Put your 1-2-3 magic success or fail stories here!

[mscatra]

For me, it works to help me as much as correct her. It gives me a way to quickly cut off undesirable behavior, feel like I'm in control of the situation, AND get a small break to chill out and devise as plan if needed. And sometimes her big emotions just need a little break, too. I actually don't have to use it a ton yet, and I kinda combine it with some of the philosophy of Love and Logic.

[rjamz]

It works really well for us! Though we don't use it constantly like they say - we only do it for behavior that needs to end immediately, like playing with the space heater. The second I start counting, he stops.

[Deleted]

The way the book describes it ("that's 1....")didn't work for us at first so I gave up but somehow a few months later counting her works now. But I just say "1...2...of I get to 3 you're getting a time out...." But I hardly get past 1

I didn't purposely train her for counting but I think I just started doing it and she caught on. I'm actually really confused by how it worked haha! But I'm glad it did.

When we tried the "that's 1..." She would say "that's 2!" But not being sassy, just counting for fun. I think she was too young maybe

Sorry I am rambling

[helicase]

It works -75% of the time. Lately he's been saying "mommy stop counting!", so that's difficult. I just keep counting and most of the time he'll listen.

[Deleted]

So if I'm SUPER consistent, it works like a charm. If I slip, he figures it out right away and its like starting over.

Also, my child does not stay in timeouts at all. But what works for me is putting him in the same spot consistently and once he's there, he realizes it's not good and the behavior stops, without him sitting for a length of time. Locking him in a room or holding a door shut just isn't something I can do, especially at work, so the modification works for us.

[breezy8407]

I Didn't read the whole book, but we use counting most of the time. It works better for DS than DD. We usually start counting and go really slow.

It usually goes like this:

"I am going to count to 3, and if you don't do xyz, it's a time out."

[lauranicole91]

I don't know what 1-2-3 magic is from reading the book, but I think I get the gist from the responses.

If she is doing something we don't want her to do, we start off with a simple "no ma'am". If she doesn't stop we say "do I need to count to 3?" 95% of the time it stops there. Sometimes she stops at 1 or 2. And of course occasionally we get to 3 and she goes to time out. If she's feeling particularly feisty that day, we will have to hold her down in time out (that sounds a lot worse than it is I promise!), but usually she's good about sitting there. And we always discuss why she went to time out and what she should have done differently etc.

We started the 1-2-3 method a little after 18 months and she caught on pretty quick.

[LiveLoveLearn]

1-2-3 magic worked awesome for us for a while. Two things that have made it slightly less lately. The first that we are not 100% consistent with it, we are trying to work on this. Sometimes it is so hard to not have any emotion. But when you see it work you know it's worth it to really try. Time outs have no longer been working for us. He was acting out just to get me to stop what I was doing to put him in time out which he saw as attention. Or he would just leave it. Instead we have been doing he loses a toy when we get to three. This seems to work better. He can then earn back the toy with good behavior so he's also getting positive reinforcements.

[Deleted]

Dec 21, 2014 11:09:14 GMT -5 lauranicole91 said:

I don't know what 1-2-3 magic is from reading the book, but I think I get the gist from the responses.

If she is doing something we don't want her to do, we start off with a simple "no ma'am". If she doesn't stop we say "do I need to count to 3?" 95% of the time it stops there. Sometimes she stops at 1 or 2. And of course occasionally we get to 3 and she goes to time out. If she's feeling particularly feisty that day, we will have to hold her down in time out (that sounds a lot worse than it is I promise!), but usually she's good about sitting there. And we always discuss why she went to time out and what she should have done differently etc.

We started the 1-2-3 method a little after 18 months and she caught on pretty quick.

That's exactly how it works with us too! Say no, do I have to count, counting, and occasionally "holding her down" in time out. It does sound bad but it's not, she's not exactly fighting and I'm like laying on top of her! Haha
I also hold Rhys' head down when he's going to sleep and that always sounds bad when I say it too- more like putting my hand there so he doesn't move it around like a crazy person, it settles him. Okay I'm way off topic... I'm very talkative today apparently.

[Deleted]

Dec 21, 2014 11:53:44 GMT -5 LiveLoveLearn said:

1-2-3 magic worked awesome for us for a while. Two things that have made it slightly less lately. The first that we are not 100% consistent with it, we are trying to work on this. Sometimes it is so hard to not have any emotion. But when you see it work you know it's worth it to really try. Time outs have no longer been working for us. He was acting out just to get me to stop what I was doing to put him in time out which he saw as attention. Or he would just leave it. Instead we have been doing he loses a toy when we get to three. This seems to work better. He can then earn back the toy with good behavior so he's also getting positive reinforcements.

If we have to count because of something with a toy (playing with too rough, not being nice, not stopping when we ask, etc) then we also take the toy away. Other behavior issues end up in time out

[Deleted]

Also I tell her I'm going to throw her toy away because she doesn't get it if I just take it away- she just finds the next toy like it. One time she wasn't listening so I really did throw it away and it totally clicked for her. She earned it back though.

[lauranicole91]

Dec 21, 2014 12:00:52 GMT -5 ladybug said:

Also I tell her I'm going to throw her toy away because she doesn't get it if I just take it away- she just finds the next toy like it. One time she wasn't listening so I really did throw it away and it totally clicked for her. She earned it back though.

Dude we are the same people. We threaten to throw away toys too! We had warned her about playing gently with her stuff like breaking crayons or not putting caps on markers and playdoh. And sure enough she did that all enough times that they got thrown out not to be earned back a couple months ago. So it really clicked for her as well. She's getting all new crayons, markers, and playdoh for Christmas and she is going to go bonkers. Haha.

We also threaten to leave and go home if she is refusing to behave in public. We've had to actually follow through with it twice so that works really well for us.