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Over the years, a commonly accepted immunization schedule has evolved. Most doctors follow it, although there are some acceptable variations. The schedule is designed to give your child the maximum protection available as soon as possible. The reason some shots are not given earlier is that the child’s own defense system hasn’t matured enough to develop immunity. For example, a number of years ago, the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine were given to infants at twelve months. It was discovered that many of these infants didn’t develop protection against these illnesses because their own defense systems weren’t able to react to the vaccine correctly. The date was changed, and now the vaccine is much more effective.

Immunization and Testing Schedule

• 2 months – DIP and TOPV
• 4 months – DIP and TOPV
• 6 months – DIP
• 9-12 months – TB test
• At least 15 months – MMR
• 18 months – DIP and TOPV
• 2 years – HiB and TB test
• 4-6 years – DIP and TOPV

DIP [diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine]: This immunization is given as a shot, usually in the thigh. Many children have no reaction to it. Some have swelling and redness at the injection site, as well as some fussiness.

TOPV [trivalent oral polio vaccine, also called the Sabin vaccine]: Your child is given a small amount of liquid to swallow. Side effects from this vaccine are very rare.

MMR [measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine]: This vaccine is given as a shot. Your child needs only one shot to have lifelong protection from all three viruses.

TB Test [tuberculosis test]: Some doctors feel that routine tuberculosis testing is necessary and do it on all children. Other doctors feel that this testing is not needed and do it only when they believe the child is at risk of exposure to this disease.

HiB [hemophilus influenza type B vaccine]: This relatively new vaccine protects children against developing several types of infections including one type of meningitis [infection of the coverings of the brain and spinal cord]. This meningitis is more common in children two to six years old who are exposed to a number of other children, such as in day care centers, or who stay with babysitters who care for four or more children. Although this type of meningitis isn’t common, if your two to six year old child is in day care or with a babysitter, you should discuss the HiB vaccine with your doctor.

Boosters: After your child has his childhood shots, he’s all set unless he is going to be traveling in certain foreign countries or until he turns twelve. The tetanus shot provides protection for five to ten years.

Smallpox: The immunization used to be routine, but it has been discontinued because the risk from the vaccine itself is greater than the risk of getting smallpox. This disease has almost been wiped out worldwide.

With goodwill and a sincere desire for communication, you may very well be able to take the best that your parents and other older relatives have to offer and tactfully teach them the best of what you know, without lowering your standards or sacrificing your values. First, use the many available resources to back up your opinions. We all tend to believe what we read, and women of the older generation held doctors and experts in high regard, so show Grandma the passages in books and magazines that reinforce your opinion. Quote your pediatrician to her. Share with her the literature you have from organizations such as the La Leche League (International, USA,

Canada) and the National Childbirth Education Association. Tell her what you’ve learned from people whose opinion she respects-you neighbor, whose children she always admires, or your sister or sister-in-law. Sometimes simply stalling is a good technique. Thank her for her advice, and say and do nothing more about the matter. Or “forget” to try her method, or tell her you’ll probably “start soon.” With good humor and consideration, you can probably work things out with Grandma so you at least approach the ideal relationship, in which you are working together for the benefit of your child and in which the child is more important to both of you than each other’s opinions about child care are. Bear in mind that the ultimate benefits of your rapport with Grandma will go to your child, whose relationship with her is priceless.

 The bottom line in dealing with Grandma or anyone else is that you are the parent, an intelligent and well informed person, and you have the right to determine what is best for your child and to raise him or her as you see fit. In the end, if you have to, you can remind these people that they chose their ways and you will choose yours. Of course, all this is easier with acquaintances or strangers, who will perhaps surprise you with their audacity in telling you what to do or asking you impertinent questions about the way you are caring for your child. You do not need to justify your actions to such people; you can avoid confrontations by simply thanking them politely for their interest and going your way. Do be sure that you are actually being criticized before you react. Remember that the more insecure we are, the more we tend to infer criticism when none was intended, and that we all tend to overreact to situations in which our children are concerned. There are few issues important enough to force confrontations with relatives and friends.

