Easter candy and marshmallows got us started again. And they disappeared when Jonathan turned three, replaced by this:
Jonathan gets stickers when he is successful, and he's very pleased about this. We've only had one or two small accidents this week. Today marks the end of the week, and his reward for a full sticker chart? A trip to Walmart to choose a (small!) toy. We're going to gradually extend the number of days on the chart, and eventually I know we'll be able to get away from the reward system. For now, though, this seems to be a good transition from immediate (candy) gratification to a slightly more delayed form.
Potty training with a three year old is a completely different experience from training a two year old. Even though it was his idea in the first place, I do wonder if it wouldn't have been wiser just to wait. Maybe it would have saved us a year of ups and downs and major frustrations. It will be interesting to see how (and when) Thomas approaches the idea.
2 comments:
Yeah, I'm kind of thinking waiting is the way to go with Gregory. We've talked about it a bit, and I really don't think he's ready. I had hoped to do it this spring, but I'm thinking that I may not even try until mid-summer at the earliest. I'd rather not spend huge amounts of time and energy trying to make it happen and just end up frustrating both of us terribly in the attempt. Emma was really easy to potty-train, but she was ready for it and interested in the idea - neither of which holds true for Gregory at this point!
Check out "toilet trained in less than a day" - I heard of it from another chum's blog and checked it out. It sounds like it's very aggressive and high-stress, but actually it's just a very different approach - rather than rewards for USING the toilet, the child gets rewards for staying dry, which is really the goal anyway. It was amazing with Peyton. Also, it has a section in the back on how to know when the child is really ready, so you can avoid a lot of the frustration :-) I blogged about our experience here http://ogle3.wordpress.com/2006/06/29/control-issues-actually-written-6-27/ and here http://ogle3.wordpress.com/2006/06/29/he-did-it/
And Congratulations!!!
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