Saturday, November 5, 2011

Five Star Day?

I am trying out a behavior chart with Gracie (like on Sid the Science Kid). Her five behaviors to work on are: helping clean the living room at night, being a good listener, going to nap when asked, being a good helper, and not screaming no at Mommy. She is usually pretty good about cleaning the living room if I give her very specific tasks, but a lot of times she just stops helping and starts playing instead. Completely normal behavior-just something that needs a little bit of work. As far as nap she tends to settle right down and go to sleep (except for once every few weeks when she just fools around and flips and talks and won't sleep-I hate those days), but the getting her to nap part is the problem. She is yawning and falling asleep on the living room floor, but she doesn't want to go to the bathroom or find Bun Bun or get her book. I think that her chart will help these two behaviors the most. Unfortunately the other three behaviors all go hand in hand and seem to be the biggest issue. Gracie can be a very good helper when she wants to be (especially with her sister) but sometimes when I ask her to do something she will tell me, "You can do it yourself Mommy." Yes I can, but that isn't the point; the point is that I asked her to. The biggest problem I have with her and the sticker I'm not sure if she can ever get is the screaming no at Mommy. That is just rude nasty behavior, and she doesn't seem to understand that. Politely telling me no thank you is one thing, but this is just flat out refusal, and it is usually when I am telling her to stop doing something that is clearly not allowed. Sigh. We're working on it (and she honestly doesn't do it as much as she used to) but I still get so frustrated. Yesterday we had a particularly bad day where she only got one sticker (cleaning the living room). Today she did a lot better and got every sticker except for one (no surprise which one that was). I wavered on giving her being a good listener, but you can't expect perfection out of a four year old. She just gets so distracted and unfocused and then stops listening, because she is concentrating on someone/something else. She is getting bigger and learning more every day though and for the most part she is a very good little girl. She helped picked out the prizes for getting enough stickers. After twenty five she can get either: jumping at the mall, ice cream, or a new book. After fifty she gets a play date with Mimi (that was entirely her idea). When I was growing up I had a sticker chart for chores. I loved those Dilly bars.


Oh Gracie, you're just too much.

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