Finding adequate child care is also an important part of making the choice. “At first the idea of leaving her with anyone terrified me,” recalls Georgianne. “Getting adequate child care was a nightmare. I got a list of the places licensed in my area, but when I went to visit the very first one I was discouraged. The woman had three other children and the home was in a depressing, stark apartment building. I just thought, no. In the end I paid a fortune for a series of nannies. They were all OK, but none of them stuck around much longer than six months.”

Very few companies provide day care or nurseries. Local social-services departments have few day-care facilities, and these are mostly filled by single or special-needs mothers. Some churches and temples have day-care facilities, however. Private day-care services tend to be expensive, but they are becoming more common. Baby-sitters can be a good, inexpensive option if you find one you like. Nannies can live in if you have the space, or can come in for the day. Also, if you have one child and work part-time, you may be able to share a nanny with another mother to cut costs. If you work part time, au pairs can work out if you have the room. However, they aren’t expected to work more than five hours a day. Also, they may be very young and inexperienced with small children.

Finding suitable child-care arrangements is often an ongoing worry for the working mother. What works when you have one baby will not be perfect when you have two preschool children. Often child-care problems get even more complicated when children start school: It’s harder to find someone who wants to work for only two or three hours after school or during school vacations. And what do you do when your child is ill? Having both children and a job usually means:

• You have a reasonably understanding relationship with your employer.
• You are prepared to sacrifice some paid vacation days at those times when your child or baby-sitter is ill.
• Your partner is prepared to make some of these sacrifices, too.

Otherwise, the situation may become unworkable.

Even though your baby has already experienced some separation anxiety, it is likely that she will develop more intense reactions to separation at this developmental stage.  Leaving her with a babysitter or dropping her off at a daycare center may be more difficult.  Remembering to take a favorite toy or a lovey along may help with these leave-takings.  Fear of new situations results partially because of your child’s inexperience with them.

Easy sleep patterns that can be established may be disrupted in this stage.  So much time during the day is spent in motor activity-walking and running-that by the time evening rolls around, your toddler is likely to be too overtired to go to bed easily.  In addition, you shouldn’t be surprised if your baby starts to wake up again in the middle of the night.  This may be because your baby is afraid of being alone.  Night-fears begin around eighteen months.  They may continue through the third and fourth year, changing in intensity and content.  Three year olds can often tell you about the dreams that wake them up.

At these early ages, your baby doesn’t know what’s real and what’s fantasy, so nighttime being alone, and dreams can be frightening experiences.  You can relieve some of your baby’s fearfulness by comforting her and telling her that you are there and will protect her.  On occasion, even letting your baby crawl into bed with you can give her a sense of security and you a good night’s sleep.

Children’s fears can be lessened through imaginative play and books.  Play is a terrific means of working out difficulties your child may be experiencing.  Some of your baby’s fears and worries can be worked out through your playing together.  Each of you can take turns pretending to be the “scary monster,” which the other one banishes.  Some delightful children’s books cast triumphant little boys and girls as conquerors of nighttime monsters.

In addition to books, parents can use puppets to engage their toddlers, and older children too, in lively re-enactments of daily concerns and fears.  Playing with puppets removes some of the tension associated with real-life discussions about upsetting issues.  By giving the worries to the puppets in the realm of your play, some forbidding topics are no longer unthinkable.  Toddlers need a regular bedtime routine.  Many parents use the hour before bedtime to read books with their children.  Not only is reading to your child known to be beneficial to her later reading readiness, but eighteen months olds find the same routine night after night comforting.  Thus, a consistent bedtime “ritual” is good for your child’s emotional growth and cognitive development and may provide a better night’s sleep for both parents and child.

