Opinions for Breaking Children of Bad Habits???

It’s a good question and I have to wonder whether there is a sure answer for it. I think that your own behaviour has to set an example because I see my daughter acting exactly like me which is downright scary. She picks up all my habits good or bad. For example I had a few problems a while ago and I was particularly irritable...Okay, very irritable (LOL) and she was reacting exactly like I was when things wouldn’t go her way. These days I have calmed down which has resulted in much better behaviour from her. The other way to deter children from bad habits is by allowing them to live consequences, for example, “If you don’t do your homework you will have to explain that to the teacher and he will punish you, so it is your choice and I will not be helping you and you will not get any pocket money.” I found taking treasured possessions away works really well too, you’ve just got to learn what they value.

I know when my niece was about 4 or so, she would always say G..D..it and start laughing because she thought it was funny (her mom would say that all the time and she thought it was ok). Her dad got her to say Barsh Wangit and she thought that was funny so she stopped saying the other. Depending on what the habit is, it would be helpful to give an acceptable alternative. I think the main thing to remember is to not pay a lot of attention to the negative and if there is something they are doing that is better to acknowledge that. At least that is what my education textbooks tell me about that kind of thing. I don't know if this helps or not, but I thought I'd share. Good luck with that.

The most important things are these: 1) Set a good example. 2) Be consistent. 3) Show kindness even while being firm.

My 'tip' is what the advise I always give to parents in need of support, help, advise, etc. Go to: www.loveandlogic.com and get the books they talk about on the site. These people are so good and their techniques are great! I can't say enough good things about these books and techniques. I have seen the videos, read the books, applied the techniques. THEY WORK! And they make so much sense. I hope you will check it out.

Hello, Getbrowser, thank you for start this question. I have same concern as you. My son is about twenty days over twelve months, but I found he has a very hot temper, whenever he want something, he has to get it, if we give him something else, he will just throw it away... It is really hard to teach the kid especially when he is too young to know what is right and what is wrong... Have a nice day and happy mylotting.

when i was a child i have lots of bad habits . when my mother found one she would told me directly the first time if it did not work she would beat me once she found . luckily i gradually got away from them.

A main focus on breaking a bad habit would be consistency, and to teach the right habit not to just focus on what NOT to do. Also to be sure that you are modeling the good behaviors and providing back-ups to this habit. Make sure that the parent also understands that this is not an easy task, that this has to be done with plenty of repetition. Raising children is never easy!

I agree that bad habits should be dealt with while they are still young. Its a lot harder to break a habit once you get older. I think that parents should be consistent on reminding the child whenever he does something wrong, habits are not easy to break, even for adults, so we have to be more considerate with little children until they are able to finally kick the habit

Most kids grow out of bad habits as they grow older,their friends will point it out to them and it will suddenly stop,ignore it,if they know you don't like it they will do it all the more.If it is something that could affect their health sit them down and frighten them out of doing it.Sounds awful but it does work.

When I am young I have many bad habits. My mum will use cane and cane me whenever I do those bad habits. And everytime I got cane because of my bad habits, it actually make me remember not to do the bad habits, which I think really help.

When I was young I would bite my nails and then one day a friend had nail polish on her nails. I went home and ask my mom if I could put it on my nails and she no because I bite my nails and might get sick. She told me if I would not bite my nails I could put nail polish on my nails. I told her I would not and she let me put it on my nails I did forget and bit one nail it did not taste good so I did not bite my nails again because I want to be able to wear nail polish. It is hard to break kids from their bad habits you can talk to them about it and explain what they are doing is wrong.

if you have children you want to help,there is a book for you too.it called goodkids,bad habits.the real age guide to rasing healthy children.in it jennifer tractchenberg discuss the kinds of habbit children have as they are growing up .she gives insight into how these habits can follow them into later life.the author helps parents set up programme that is designed specially for their child.this will help the children to break bad habits

You are very right. It is extremely difficult to get children to stop their bad habits.. Well, first of all, you have to explain to them that it is not good for them, whatever they are doing. Then, if it doesn't work, you have to keep scolding them whenever they do their bad habits or give some sort of punishment (no ice cream for today..etc.) Eventually, they will stop the bad habit...But it can take time..

I used to have a bad habit of sucking my thumb when I was young. And i was already in the third grade when that habit stop. And it was too hard to stop it at that age. I think if my parent try to stop it when I was younger it won't be as hard as that. But my parents reason is that they pitty me if I cannot go to sleep. Because before I really can't sleep if I am not thumb sucking.

A few years ago my daughter had the habit of biting her nails.... she would bite so much that there would be nothing to bite then she will bite the skin around her fingers, but gradually she came out of the habit... I am not sure what triggered it, but now that she goes to school and is quite busy she has forgotten that habit... My son now has the habit of asking the neighbours for chocolate or biscuit or anything to eat, he will go to their house and ask them can you give me chocolate... we have tried to tell him its not a good habit but he seems to ignore our warnings... he is just 4.... So sometimes time will just heal the problem and they will leave their bad habits just the way they caught it.... so it should be quite ok...

My children didn't have many bad habits but one of them would chew their fingernails. First I tried to find out why he did it and discovered that when he was nervous about something he would bite the fingernails. He didn't really like the ragged results so we worked on finding another way for him to cope. I taught him to do sums in his head, simple addition and subtraction because he loved working with numbers. That relaxed him and he stopped biting his fingernails. Find the cause, talk with the child to see how he or she feels about what they are doing, explain why they should be do that and find an alternative behavior that is acceptable to everyone. It works!

my son is only three years of age, and so far i dont see any bad habits from him. maybe he will adopt those when he starts going to school next year. parents needs to guide their children and as you said that we need to help them break that and to let them realize that it is bad and they need to break that. for me i think if i see my son starting to have a trait that is not good from that instant i will tell him to not do it again. i will not let it be a habit from the start i will tell him to stop it. like you said it is easier said than done and i will cross the bridge when i get there. are your kids have such habits that you wanted them to stop?

As far as bad habits, my daughter really only has one. She has sucked her thumb since she was a baby and now that she is almost seven years old, it is a habit that we really need to break. We are trying fingernail painting right now with her. She says that if her thumbs are painted that they don't taste good so we are painting her thumbs when she wants her nails painted. Other than that, I don't know what else to do with her.

I like to just be as positive as possible. If I see something I don't like then I TRY to ignore it. (I am not perfect at this.) I also praise alot of anything they are doing right.

Children are innocent. I think it is easier to break a young child's habit than an adults. You can try reinforcing the good habit (opposite of the bad habit) with some sort of prize or reward. If the child is old enough to understand you, then you simply explain to the child what they are doing and why they should not do it. When a child is young they are strongly influenced by their parents, so it is a good time to engage in these type of discussions. It is much harder in the preteen and teen years. At that point they mostly listen to their friends. Remember it takes about 40 days to establish a habit. So, if you want them to develop good habits it's going to take some work.