Coping with frustrations

The first time your toddler has a tantrum may be a surprise. You may be embarrassed — especially if the tantrum occurs in public. Tantrums are your toddler’s way of expressing strong emotions like anger and frustration. Children may not grow out of tantrums without help. Parents can teach their children to understand and manage their behaviour and reactions, and to stay calm when something upsetting happens. This tip page gives some suggestions to help you manage tantrums and help your toddler learn to recognise and express their feelings in appropriate ways.

How confident do you feel that you can teach your child to express their feelings and wants appropriately, without tantrums?

Tantrums may start at about 12 months of age and are common in 2-year-olds. Toddlers may appear to be demanding, stubborn and uncooperative. In fact, they are learning how to wait, follow instructions, get along with others and use words to say what they want. They are also learning to deal with strong emotions like anger and frustration.

We all get frustrated. Parents can use these opportunities to help children learn to better handle their strong feelings. When children receive guidance and support, tantrums become less common in 3- and 4-year-olds. Children have fewer tantrums as they learn to express their emotions and wants, and solve problems in other ways.

Tantrums in children can be as short as 20 sconds or go on and on. They can include:

• crying (without being physically hurt)
• screaming and yelling.
• stamping feet
• rolling around on the floor
• hurting themselves or others
• throwing or attemping to break things
• holding breath (this can be frightening but all children eventually take a gasp of air)

Tantrums happen when children feel strong emotions like anger or frustration. Toddlers can get upset when:

• they are told No
• things don’t go the way they want or expect
• they are unable to manage difficult tasks
• they don’t know the words to say what they want.
• they are hungry or tired
• there is no obvious reason

Children have different temperaments. Some are quiet and easy going and rarely have tantrums. These children may need encouragement to ask for things and be assertive or independent. Others can get upset easily and often have tantrums. These children may need more help to learn to cope with strong feelings and that they can’t always have what they want.

Children can learn to keep having tantrums if they get what they want. They can learn to escalate their behaviour until others give in to their demands. Consider the following example. Your child picks up a toy at a shop and says I want it. You calmly say No and put it back. Your child whines, grabs the toy and starts shouting Mine! Mine! If you try to avoid a tantrum by saying OK have it, but just this once&hellips; your child will learn that No means try harder and protest louder until you get what you want. If tantrums work, they are likely to happen again.

Trying to reason with a toddler in the middle of a tantrum can accidentally reward them with attention. If this happens, tantrums can become more frequent and intense. Too much cuddling and soothing during a tantrum can also cause problems. Toddlers may miss the opportunity to learn how to cope with frustration and settle themselves. When emotions are high there is also the chance this can become a struggle and risk injury.

A child who hasn’t yet learned to cope with frustration may react with a tantrum. Parents can fall into a trap that accidentally rewards tantrums – check out the details in Module 1.

Plan ahead

• Where you can, put away things you don’t want your child to touch, to avoid having to say No and Don’t touch too often.
• Have a few necessary and realistic rules.
• Try to keep to your child’s usual routine for meals and sleep times.
• Throughout the day, let your child know what you are doing and what is going to happen, so they know what to expect.
• Keep your child busy with activities in situations where they might otherwise be bored and disruptive.
• Watch your child and praise them for behaving well.
• Decide if your child’s requests are reasonable before you say Yes or No. Stick to your decision.

Help your child recognise and express their feelings

Use everyday opportunities to help your child learn about emotions. Talk about your own feelings. Teach your child the names of feelings and acknowledge them — You look sad. Are you sad because your toy broke? You could use images to help identify and name feelings. Children get better at talking about feelings as their language and thinking develop.

Talk about how everyone sometimes has strong emotions (anger, fear, sadness, joy), especially when you can’t have what you want, when you want it. Let your child know that even when they are upset or angry, it’s not OK to shout or hurt anyone. Suggest how they can keep calm when strong feelings arise such as taking some deep breaths or changing activities. Reasoning and discussing with your child are best done when things are going well rather than when a problem is happening.

Tune in and be aware of your child’s feelings so you know when strong emotions may be on the way. If you respond quickly, you can help them learn to regulate their emotions. For example, if your toddler wants something they can’t have, you can talk about what’s going on. Let your child know it’s OK to feel frustrated or disappointed. Talk to your child about how they can react appropriately — It’s hard when we can’t have what we want. Let’s take a deep breath and blow that frustration away.

These tips suggest strategies to help you and your child prevent tantrums. Continue your course to find more details on these strategies in Modules 2 and 3.

