1-2-3 Magic

How do you stop those annoying kid behaviours?  You know they can stop screaming in an instant.  You count them thats what you do.

Well there is a right and wrong way to do the 1-2-3 count? Yes, I have been doing it all wrong all these years. I guess you can attribute it to the same outcome as when you played "telephone tag" as a child. You know the game where you have this big long story and tell it to the first person in the circle who tells it to the next, and then the next and final end up with something totally different then when you started.

There is a book the psychologist recommended when trying to sort out Timmy, our recently diagnosed ADHD kid.  Its called 1-2-3 Magic by Thomas W. Phelan, Ph.D.. Can't mess with that. And apparantly there is a whole web site dedicated to it http://www.parentmagic.com/. I'm going to have to check this one out later.

The book states there are two behaviours that you are trying to control (stop and start behaviours). Stop behavours are (teasing, whinning, etc) and start behaviours (clean your room, brush your teeth,etc).

TO STOP A BEHAVIOUR - You must show NO emotions, NO explanation

1. Say; "Stop screaming"
2. If they dont stop say: "Thats 1" say nothing else and give them a second
3. If they continue say; "Thats 2" say nothing else and give them a second
4. Still screaming, say; "Thats 3, you have 5 minutes in ___" 
5. If they dont' go to ___, then say they have additional minutes if they dont' go.

Works perfect if you are consistent and REMEMBER NO EMOTIONS, NO EXPLANATION

You want them to stop and you know they can. Don't give them the control by seeing you scream like them.



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