Disciplining preschoolers can sometime be a challenge. They are just beginning to get their first tastes of independence, are still learning right from wrong, and sometimes don’t understand the simplest of instructions and appear to be uncooperative.
It is possible to strike the right balance in discipline while maintaining a happier and productive learning environment.
Maintain a routine. While preschoolers enjoy independence and free play, they still find comfort in predictability. You can often help minimize behavioral problems by keeping a regular schedule during your ministry times. You can still feel the flexibility to offer choices within your schedule, but by maintaining routines with play, worship, craft, and snack, you can typically ease your kids’ anxiety and help them follow instructions with greater compliance.
Keep instructions simple. Don’t overwhelm your children with complicated instructions or multiple steps within any activity. Give them simple rules that are easy to understand. In our ministry, we share these simple expectations each week:
- Be a Good Friend.
- Be A Good Listener.
- Be Safe.
Set and follow established disciplinary procedures. How will you or your staff handle disciplinary issues when they arise? It’s best to have established procedures and processes, that are shared with the entire team, to insure that discipline is fair for all the children. Consider setting procedures that follow the pattern below:
- Make eye contact with the child, put your finger over your mouth to signal quiet, smile and look away.
- Put your hand on the child’s shoulder. Touch the hand of the child. Many times a touch can be reassuring and can return the child to the proper behavior.
- First, move yourself to the most disruptive child. Second, move the child to another seat close to you or simply separate the children that are bothering each other.
- FINALLY, if the bad behavior continues, the child should be escorted to the back of the room and further discipline will be administered at the close of the service.
