another kid question/poll

[Stoof]

I have 2 little ones. Ages 1 and 4. I am starting to realize that I often set them up for failure.
Example:
"If you eat all of your dinner and in a timely manner you get dessert."
It never fails that if I set up the reward at the beginning it falls apart quickly and turns into an hour long struggle.
But if lay out expectations without mention of the reward, dinner often runs smoothly and I give the older one (Boy) dessert.
What has worked for y'all?

[Stoof]

This is also, I might add is a "Live Thread". And I am sure everyone is dying to find out how it plays out.

[Playa]

Just let the kid eat. Hunger is the most basic of human sensations, they will eat when they are hungry, won't eat when they are not.

We are working with my 3yo now that dinner is when we all sit down. If he gets up, his plate goes away, and he doesn't get anything later, goes to bed hungry. Same thing if he doesn't like what we are serving. Sure you get some good crocodile tears on the 1st to go arounds, but Momma comes around eventually !!!

We don't reward with desserts. Desserts are occasional, and special. Too many kids think every meal should end with a sweet.... too many kids are also obese and suffering from diabetes.

[outlaw38]

I believe you need to raise your own kids the way you see fit.

[Stoof]

Just let the kid eat. Hunger is the most basic of human sensations, they will eat when they are hungry, won't eat when they are not.

We are working with my 3yo now that dinner is when we all sit down. If he gets up, his plate goes away, and he doesn't get anything later, goes to bed hungry. Same thing if he doesn't like what we are serving. Sure you get some good crocodile tears on the 1st to go arounds, but Momma comes around eventually !!!

We don't reward with desserts. Desserts are occasional, and special. Too many kids think every meal should end with a sweet.... too many kids are also obese and suffering from diabetes.

I am with ya. We have seen and tried it all with the boy. I just made the realization that setting him up with a reward often backfires and is useless.
Right now now his "Dessert" is half a rice cake with peanut butter.

[sector42]

My son was really bad about not eating his food, he would always want something else to eat, so when he would get up from the table or refuse to eat, I would cover his plate and when he started crying I'm hungry, that is what he would get to eat. Eventually, he would get hungry enough to eat it. I would only reward if the behavior occurs without me having to set the expectation. After dinner, I would be like, "You were so good an ate all your dinner without complaining, so I will make you dessert."

I don't really feed the kids a lot of dessert, but for some reason, my wife thinks every meal should end with dessert. Just another thing we agree to disagree on.

[Dejashoot]

I'm not sure how to make this not come off harsh but IMHO "Clean your plate" is one of the worst phrases ever. It sets a young mind to always "need" to eat everything on their plate. That can come back to hurt them later in life.

I agree that if they don't eat at dinner, they should be done for the night unless they have severe Anorexia. Otherwise, they can eat in the morning. Too many people are over weight today in part because they have to eat all they are served.

[Shane]

There's no need to "clean your plate". The only thing you need to do is to make sure that they eat good healthy food at meal time. If they're not hungry at lunch, then put their plate in the fridge and warm it up for them at supper. Don't let them use "I'm not hungry" as a way to make their plate of healthy food disappear just so they can have junk food snacks 30 minutes later. If they don't want to eat what you serve them, then let them do without any food until the next meal time. If they are stubborn about not wanting to eat whatever you serve, then let them miss a meal or two. Once they get hungry enough, they'll eat what they're supposed to eat. It won't kill a kid to miss a meal or two, and they won't miss more than one meal more than once or twice.

There's no need for screaming and hollering, threats, trying to reason with them, rewards, etc.... FOOD is a reward when you're hungry.

[Bob G]

To set everyone up for sucess is not an easy task. Each individual and the situations vary soooo much. I learned from my wife that if we broke the total picture into little pieces then it made it easier to set up sucessful events. But of course you can't think of every detail that may come into play, it would take up tooooo much time. So when a goal or positive outcome was accomplished we praised, rewarded and if it didn't pan out the way we wanted it was not always a total lost but more like a lesson learned. Then we moved on. Just a quick thought for ones life in general...

tending the fire,
Bob G.

[Stoof]

Good thoughts bob.
Dinner is only the example. Not the issue. I am trying to rewire my brain to set my kids up to succeed and start to understand consequences in general. Maybe I am asking to much of a four year old.
He is proving to be a worthy opponent.