New Advances

As a parent, your role is to support your baby’s move toward independence while at the same time recognizing his need to be dependent on you.  Some children have great difficulty struggling to reach the next developmental milestone.  Others make smooth transitions from milestone to milestone.  Some experts believe that development is mainly dependent on the child’s growth or maturation, with maturation moving in an upward cyclical manner.  Occasionally peaks and valleys do occur.

With this cyclical view of development, parents can see how new advances can be upsetting for children.  Thus, with advances to each new stage of development, notably with walking, your baby’s behavior may seem disorganized until he is sure of himself and has consolidated his new skills.

Special Smiles

Special smiles just for parents begin appearing at four months.  A smile will spread across your baby’s face when he sees you, but not at anyone else.  This behavior implies not only recognition of you-a cognitive skill-but also recognition of your specialness-a social skill.  This, of course, produces an incredibly strong emotional response from you.  It makes it more fun for you to be with your baby and to play with him.  In fact, it may be hard for you to pull yourself away to do household chores or return to work.  This, in turn, brings great benefits to your baby, providing him with two ready playmates to teach him the many things he needs to learn.

Babbling and Cooing

Isn’t it wonderful to hear a baby beginning to make sounds, to coo and babble as you jiggle him up and down?  Your baby’s babbling and cooing evoke a strong response from you, just as his smiling does.  Your play begins to take on a real conversational quality. Now each of you is more likely to take a turn-you respond to your baby’s cooing with words and funny faces, and your baby answers with more cooing and babbling.

Laughing

Some babies begin to laugh even before four months, some as early as five weeks.  Laughing occurs about a month after your baby first smiles.  A sudden, intense [perhaps surprising] stimulus can make a baby laugh.

But you may notice that sometimes your baby is not sure whether to laugh or cry.  Laughter appears to be an emotion on the cutting edge of fear.  Theories regarding laughter suggest that babies laugh at things that are almost, but not entirely, understandable to them.  Things that are too confusing, however, will make them cry.  Four to six months olds tend to laugh more at things that touch them [like ticking] and talk to them [like you saying silly things].

Your baby’s laughing helps form an emotional link between the two of you, making your play a lot of fun.  We like to see babies laugh, so we repeat whatever we did to get them laughing again.  By doing this, your baby is learning to gain some control over his environment.  Through laughing, babies can also learn the kind of effect they have on other people.

Feeding and Sucking

By four months, in all probability, either your baby has found his fingers or thumb to suck on in between feedings or you have offered him a pacifier.  Several factors may influence the amount of time your baby spends sucking just for fun.  More sucking is likely to occur particularly with breast-fed babies, when you begin to wean your baby.  [Oftentimes, weaning is more difficult for the mother than the baby.  That special dependency relationship may be difficult to leave behind.]

When teeth begin to erupt, you may see your baby chew more on hands, fingers, and any available toys.  Weaning and teething frequently take place simultaneously because of baby’s biting.

Most babies like to suck on something between and during meals.  If babies have the good fortune to find their own thumbs-some do this as early as three weeks-they may be able to calm themselves down.  Nonnutritive sucking [sucking for pleasure and not for nutrition] is one of your baby’s first means of exploration.  Babies use their mouths for exploring the world by touching and tasting all sorts are things.

People used think that the amount of sucking their babies did would have lasting effects on their personalities and behavior patterns.  For example, some thought that babies that didn’t suck enough because of bottle feeding [or because the holes in the nipples were running too fast] would grow up to have “oral” personalities and would be thumb-sucking school age children and smoking adolescents.

These early theories have not been upheld.  How babies were fed or weaned makes little difference in their later personality development. Frequent sucking also doesn’t seem to have any effect on emotional development [or on dental development, until the permanent teeth start coming in], so there’s no need to continually remove your baby’s thumb from his mouth or deny him a pacifier.  In fact, it is impossible to keep babies from sucking when they want to; some babies will even suck when they have nothing in their mouths.