Stay calm

Be a good role model and respond calmly, no matter what your child does. If you get loud or angry, it’s likely the tantrum will escalate and last longer. Also, it will confuse or possibly scare your child if you are unable to manage your own emotions.

Use planned ignoring

You can help de-escalate a tantrum by ignoring it. For this to work, your child’s tantrum must be completely ignored. You can let your child know that you’re not going to respond until they have settled. Pay no attention until the tantrum stops. Avoid looking directly at or speaking to your child. Stay close and as soon as there is a pause in the tantrum (even when your child is taking a breath before the next outburst), look at and praise your child for being quiet. Turn away as soon as any noise returns and wait for the next pause to praise them.

Repeat this planned ignoring until the tantrum is over. It may take several minutes for your child to calm down. If it’s safe, you can walk away and pay no attention to your child until the tantrum stops.

As soon as your child is quiet or behaving well, praise them for calming down — I like how you took some big deep breaths to calm down. Encourage them for expressing their feelings with words.

If you can’t use planned ignoring, tell your child what to do

When it’s not possible to use planned ignoring or your child is not safe, act quickly. Stop what you are doing and move within an arm’s length of your child. Calmly but firmly tell them what to stop doing — Chris, I know you’re upset but stop screaming — and what to do instead — Tell me what’s wrong. Praise your child if they cooperate — Thank you for being quiet and using your words.

Back up your instruction with quiet time or timeout

If the tantrum continues, use quiet time. Calmly tell your child the problem — You haven’t done as I asked — and the consequence — Now you need to go to quiet time. Quiet time involves removing your attention from your child and having them sit or stand quietly nearby for a short time. Take your child aside, away from others and apart from activities and toys. Let them know quiet time lasts until they have been quiet for 1 minute. Tell them when the time is up.

If your child is over 2 years of age and doesn’t stay quietly in quiet time, you can use timeout. Time-out involves taking your child away from the situation where a problem happened so they can settle and be quiet for a short time before re-joining the activity. Time-out is a planned approach to help prevent escalation of behaviours and emotions. It provides a safe place for your child to regain their emotional balance.

Say something like You’re not being quiet in quiet time, so now you’ll go to time-out. Stay calm and take your child to an uninteresting but safe space or room. Let your child know time-out lasts until they have been quiet for 1 minute — Stay here quietly for 1 minute and then you can come back. Give this reminder even though your child might be upset. You can stay close by, but don’t give them any attention. Start timing as soon as your child is quiet.

If your child leaves time-out before the time is up, calmly return them and remind them they need to stay there quietly for the set time. You may need to repeat this process a number of times at first.

Before using these strategies the first time, make sure you explain the steps of quiet time and time-out so your child knows what to expect. Do this at a time when no problems are happening. You can practise with your child how to calm themself down by taking deep breaths or going floppy like a rag doll.

Time-out is also an opportunity for you to take care of yourself — if you find yourself getting upset, try taking some slow, deep breaths and say the word Relax to yourself. Remind yourself that you can follow the routine without getting upset or angry. When you are calm, you are better able to think clearly and respond well to your child.

Return your child to the activity

After quiet time or time-out, let your child re-join the activity or find them something to do. Praise them for behaving well. If the tantrum occurred because your child was refusing to follow an instruction, take them back to the situation and give your original instruction. Praise them when they follow it — Thanks for doing as I asked.

If tantrums happen again, repeat quiet time or time-out (the same consequence as the last time). You may need to repeat this a number of times before your child learns to express their frustration and anger in appropriate ways.

If a tantrum occurs when you are out, use planned ignoring if you can. Turn away from your child and wait for a pause in their tantrum. When they are calm, engage them in an activity and praise them for behaving well.

If this is not possible, you can try quiet time. Find a safe place to sit with your child such as a bench, or they may already be in a pram or shopping trolley. Pick them up if needed. Tell your child they need to sit quietly. Wait beside them (without talking) until they have been quiet for about 30 seconds before going on. Praise them for calming down and involve them in an activity as soon as possible. If your child doesn’t calm down, you may need to take them away from the situation.

Once a child is upset, angry or frustrated, it’s not the time to teach or reason with them. Focus on calming the situation and making sure everyone is safe. Later, when everyone is calm, help your child to understand their emotions and how they can react next time. For example, you might say I know it was hard leaving the playground when we were having so much fun. Next time, let’s try to take some deep breaths and shake out those sad feelings and remember we’ll come back again.

You may find it helpful to write down each time your child has a tantrum. Then note how long it takes for them to regain their emotional balance. By the end of the first week, tantrums should be less frequent and shorter.