Showing posts with label Potty Training Methods. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Potty Training Methods. Show all posts

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Potty Training Step-By-Step Program

cartoons for a potty training child


Potty Training is a very important development in our child's life. It helps him become independent and have stronger self-confidence. Whether you have decided to choose the early training, late training or potty train at 2 years old you will need to follow some steps in order to proceed and progress. I will suggest steps to follow based on my readings and my personal experience as a mother. Noting that potty training Nour lasted 2 months, it was relatively fast, easy and I am so proud of our experience that I would love to share it with you. At 28 months she was clean day and night and since then we never experienced any sudden accidents. So allow me to offer you this small guide maybe it'll help you.

  • Buy a potty or a child's seat. In my case, we bought a beautiful colored child's seat that Nour chose herself. It is red, yellow and navy blue, she decorated it with Winnie the pooh stickers and it had built-in stairs to help her climb.
  • Decide on the terminology you will use to refer to the bladder and bowel function (wee/poo - pipi/caca ) and tell your child what the potty is for. Explain to him how big kids don't do it in their nappies - use yourself and his dad as an example since you are his role models.
  • Suggest that she sits on it to see what it's like, you can do it as a daily routine in the morning and at bedtime too.

You can start with those  first steps few months before starting the real training. Doing this you will be preparing your child to the idea of using the seat and if you do it right he will be so excited to start using the potty and the progress will be fast. Exactly what happened with my daughter. We started these steps when she was 20 months old and by the time she was 24 months old she was so excited to remove those diapers that it took us 2 months only to be completely clean, accidents-free!

  • Try to figure out what time your child usually urinates and catch the motion by putting your child on the pot/seat and if you do catch urine or stool show pleasure and approval but don't go overboard.
  • Depending on the willingness of your child, increase the frequency of pot sessions. Look at books with her while she sits on it, play games, teach her stuff ( we learned "what is this animal favorite food? "while potty training). The point about this increased length of time is that you increase the chances of something ending up in the potty. Never force her to sit on it for longer that she wants!
  • Teach your child to tell you when has passed urine or a bowel motion. Every time you change her diaper tell her: "Is pee pee annoying you honey? Maybe next time you could tell mommy so she will change your diaper fast" Same thing goes for the bowel motion. Little by little your child will learn to pass the message to you and that means she is being aware of having urinated which is more important than the awareness of impending urination or bowel motion.
  • When you feel that you're baby is happy and making some progress you can give a little more to drink before offering her to sit on the potty that way you will be increasing the chance of her urinating while sitting and that will make her so proud. They love to hear the sound of pee in the water cabinet my daughter clapped every time she went and I never forgot to cheer for her and reward her with a sticker. Always leave the big prize till the end or else you will be spending a fortune on potty training.
  • Buy her nice colored under wears, this will encourage her to remove the nappies faster.
  • At some point during the progress of the training, you should consider removing the diapers for at least 5 hours a day to make sure that she will pass urine during that time. It is a bit messy but it's worth it it will push the training forward. I owe this precious advice to a friend, and she is right. With those advance nappies a child is never annoyed from a little urine, he won't be encouraged to pee in the seat unless he feels the water going down his legs and seeing the mess it makes. 
  • When going out while still in training, put nappies on unless you think it's a safe bet she can hand on long enough not to wet herself.
  • Encourage greater independence in using the potty. Make sure the potty or the seat are easy to reach, teach your child how to pull down and up his pants and how to sit securely.
  • Try to stay as calm and happy as you can. I consider potty training to be one of the most difficult stages but hey! It'll pass faster and smoother if you take it easy - don't loose it when your kid makes a mess. Always learn to praise his efforts and never make a big deal of accidents your will discourage your child and pull the training backwards.
I hope that those steps will help you throughout your training. How to Be Super Mom is always around for help leave your comments or visit my page, Like, and leave your question.

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