The upshot of professional studies is that a child’s emotional development stability is not related to how she was fed.  Also, weaning has not been found to have long-term, resounding ill effects, either psychological or physical, on well-fed babies.  Rather, such issues as parental warmth, maternal responsiveness, and the level of conflict in the home are related to development of secure relationships.

Problems in Interaction

By as early as four months, your baby is beginning to develop a specific relationship with you. Your patterns of play with your baby help you to form a lasting bond.  But problems can occur in parent-baby play.

Problems in interaction can best be viewed as a breakdown in the play sequence-a misstep in the dance-such as mutually [a back and forth togetherness] and turn-taking are inhibited.  Sometimes the break is obvious to all concerned-as in child neglect and abuse.  More often, problems may be very subtle and can be identified only through frame-by-frame analysis of videotapes of parents with their babies.  Some parents and babies show a beautiful rhythmicity and “dance” in their play, while others appear “out of step.”  The misstep appears when what you expect to happen next just doesn’t happen.  An example of this kind of misstep is seen with a mother who turns away just as her baby starts to smile at her.  Problems can arise because the baby isn’t learning he can control his mother’s behavior through appropriate social behaviors of his own.  Psychologists would say that the partners in such an interaction are “noncontingent”-that is, one partner’s response has nothing to do with the other partner’s signal.  Babies experiencing this type of interaction can “learn helplessness” no matter what their signal is, they are unable to adequately control their environment [in this example, the mother’s response]. For this reason, it is essential that all parents react sensitively to their babies’ signals.

Another problem may occur if one partner in the interaction is overwhelming.  Some parents “turn off” their babies by working too hard to sustain their attention.  If, for example, a mother continues to intrude on her baby, moving closer and trying to coax a smile, even though the baby signals that she doesn’t want to play, the mother is dominating the interaction by not allowing her baby a chance to be an equal partner.

There can also be a problem with the match between the personality style of the parent and the activity level of the baby.

Unfortunately, there are no set rules or easy answers for the “right way” to play with your baby, except to be sensitive to your baby’s particular characteristics. Some babies are far more difficult to parent than others.  Sometimes, just knowing why babies respond in the way that they do is enough to free parents from any misgivings they may be having and help them get back on the right track.  The best advice you may ever receive as first time parents is to relax, have fun, and enjoy your baby

Recognizing Your Child’s Uniqueness

Every baby is different.  Some of these differences come from you and the kind of environment you provide.  But some of these differences seem to come with the baby at birth.  One of these inborn differences is in his temperament or behavioral style- that is, whether a child is “easy” or “difficult’ or “slow to warm up.”  Considering temperament is important because, unfortunately, gross mismatches occur occasionally between the temperaments of parents and their infants.  These parents are bound, therefore to “go against the grain” when trying to set limits for their children.

An “easy” baby shows biological regularity [in feeding, sleeping, and eliminating], predictable behavior, and adaptability.  Almost any parent finds this kind of baby easy to get along with because she quickly adjusts to parental routines and expectations.

The “difficult” child, on the other hand, withdraws from new situations, has negative and intense moods, and adapts slowly.  Although some parents take great pleasure in this type of baby, describing their baby’s difficultness as “vigor” and “lustiness,” more frequently, parents and teachers of “difficult” children feel threatened, anxious, and inept.  If yours is such a child, it is important to keep in mind that your baby’s personality is probably not your fault.  A difficult baby’s temperament often exists independent of parental attitudes and of management techniques.

Although, the “slow to warm up” child is somewhere in the middle, this baby sometimes causes more confusion for parents than either the “easy” or the “difficult” baby.  These babies may be frustrating because their behavior is often so unpredictable.  At times they are a joy to be with, but changes in routine seem to throw them, causing great difficulty for their parents.

