Hellobee Boards

What works for us is a combo of explaining (you have to listen to mom and and outside because there is lots of danger and we have to keep you safe), giving warnings (do not put the leaf in your mouth, I can't let you do something unsafe, that could make you sick, if you put another leaf in your mouth you are going to have to take a timeout), and then finally the timeout if necessary after the other things! Good luck!

Oh, and with extreme danger, an abrupt shout will kind of shock her out of the activity, but obviously I reserve that for extreme danger.

Agree with "stop". That is the most important one imo. They need to know to listen to that for so many reasons. They're getting too close to a strange anima, the pond, the street, etc etc.

Repition, repitition, repitition and consequences for not listening. If we're out and she does not listen to that it's an immediate lost of privileges.

LO is 25 months. This may not be an option for you, but I just don't rely on him following orders when it comes to safety. For example, we live on a busy city street and--when we are in the front of the house--he's just not far enough away from us that he could make it to the street without us being able to catch him. Then if he doesn't stop when we ask, we can stop him (and move to the back of the house afterwards). When he is in the backyard--where his desire to dart is very unlikely to land him in danger--we give him more freedom and work more on following the rules we have laid out for him. (And "working on it" is just our usual discipline method of an attempt at natural consequences. In this example, we go inside if he doesn't ask one of us to walk down the driveway with him.)

I think every parent has this problem, lol. If it's not the farm, it's the parking lot. I agree with pp that you can't rely on obedience to keep them safe. A 21 month old is totally impulse driven. The only thing that works at that age is close supervision, correction/redirection, repeat, repeat, repeat. There is a difference between the cognitve ability to understand a command and the ability for a kid to translate that understanding into overriding the impulse. At 21 months, they just don't have that ability.

I don't use the word no or don't. I tell her what I want her to do and give her freedom when reasonable. I say please stay on the sidewalk or you need to hold my hand in the street. I let her run free as much as possible so she knows when I mean business. Since I don't say no or stop or raise my voice often it shoved her into stopping. I also don't rely on her to listen so in dangerous or potentially dangerous situations I stay close by.

Was also going to agree with using STOP for the most important things rather than don't do this or that. But it is a tough age too. In a few months you will probably notice a big difference in understanding things like that.

We use the phrase "stop sign", since that's what our daycare taught our kids. Another good one I've heard is "freeze"!