Your three-year-old charge smiles up at you as sweetly as can be. “Can I have a piece of candy?” She asks, pulling you over to the cupboard. Before you can even answer she is jumping up and down in front of the cupboard, squealing “In here! It’s in here! Hurry, hurry, get it!”

It’s just before dinner though, and her mother told you that she couldn’t have any until after dinner. “Not now, Sarah,” You tell her. “Your mom said that you could have some after dinner.” You wince as the sweet, adorable Sarah throws herself onto the ground, screaming and kicking with all her might.

What do you do now? Do you give in and hand her a piece of candy? Do you punish her? Absolutely not. Here are some things you can do, though, to handle temper tantrums.

If you are in a situation like in the example above, you have a few options. In this situation you aren’t forbidding the activity completely, you are just telling the child that they have to wait a while. Unfortunately, small children aren’t very good at waiting. The first thing you need to remember to do is always keep a calm voice. They are screaming loudly, but if you raise your voice, they will raise theirs also. By keeping a low tone of voice, they will have to quiet down to hear you. They won’t quit screaming or crying most likely, but they will tone it down a bit because they don’t want to miss what you are saying. You could be telling them that they can have what it is they want for all they know.

Remember the“compliment sandwich” that was used on you as a child? Where they told you what you did right, then what you did wrong, then something else you did right again? What you are going to do next is a variation on that. Tell them when they can do it, that they can’t do it until then, and once again when they can do it. (E.G., “After dinner you can have some candy, but not before. When you have eaten your dinner you can have it.”)

If there is a set time the child can do it, be sure to tell them when it is. If it I two o’clock now, and they can go outside to play at four, show them on a clock. Point to the big hand and tell them the number. Then show them where the big hand has to be before they can go outside to play. You can’t show them until they have finished their tantrum, but offering to show them where the clock will be is often a good way to get them to stop crying.

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