Your child’s temperament influences the behavior and attitudes of peers, siblings, children, parents, and teachers.  How your child “fits” with these significant people in his daily life will dictate his patterns of adjustment to new situations.  If you think that a poor “fit’ may be detracting from your baby’s opportunities for growth and development, you might ask your pediatrician about the parental-infant programs in your community.  Parent-infant educators can often suggest some techniques to help make parenting easier.

Language Makes Life Easier for Everyone

When your baby can communicate some ideas to you, your parenting job becomes a bit easier.  You can ask what’s wrong.  You no longer are required to be a mind-reader and try to second-guess your toddler to figure out what is bothering him.

Much younger babies use gestures and single words to make their wants and needs known.  Your baby may have developed some of his own unique gestures to express different wants.  Many eighteen month olds have command over a number of words.  These single words can mean whole sentences.  Some eighteen month olds put words together in two or three word combinations.

Wise parents make use of their babies’ natural ability to acquire language to make their jobs easier.  For example, one mother was so quick to get everything for her toddler that he didn’t need to talk.  All his needs were being met without much effort on his part.  When her pediatrician suggested that she wait for her son to ask for things, the little boy started talking in five word sentences.  In this situation, the mother had been too good at reading her son’s signals.

If you have concerns about your baby’s development of language, be sure to discuss them with your pediatrician.  Babies prone to frequent ear infections occasionally have fluctuating hearing losses.  If you suspect your baby isn’t listening to you or doesn’t understand what you say, you might want to check this out.  Sometimes children have behavior problems because of poor hearing.  Kids can be particularly difficult to manage when they don’t hear what you say.

For some babies, having the words in one’s head but not having the words come out right can be a very frustrating experience.  There is so much that they want to say, but they don’t know how to say it.  Try not to place too much pressure on your baby to say the words correctly.  A lot of internal and external demands are being placed on the almost two year old.  Not only are these youngsters trying to master an upright world, they are also trying to become competent users of language.  This is a time when gentle encouragement, assurance, and firm limits are needed.

Egocentricity

At eighteen months, your baby has an egocentric view of the world-that is, she sees herself at the center of the world and is unable to see things through other people’s eyes.  The term “egocentric” is often used to refer to self-centered adults, but it also depicts a baby’s view of her position of power in the world; she, too, thinks that the world revolves around her.

At this age, your baby recognizes that parents can do things for her.  Adults serve a purpose for babies; they are a means to an end.  However, while adults can give babies what they want; they can also make demands and set limits, which can be a source of conflict.  For example, a mother can ask her toddler to begin to master independent living skills [such as giving up the nighttime bottle, using a cup and spoon, and using the potty] before the toddler feels she is ready.

Feeding can be a potential battleground for parents and babies-with the baby often winning.  Babies can use the feeding situation as a way to control parents. A laid-back approach-allowing the baby some selection of food and not forcing her to eat detested foods-can prevent later feeding problems.  There are also some tricks that you can use, such as disguising the disliked foods with preferred tastes.

Conflicts about self-care skills often center on dependence-independence issues.  Some sort of balance must be achieved between your baby’s dependence on you, the caregiver, and your desire for your baby’s increased independence.  Some of these skills-such as toilet training-may be best dealt with at a later date since some readiness skills may be needed.  There is no single time table because children master developmental skills at their own rates.

No… No, No… No, No, No!

One of a baby’s first words is no. Babies often say no to your requests when they mean yes.  Some say it is easier for a baby to shake his head from side to side than up and down, but defiance is certainly also the name of the game.  We have all seen many a two year old throw a temper tantrum in the middle of a store because he didn’t get what he wanted.  These temper tantrums are disruptive and embarrassing, but are all part of growing up.  Though never easy to deal with, they are inevitable, and are faced by every parent.  The difficulty is not yours alone.  And yes, the phase will pass!

Although toddlers do have more language available to them, this stage is characterized by a great deal of opposition.  It’s as if the toddler has to do the opposite just as a statement of his independence.  This is a very important developmental step for your child.  It is an assertion of your child’s sense of himself as an individual.  These difficult times are important for your child to separate from you and move toward becoming a distinct person.

