Five Tips for Getting a Little Kid to Take "No" for an Answer

Gretchen Rubin
February 3, 2010

My three-year-old hates being told "No" and "Don't," and she's also one of those kids who immediately does exactly what you ask her not to do, so I've had to develop some strategies to get the "No" message across without unleashing the very behavior I want to stop.

I realized that although she doesn't want to hear "no," my daughter responds very well to certain kinds of explanations. While "It's not healthy," "We don't have time," and "I don't want to buy that" don't work very well, other justifications for saying "no" are more effective:

1. "It's for safety." For some reason, my daughter wisely accepts safety as an absolute directive, so I invoke it whenever possible. For example, I characterized the "no slamming doors" rule as a safety rule, not a noise/behavior rule. "When people slam doors, eventually, people get their fingers smashed. So for safety, no slamming doors."

2. "That's just for decoration." We can walk into a store crammed with treats or gimcracks, and when she asks if she can get something, I just say sadly, "They're just for decoration, they're not for sale." She never questions this!

3. "The doctor says..." Invoking the authority of a doctor, dentist, teacher, or grandparent often makes a message acceptable. "The Yellow Room teachers say children must wear mittens to schools, not gloves." "I know you don't feel like brushing your teeth, but Dr. Smith says it's very important to brush every night." I'm not above pretending to send an email to get a particular answer.

4. "I know you know." My daughter hates being told "Don't," and she loves to show that she's a big girl. So I often say things like, "I know you know this, but other children don't know that you shouldn't tap on the glass of a fish tank. They don't know that the noise bothers the fish. Fortunately for the fish, you already know that."

You can read the rest of this article (and so much more) at Gretchen's website, The Happiness Project.