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A frazzled mother in the grocery store checkout line struggles to unload her purchases onto the conveyor, stop the baby from chewing on the handlebar of the dirty shopping cart, and keep her 3-year-old from picking up every candy bar, magazine and small gadget within reach.
“Annie Adams, I’ve told you not to touch anything… Annie, I mean it… Annabelle Elizabeth Adams, put that down right now… Okay, that’s it. As soon as we get home, you’re in Time Out, Young Lady.”
Annie, seemingly oblivious to her mother’s increasingly persistent reprimands, continues playing with a handheld flashlight and a travel toothbrush, unconcerned at her impending punishment.
The older couple in line behind her exchange glances and roll their eyes. “When our kids were young, we didn’t have any of this Time Out business,” they whisper. “And we didn’t have any trouble getting them to mind.”
Obviously something isn’t working here, but is Time Out to blame? Not necessarily, says Dina O’Brien, Ph.D., pediatric psychologist and assistant professor of pediatrics at the Medical College of Georgia. “I think it is an extremely effective and powerful behavior management tool, if done right,” she says. “In order to be effective, though, parents and caregivers need to have a solid understanding of how it works.”
The purpose of Time Out, says O’Brien, is to remove the child from access to all stimuli, from your attention to a fought-over toy, thought to be maintaining the child’s misbehavior. “It’s a chance to think about what they’ve done and cool off,” she says. “Its main purpose is to help the child gain self control.”
How and When to Introduce Time Out
O’Brien suggests that parents begin introducing the concept of Time Out between 18 and 24 months. “At that age, they can begin to grasp the concept,” she says. “By age 2 or 3, they understand it.”
The general rule of thumb is one minute in Time Out per year of age. “The premise is that children who are younger have a shorter attention span,” she says. “It should be a relatively short amount of time, otherwise it begins to lose its effectiveness.”
“I also think it’s important to add the stipulation—let’s say a child who’s 3 is in Time Out for three minutes and screams the whole time,” says O’Brien. “Explain that one of the rules of Time Out is no screaming. Say, ‘your time is up, but you have to be quiet and calm before you can get up,’ and make the child sit that way for 30 seconds or so.”
Choose a location for Time Out in advance, before the child gets in trouble. “Pick a place in your home that’s boring. It shouldn’t be in the child’s room. A boring place like a hallway, corner or in the laundry room,” says O’Brien.
But that doesn’t mean if you’re away from home, you can’t use Time Out. “If you’re in public, it can be the restroom, a car or a bench,” she says. “But you have to supervise your child more closely.”
Time Out is Not for Everything
One of the biggest mistakes many parents make is using Time Out as their only method of discipline. O’Brien suggests targeting only a few specific behaviors as Time Out-worthy. “It’s best used for blatant defiance, behavior or acting out,” she says. “Like hitting, biting or kicking. Explain it to your child when he’s not in trouble and you’re not angry. ‘If you do this, this or this, you will go to time out.’”
“And they get one warning,” she continues. “Be careful not to give repeated warnings or threats. Once you’ve given a warning, if they do the behavior again, make sure you follow through immediately.”
Delaying the punishment or making repeated warnings or threats is pointless, explains O’Brien. “Think about a slot machine. The reason people continue to put money into a slot machine is, they don’t win every time, but they do win sometimes. If you never, ever win, you wouldn’t keep playing,” she says.
The same holds true for children and their misbehavior. Once kids realize that sometimes a behavior isn’t allowed, but other times it’ll slide if only they tune out their parents’ idle threats, you’re not likely to see much improvement. “If the child learns that every time they engage in a target misbehavior Time Out will follow, they’ll stop. If Time Out only happens some of the time, the behavior is likely to continue, says O’Brien.”
O’Brien often hears from parents that they tried Time Out with their kids, but it didn’t work because the children continued to display the same misbehaviors. But that’s all part of the learning process, she says. “The behavior will get worse before it gets better,” she says. “The child will be testing the limits. In the beginning, you may have to do it 15 times in a row,” she says. “They have to see that every time they come up to a brick wall.”
Time Out in Action
One mistake many parents make with their children is providing constant, ongoing interaction during the Time Out period. “Talking to, looking at and scolding the child while he’s in Time Out defeats the purpose,” says O’Brien. “Negative attention is still attention.”
O’Brien outlines a scenario of a child hitting his brother as an example. Hitting is one of that family’s target behaviors, so the witnessing parent responds, “You hit your brother. You’re going to Time Out.”
“But it’s very short—two sentences,” she continues. “Send the child to the place already picked out, and set the timer or look at your watch. At that point, there should be no more interaction whatsoever. No looking at them, no hands on your hips, no mocking and no lecturing.”
If the child won’t go to Time Out on his own within five or 10 seconds, O’Brien says you should take him there yourself. “If you have to do that, do it without talking, looking mean, or anything. If they won’t stay, stand behind the child, cross their hands in front of them and hold their hands,” she says. “It keeps them in place without using excessive force. But again, don’t talk to them.”
What if the child is physically beyond your capabilities to move? “If parents don’t feel confident to bodily take the child to Time Out, select backup consequences,” says O’Brien. “Tell the child, ‘It’s your choice. You can go to Time Out on your own or lose something you value.’ Choose an activity that’s the most meaningful—TV for a day, they can’t play on the computer, missing softball practice, no dessert—and if necessary, continue taking things away until they go.”
Once the timer goes off or the child’s time is up, allow the child to return to normal activities as if nothing ever happened. No discussions, no lectures.
“Time Out alone doesn’t work,” says O’Brien. “You’ve got to balance that with letting the child know what they’re doing right. It’s so important, as soon as they go back to normal activities to catch them doing something good and praise them as soon as you can,” says O’Brien. “By praising them, the child learns good behavior and that his effort and progress are noticed.”
How Time Out Can Be Misused
Even with the best of intentions, sometimes parents or teachers can take the punishment too far. “It can be overly harsh if it’s done for a long length of time or in a nasty or humiliating manner,” says O’Brien.
Because childcare and school environments are limited in the types of discipline they can administer, Time Out is a common choice for behavior management. However, its use in group settings has also been criticized by child development experts.
“There are right ways to do it—a team approach individualized for each child, not making a huge deal out of it, and never using the child as an example,” says O’Brien. “‘Johnny didn’t follow the rules, so he’s in big, big trouble.’ Instead, the teacher should just quietly lead the child away.”
Some schools also utilize a ‘watching chair,’ where the child sits on the sidelines of the activity for a few minutes. This is not as isolating or humiliating as banishing the child to a corner. “It allows the child to regroup without being completely separated,” says O’Brien.
It’s Just One Piece of the Puzzle
“Time Out is just one part of a behavior management program,” says O’Brien. “Just one tool. In order to be the most effective, you have to have other behavior management tools—praise, rewards, quality time together and really listening to your child. If you have a lot of ‘time in,’ if you give the child a Time Out, it’s a lot more poignant.”
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