Like everything else in development, the timetable varies from child to child.  Some very verbal children don’t hit the “terrible twos” until they are three.  This is a consequence of the child’s and parent’s ability to talk about what the child is feeling, thinking, or wanting.  Parents can explain a lot of different kinds of things to toddlers, sometimes what appear to be quite rational explanations can diffuse a potentially explosive situation.  Other times, these explanations are totally useless, partially because the baby doesn’t have the necessary level of understanding to know what you are talking about.  Also, there are times when your child just won’t give in.  It is very important for parents to sit down and talk with each other so they can establish priorities as to what’s worth a fight and what isn’t. 

By three years of age, your child is likely to have a number of relationships with people other than his parents.  He may have a favorite babysitter, or just a good friend.  He will prefer to play with children his own age rather than to play with you, though he still enjoys and needs you.  Long periods of time can be spent in play without any fighting and with some sharing of toys. As your child’s world expands-for example, when he goes to a daycare center or nursery school-the influences on your child’s self-esteem will also include new people’s attitudes toward him.  As parents it’s essential to provide him with the security he needs so he can go out and explore his surroundings. While your child may be quite ready to go off to nursery school, once in a while he may slip back to his less-sure former self and not want to leave your side.  These are considered to be normal separation reactions.  His going to nursery school is a big emotional step for both of you.Here is an example of a three year old boy we knew.  It was the first week of nursery school.  Everyday the boy’s mother walked him to the classroom, gave him a hug and a kiss, and said goodbye.  Each time the boy cried uncontrollably, refusing to take his jacket off for the whole day.  Knowingly, the teachers respected the child’s need to hold onto his jacket.  For this child, removing his jacket meant that he was going to stay at this place without his mother.  In a way, he was unsure he was ready for all this independence.  Both mother and child benefited from the teacher’s warm assurance that everything would be all right.  Gradually, the teachers enticed the child into the fun the others were having.  Some nursery schools are quite aware of children’s difficulties with separation and build this into their programs by slowly introducing children into the classroom.  For some children, nursery school is the first time to be on their own.  It is, on the one hand, an obvious milestone, but on the other hand, it is just one of many steps that take your baby gradually toward independence. 

Imagination is especially wonderful and exciting to watch develop in your child.  Through the windows of your child’s play and the talking he does to himself, you can actually follow your child, the “movie director,” casting a set of characters into their various roles.  Fantasy develops along with your child’s more sophisticated knowledge of the world, although he cannot yet differentiate fantasy from reality.

Some children have such great imaginations that they tell the most unbelievable stories-and sometimes get in trouble for doing so.  One child we know had an imaginary friend; whenever he did something really bad that he didn’t want to catch the blame for, his imaginary friend was there to cover for him.  Usually, the presence of an imaginary friend is just a sign of a healthy, imaginative child.  But imaginary friends can become too powerful; they can interfere with your child’s ability to accept responsibility, can be present to the exclusion of other friends, and can do all your child’s talking.  Luckily, this doesn’t happen very often.  If you are concerned about your child’s imaginary companion, you may want to consult with a professional.

By three, your child has internal pictures of the people in his world.  The television shows he watches, and daytime events.  The world is no longer viewed as a place as filled with magical powers: cause and effect relationships are becoming explainable to him.  Earlier, his parents were omnipotent; now there are some chinks in their armor.  Before your child was able to connect cause and effect relationships, he thought things happened because of the things he did.  Imagine how powerful and scared a two year old might feel if he thought he caused lightening to appear.  This kind of thinking takes years to change into the logical form it will acquire in adulthood.

