How to nip attention-seeking behaviors in young children in the bud?
I've been explaining to FDH how I believe most of his son's behavior issues are attention-seeking behaviors...basically ever since I met him. I'm a teacher (or was before I relocated, I'm job hunting), but I typically see the behavior in high school students that I teach/coach, and I'm not sure what to do with a 3.5 year old who does things for attention. FDH hasn't really known what to do besides just kind of in general being hard on him. By being hard on SS3, I mean that we don't give him a lot of sympathy for things like when we can tell he's not truly hurt but that he's complaining that he hurt something...you know what I mean.
Well last night was a CLASSIC example! We were dying laughing later about it because it finally made FDH see that it is SO OBVIOUSLY attention-seeking.
SD5 was downstairs and was crying about something. I yelled down, "Are you okay?" and I heard her starting to come up the stairs. I waited for her, she was holding her hip, and I checked it out and everything. She said she fell on something in her room. There was a little red mark so I told her to just chill out and have a seat and rest it til it feels better.
About 10 seconds later, I hear SS3's fake cry coming up the stairs, too. I could tell it was a fake cry so I just walked back into the kitchen, but there's a window ledge/cutout above our sink that looks at our stairs. I watched him walk up the stairs with his fake cry -- walking completely fine. He didn't know I could see him. Then he turns the corner in the kitchen where he now thinks I can see him, and he grabs his knee and starts hobbling like he can't walk, still doing the fake cry. "SteppingUppppp, my leg hurts...." so I said, "I just watched you walk up the stairs just fine, I'm sure you're fine. Sit down next to sister." SS3 walks (COMPLETELY NORMAL) over to the couch! HAHA..wow!
This morning, SS3 hit his head on the door knob. I watched it happen -- he was dancing/hopping around. He looked at me, then grabbed the OTHER side of his head and started to fake cry. I was laughing and said, "You didn't even hit your head on that side! You're fine...go get your boots on!"
It's not like we don't give him attention...so what can we do with this behavior? Just continue to not let him 'get away with it'?
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how do you squash attention
how do you squash attention seeking behavior in 11 & 14 yr olds? and how do you do it when every other adult feeds into and almost in a way encourages it? that's what i want to know!
I agree with both of you...I
I agree with both of you...I don't really know the answer to that either. But when they're older kids like that, I think it's easier to figure out what the root of it is. It typically revolves around them being insecure about something, and is basically a self-esteem issue. With high school kids I've taught it amazes me that for some kids, even negative attention is better than NO attention. So as a teacher I would try REALLY hard to ONLY give attention for positive things...which was hard in some cases because they rarely did anything positive! You had to "search" for those things and really be on-guard for them. But I've taught two kids who I ended up really enjoying in my class because I made a conscious effort to do that as a teacher, and it worked.
Maybe the same can be applied to young kids too....
Exactly what I was going to
Exactly what I was going to ask! My FSD is 17 and my friend's 5 year olds act better!
We've had this attention
We've had this attention seeking problem with my 3 ss's too, and we do exactly what you do - don't give them a big reaction, just calmly say "oh well if it hurts go and have a sit down for a while till it's better". Even in the event of a genuine illness/injury, we don't go overboard and make a big fuss, just keep calm, reassure and give appropriate medicine/treatment so they don't get to expect a big reward for being ill (because they would milk it for all it's worth, believe me!!). Many times we've had the same problem as you, that when one kid is genuinely hurt/ill the other is suddenly at death's door too. Unless there's actual physical evidence, ie a temperature/a visible injury, we don't take much notice and tell them that they need to go and have a rest till it feels better, or that they'll feel much better when they get to school and see their friends (SS7 would stay at home and cling to daddy every day if we let him, so we have to be really tough on this one). It's also worth telling your SS that if he's hurt/ill he'll have to go to bed and won't be able to have his ice cream/trip to the park or whatever other nice things he looks forward to and he'll soon feel better!
We also have a zero tolerance towards whining/crying over their petty squabbles. They're all boys and act stupid sometimes, playing too rough, but they know better than to come whining and telling tales that "so and so has done something", because we just tell them that if they want to play rough and act stupid then they're gonna get hurt, and that any further whining will result in loss of privileges or early bed. This has worked a treat and they don't do it half as often now, much to my relief.
All this attention seeking gets right on my nerves and I'm glad that dh doesn't give them the reaction they want. They still try it on sometimes but have learned that it doesn't work in our houss. They live with us full time and have eow with BM, and we know she's a typical guilty parent who give in to their every demand, which doesn't help them at all.
I think you have to continue doing what youre doing now and don't give in or let him get away with it. Keep it very low key with minimum fuss when he's genuinely hurt or ill and pull him up firmly when you see him doing things like he did with the door knob. Hopefully he'll soon learn that his attention seeking doesn't get him anywhere.
we do the same with my
we do the same with my DSS6.
all kids go through this. it's just a really annoying phase. my DSS started crying because there was knot in his shoe this morning, and he kept saying he couldn't get it out.
he was trying really hard, too. i know because i saw him laying on his back and every once in awhile he'd try to touch his shoe all pathetic like. so, i told him to stop or sit in the chair. it's funny how easy the knot was to get out after that.
I actually took video of my
I actually took video of my SS3 one time doing something similar. He was 'struggling' with putting on his sock. He was sitting on the floor, and every time he'd lift his foot up to put his sock on it, he'd tip backwards, lay there and fake cry for a few minutes, then sit back up and start over when he realized no one was paying attention to him (he didn't know I was video taping, I just pretended to be doing something else). It was a 5 minute video just to put on one sock.
Someday when he asks why we're not sympathetic towards his ails I will show him this video... }:)