🙂
I also go for the laughing approach but it seems to spur her on even more and get accused of being mean 🙂