Shut up!

melody921 · February 2013

This lovely phrase has made its way home from daycare, and my son has said it numerous times over the past three days. I just tell him, "We don't say that. It's not polite and it hurts people's feelings." He will often agree not to say it, but then of course he uses it again. The most recent time, he said, "Well, Kendall (a girl in his class), says it."

Any thoughts on a new approach? I'm hoping that if I don't react too strongly he'll get tired of it and stop saying it. But I don't want to just ignore him in the meantime bc it's really not something I want my 3-year-old saying. KWIM?

KathrynMD · February 2013

oh - hi, yeah, I've gotten "shut your face" a few times - thanks to DD's classmate.

I just gave a very short, "that's not nice" response to it anytime she said it and that stopped it for awhile. She tried it again 2 weeks ago in the car. And, I pulled over the car and told her it wasn't nice and not to say it again. Its now been a few weeks and it seems to have done the trick.

She's started using more 'fresh" talk like that in general, I try not to totally ignore it, but I will ask her to say whatever again nicely and I also talk alot about using nice words so people know you're a nice girl and you won't hurt people's feelings and so people will want to be friends with you.

mrs. remy · February 2013

"shut up" and "stupid" were both brought home from school by my 3 year old. I try not to make a HUGE deal, but I tell him those are ugly words and we don't use them. If he keeps using them, he goes and sits in his room for a few minutes. Now when he hears someone say "stupid" on TV, he goes "awwwwww! Mommy! They said stupid!" He's pretty good about not saying that stuff now unless he is in one of his moods where he is just acting out.

bethelon · February 2013

We had the opposite happen. We never use "Shut up" in our house. Not even in private. If anything, husband and I use "shush" as a single word sentence when we are joking around, but that's as strong as it gets. It's also very known at her school that Shut up is absolutely forbidden and not acceptable, including by all of her classmates (who are all a year older than her). Yet one day, out of no where, she screamed "SHUT UP!" in the middle of class. Apparently all of the students went completely silent and stared. Her teacher emailed me immediately about it. So we are both clueless as to where this came from. She doesn't spend time with babysitters (other than my mom), goes to dance class, but I've never heard it used there. So we are at a completely loss to where she learned this. Also, her PreK school is one class, not a center, so she didn't learn it on the playground from other kids/classes, etc.

Sidenote: we also don't want Spongebob Squarepants either (which I know is famous for teaching kids fun words like that...LOL)

KatFCo · February 2013

When DD started this, we told her it wasn't nice and tried to just not respond, but when she continued, we told her if she couldn't be respectful, she would go to her room until she was ready to be polite. It's worked wonders (eventually). It was an apt punishment because it taught her that it's important to be polite to people and no one wants to be around someone who's rude.

waTracy · February 2013

I think it's a 3 year-old thing. The attitude. The snark. The bad words. My daughter came home one day telling me about words being "potty words." I think that's how her teachers are dealing with it. So we talk about potty words and she knows if she says one she gets a time out. Of course I give her a warning after she says one. I mean she's 3 after all. If she says it again, she goes to time out. It's helped a lot, plus her understanding of what "potty words" are. Of course it's not perfect. I mean...they are 3 after all.

neverblushed · February 2013

Getting kids to stop saying rude stuff can be tough. A preschooler can know that it's wrong to say something, but still lack the impulse control to prevent the words from slipping out.

I never dealt with "Shut up!" per se, but I have dealt with similar stuff. I generally respond to this type of stuff with something along the lines of, "That's not a nice way to talk, and I don't want to hear that type of talk in our house. If you want to talk that way, go in your room and talk to yourself. I'll be happy to listen when you're ready to talk in a nice way."

It takes practice for them to gain the impulse control to stop this type of thing. You just have to be consistent and give them time to practice stopping themselves before they use the forbidden phrase

KatieandMark06 · March 2013

I would talk to the daycare teacher about it. I think that the daycare teacher should correct children who say it because it is inappropriate. That being said I would still continue with the "That's not polite and we don't say that in this house" approach. I take this approach and it tends to work.

echowysp2 · March 2013

Maybe we do it wrong, but we tend to act like it's a big deal to swear (I count SU as a preschooler swear), so I'll usually gasp, stop what I'm doing and sternly tell them it's not ok to talk that way. I've started putting 2 1/2 year old dd in TO because she's picked it up from ds. Ds has pretty much stopped and will correct dd when she says something wrong now.

I have a really hard time calmly reminding them when they do these things. :::breathe in, breathe out:::

Emilia0101 · March 2013

echowysp2:
Maybe we do it wrong, but we tend to act like it's a big deal to swear (I count SU as a preschooler swear), so I'll usually gasp, stop what I'm doing and sternly tell them it's not ok to talk that way. I've started putting 2 1/2 year old dd in TO because she's picked it up from ds. Ds has pretty much stopped and will correct dd when she says something wrong now.
I have a really hard time calmly reminding them when they do these things. :::breathe in, breathe out:::

We do the same here.

Shut up!

Re: Shut up!

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