Myths about giftedness permeate our culture. The prevalence of these myths can result in a variety of problems for you as the parent of a gifted child and for your child. Among the most common myths are the following;

1. “Every child is gifted”
2. “Gifted children are easy to raise”
3. “Gifted children are nerds and geeks”
4. “Gifted children are strangely manipulative and grow up to be white-collar criminals”
5. “Gifted children are so intensely emotional that they cannot exist in the real world. Often they commit suicide because they feel so tortured”

Society flourishes and moves forward because of individuals who have a vision, genius, or talent that enhances or improves our understanding of ourselves and of the world. To create a context where this can happen, it is imperative that talent, creativity, and genius be discovered and nurtured in our children. Schooling and the understanding of child development are the keys to developing gifted potential. Unfortunately, gifted education is neglected. The development of gifted children puzzles and concerns parents, educators, psychologists, and other mental health professionals.

General confusion about which children are really gifted stems from both the prevalent myths and the fact that there is no working definition of giftedness. Clearly, and unequivocally, giftedness is today misunderstood misused as a psychological educational construct by parents and educators.

A General Definition of Giftedness

Since psychology became recognized as a science in the 1850’s, psychologists have tried to demonstrate the existence of giftedness as a psychological phenomenon. Researchers have used twin studies for more than 150 years to prove that giftedness not only exists, but that intellectual potential is genetically determined. Although there are flaws in this genetic research, there are nonetheless conclusive indications that intellectual potential has roots in the child’s genetic endowment. Culture, environment, and parenting, contribute significantly to the giftedness laid down in the child’s genetic makeup.

Just as researchers disagree about what makes a child gifted, so do parents and educators. When I talk to persuasive and positive parents, I can totally understand why some have difficulty getting a grip on what is distinctive about a gifted child.

Only the top 2 percent of children on the bell curve qualify as gifted, while only 1 in 100 is considered highly gifted. But another part of me, the “grandmom about town,” knows that her words have a ring of truth if you hear them through the perspective of positive or naïve parents.

Why do most parents want to believe their child or children are gifted? This leap of faith is natural, healthy, and well meaning. Parents should believe in their children. From a psychological perspective, our children represent our hopes and dreams. By believing in your child, in essence, you believe in yourself and your capacity to create and nurture. Effective parents will at different times, see their son or daughter as talented, capable, brilliant, charming, and able to accomplish he or she wants to do.

Fighting usually centers on wanting to have a toy that someone else has.  Aggression is a normal part of growing up and may be related to our survival instincts.  Most children are fairly aggressive when trying to defend their belongings and themselves.

There are no easy answers for how to handle excessive aggression.  However, it certainly doesn’t make sense to the child or to the parent to handle aggression with aggression.  Imagine this scenario: Two sisters are fighting over a toy.  One parent comes in and yells at them to stop fighting, and hits one of them because the child won’t give the toy back.  What does this teach the children?  There’s quite a mixed message here-it’s all right to fight and to hit, but only if you are bigger and more powerful than your adversary.

Parental handling does influence how aggressive a child will be.  Children in families where physical violence, such as hitting or spanking, is used as punishment generally turn out to be more aggressive than other children.  The least aggressive children come from families that are nonpunitive, nonpermissive, and nonrejecting.  The parents in such families are consistent in their handling of aggression.  They don’t use physical punishment or unnecessarily harsh language.  They set firm and clear limits as to what is expected of their children, and they are accepting of their children.

Consistency is important in whatever intervention techniques you use in dealing with your child’s aggression.  A useful technique is to remove the child from the fight and isolate her for a few minutes.  Quick handling of the situation, before the fighting gets out of hand is helpful.  Once your two year old can talk, asking her to talk about how she feels or what she wants will help her learn to express herself verbally instead of physically.

Sometimes providing your child with an outlet foe her pent-up energy helps reduce the level of her aggression.  Particularly in wintertime, just as with adults, active physical exercise will help release the tension and reduce the level of stress.  Imaginative play also helps to work through aggressive tendencies.  The age old fairy tales can be used to work through some anxieties.  Parents can capitalize on the child’s imagination to help work out conflicts.