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You are here: Home / How to break the cycle of timeouts and improve behaviour

How to break the cycle of timeouts and improve behaviour

Find out why using time in discipline is more powerful and effective than using timeouts.


A five-year-old girl is catapulting her brother’s toys across the room. As each Paw Patrol figure flies through the air, her brother becomes more desperate to have it stop. Dad jumps in.

“Stop throwing your bother’s pups or I’ll send you to your room.”

She takes one look at Dad and launches Marshall across the room. Dad yells, “Get upstairs now.”

When she comes down, she’s furious and unwilling to talk to Dad but she stays away from her brother’s toys.

Dad gets back to watching the football game when the little girl makes her way over to her makeshift catapult. This time Zuma hits her brother right in the back.

Her father is less patient and sends her to her room again.

Each time she comes downstairs there is a lull in her difficult behaviour.  But whenever her father becomes absorbed in the game, she goes back to bothering brother.

 

Time ins and a mistake you might be making and want to avoid. This positive parenting strategy is simple and effective.

This is why timeouts and punishment are ineffective.

Countless research studies have shown that punishment in an ineffective way of disciplining children.

When power exertion is used, children are less likely to adopt their parents’ value. This doesn’t just apply to corporal punishment, but also taking away privileges, forcing children to comply, and timeouts. When a parent uses traditional forms of punishment (ultimatums, timeouts, lecturing, or spanking), children obey to avoid punishment. However, in the absence of punishment, children will behave the way they want to.

Sending children away to get control of their anger perpetuates the feeling of ‘badness’ inside them…Chances are they were already feeling not very good about themselves before the outburst and the isolation just serves to confirm in their own minds that they were right.

– Otto Weininger, Ph.D. author of Time-In Parenting 

Other reasons to stop using timeouts include:

  • Traditional timeouts involve the parent separating from the child when he is struggling the most. During time ins, the parent stays and offers a calming presence, offers help, and is there for comfort.
  • Traditional timeouts use what researchers call, ‘love withdrawal’ to motivate better behaviour while time ins use the connection between the child and caregiver to promote cooperation.
  • Traditional timeouts leave a child with the impression that there are good and bad emotions. While there are more difficult emotions like anger, sadness, and frustration, these are all part of the array of feelings my children will feel their entire lives. There is evidence that emotional suppression may interfere with successful adjustment.

 

How to successfully execute a time in.

Executing time-ins require calmness and deliberateness on the part of the parent. The parent must do preventative maintenance such as self-care and using mindfulness. When parents yell, they undermine they model anger instead of composure.

Related reading: Stop yelling at kids with this simple strategy

Unlike timeouts, time-ins aren’t punishment. They aren’t to be used as a threat or an ultimatum. Instead, the parent or caregiver uses a time in when the child is aggressive, having a meltdown, or unable to follow a non-negotiable rule. The parent calmly escorts the child to his or her bedroom, off to the side of a playdate, the park or family room and coaches the child and stays with the child.  During this time, the parent doesn’t lecture. Simply, they state what went wrong and provide empathy for how the child is feeling.  This is called sportscasting.

For instance:
  • “You hit your brother because you were really angry.”
  • “I know you ripped your sister’s picture because she was bothering you.”

Empathy may make a child’s feelings more intense resulting in more angry behaviour or more tears. This is a sign empathy is actually working. It is the process needed for her to let all of her feelings out and not repress them. Once he has completely unloaded emotionally, he is more able to understand your discipline.

This is when parents can prompt their children to problem solve.

For instance:

  • “The next time your brother bothers you, what can you do?”
  • “If your sister won’t give you space, what can you say?

Affirm their choices and offer your own support.

Here are incredible resources on time in discipline

  • Powerful Time In Strategies and Calm Down Techniques You Need to Know
  • In the Heat of the Moment, This Simple Technique Will Help Your Child
  • Why You Shouldn’t Punish Tantrums and What You Can Do Instead
  • Time in vs timeout and the Fundamental Mistake You Want to Avoid
  • Timeouts don’t improve behavior. With many kids, they ignite power struggles
  • How to set up a calm down corner and what’s in ours
  • How to Ditch Punishment and Get the Best Behaviour Yet



Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you choose to make a purchase, I receive a commision. The price you pay is the same.

When we successfully execute time ins and use positive discipline in general, children are more likely to internalize their parents’ expectations. This means when the father turns back to his football game, the daughter feels understood. Dad has shown her respect and modelled calmness. She has gotten the release from her feelings of frustration and can focus on making good choices.

For more about positive discipline and time-ins vs. timeouts, check out the links below
  • child playing with sensory bottle in calm down corner
    Calm Down Corner: What are they?
  • Looking for positive parenting or empathetic parenting strategies for disciplining toddlers and young children? Here are 5 alternatives to timeouts rooted in positive, empathetic parenting.
    5 Positive Parenting Alternatives to Timeouts
  • When positive parenting seems to fail, here are practical strategies to get results and encourage your children to listen better. Parenting from the Heart. Positive discipline
    When Positive Parenting Seems to Fail This is What You Can Do
  • Punish tantrums and Emotional Outbursts: Should you do it? Find out what research says about what works best for parenting through tantrums, emotional outbursts and more. Positive parenting, authoritative parenting, best parenting practices, tips for tantrums, tips for meltdowns
    Why You Shouldn't Punish Tantrums and What You Can Do Instead
  • Toddler hitting is one of the most difficult toddler behaviour. Find positive parenting strategies. Find positive parenting strategies to discipline your toddler effectively. #positiveparenting #positivediscipline #parentingfromtheheart #positivediscipline #difficulttoddler #toddlers #parentingtoddlers
    How to Stop Your Toddler From Hitting Without the use of Punishment
  • When my toddler's behaviour became difficult, we entered into a cycle of timeouts, crying and more misbehaviour. This how I turned it all around. #positiveparenting #timeinvstimeout #parentingfromtheheart
    How to Ditch Punishment and Get the Best Behavior Yet
  • This is a powerful positive discipline technique to show your child you understand them and to promote good listening and good behaviour. These social stories can be used for parenting toddlers, preschoolers, or kindergarteners #socialstories #preschoolers #parentingtoddlers #pottytraining #kidswilllisten #positiveparenting #strongwilledchild #parentingfromtheheart
    How Social Stories Help Children Who Are Struggling
  • Time in time out and a mistake you might be making and want to avoid. This positive parenting strategy is simple and effective.
    Time-in vs. Timeout: How to decide what's right for your family

 

Break the cycle of timeouts by following these powerful ways of executing a time in. #positiveparenting #positivediscipline #parentingtoddlers #difficulttoddler #positivediscipline #parentingfromtheheart

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Hi! I'm Alana. When I'm not nursing cold, stale coffee, I usually can be found with the baby on my hip, barefoot, and racing after my two older kids. Thanks to a degree in psychology and a free-range childhood backing onto an expansive evergreen forest, positive parenting and play-based learning are my passions. Read more here.

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Though there are countless people who understand t Though there are countless people who understand the importance of positive, responsive parenting, the idea that young children should self-soothe remains a prevalent belief.

Though this ideology is well-intentioned, it actually goes against what we know about human development.

Babies come into the world highly dependent on responsive caregiving not only for nurturance and protection but also to foster social and emotional development.

While it may seem that leaving a child to cry will help her learn to cope, it actually floods her brain with cortisol. She doesn’t learn to self-soothe but instead to shut down.

Though it may seem counterintuitive to some, independence is fostered through responsive care. The less stressed a child feels, the safer he feels to explore his world. The less stressed he feels, the more appropriate his emotional responses become.

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