You’re in the kitchen cooking dinner and you hear your kids screaming at each other in the next room. It’s the iPad, again. “That’s it, I’m sick of it” you think to yourself. You see your eldest, little Miss Sarah smack her little brother Johnny. “Time out!” you call. You grab Sarah and put her in her room. You yell “you need to calm down, think about what you did wrong and use gentle hands. Only then will I let you out!”. She is crying and you feel pretty lousy. So, is this what you should be doing?

Time out is a popular way that parents manage their child’s behaviour but there is often confusion about when to use it and why. So let me explain:

What is Time out (or what is it supposed to be?)

Time out is called “time out from positive reinforcement”. It is a strategy used to manage a child’s challenging behaviour by removing an environment or an object that is reinforcing to the child. In the above example, it would mean removing the iPad from Sarah and Johnny. However, removal of an object or environment should only be one aspect of time out because this in itself does not teach the child how to regulate their emotions. Imagine you really wanted a chocolate bar, and your partner snatched it off you and hid it. How would you feel? Calm?  Probably not. What if your partner then locked you in your room and told you to figure it out on your own? Feeling calmer at this point? I doubt it. We should think about time out as an opportunity to provide support to our kids.

So, What Do I Do Instead?

1. Stay calm – model the behaviour you want from your child. Take a breath. Count to ten. Yelling will only make you and your child more upset and elevated in this situation.
2. Think about your child’s thoughts and feelings. Can you understand their perspective and put yourself in their shoes? What are they perceiving in this situation? What are their needs? How are they feeling? What do they think is unfair?
3. Consider the specific skill you want your child to develop. Do you want your child to learn to use their words? Do you want your child to take a breath when they’re feeling frustrated? Do you want your child to ask for help when they can’t reach an object?
4. Remove the child from the environment that is causing the challenging behaviour. Just taking them to the side a few metres away is sometimes sufficient. Use your judgement around how much space they need.
5. If your child is in a reasonably calm you can ask them to express their thoughts (if they aren’t, try step 7 and then come back to 5). You may say something like “Hey Sarah, what’s going on? Can you tell me what happened?” This lets your child know that you are on their team and trying to understand their thoughts and feelings.
6. Validate. Validate. Validate! Let your child know that you are interested in their thoughts and feelings. It’s the worst when you tell a problem to a friend or partner, and they go straight into telling you what they think you should do. You might say something like “It sounds like you were feeling really frustrated when Johnny snatched the iPad from you, I would have been annoyed too”.
7. Help them calm down. Try asking them to pretend to smell a flower and then blow a balloon. Ask them to count to 5.
8. Set the clear expectation to your child. Keep it short! “Remember we use gentle hands in this family. You can’t hit your brother.”
9. Tell them what you expect instead. “When your brother snatches, you can take a breath and ask mum or dad for help. Can you say, ‘mum I need help?’”
10. Praise them for calming down. “I can see you’re calmer now and ready to make good decisions. Well done for calming down I’m so proud of you.”
11. Ask them if they’re ready to go back into the environment and try again. “Should we try sharing with Johnny again? Should we try using gentle hands now?”. If they aren’t ready, continue to support them in calming down.
12. Go back into the situation with your child and help support them. Take them back into the situation. You can model what you expect. You can help them problem solve. Ask them if they have any ideas of how to fix the situation.
13. Praise them in that situation (and future situations!). When they are showing you the skill that you are trying to help them develop, give them lots and lots of specific praise. “Well done for sharing with your brother and using your gentle hands!”.

What Happens If It Doesn’t Work?

• Some children may need more time and space away from things, particularly if they are very upset. Talking too much at this point won’t be helpful.
• If the child is too emotionally heightened, then they can’t access their logical brain and the skills that will help them to make good decisions. You may need to encourage the child to spend some time in a different room. This doesn’t mean that they’re in trouble. They can go to their bedroom where they have toys. It’s promoting the child to take some time away to calm down. We use this skill as adults all the time. We don’t lock ourselves in a scary dark room; we may take a walk or have a shower then come back to the problem.
• Once they are calmer you can try steps 4-12 again.

Some children may become upset more often or more quickly. This can make it harder to know how to manage their meltdowns.  If this sounds like your child, then please book in and come and see us. We can help fine tune some of the ways you are approaching them or help you learn new skills.

Take Away Messages

• The best way to avoid these problems happening repeatedly is to catch your child being good. There are so many times where children are playing nicely together, and we think “a bit of peace” and we leave them alone.  These are the times that we should be going in an encouraging and praising children for displaying the behaviour we want to see.
• When praising children, it is always more advantageous to praise them specifically instead of generally. This is called labelled praise. For example, saying “well done for using your gentle hands”, or “good job for sharing with your brother” instead of “good job” or “well done”.
• Kids need consistency and predictability. A consistent and predictable environment helps a child confidently build these skills over time as they know what to expect.

Need more information? Would rather listen than read about this stuff? I recommend The Pop Culture Parenting Podcast Episode 001 on Home Alone and Time out. You can start from 15min in https://open.spotify.com/episode/0F1AMgaLCy0W4B0xCUt1rv?si=248431de8d3347d9

Dr Andea Papaloizou, Clinical Psychologist