His scream pierces across the playroom, I know it all too well, my toddler son’s whiny scream when he doesn’t get his way. It interrupts my conversation with another mom and we slowly walk over to assess the situation.
My son wanted the ball that another boy was playing with. Clearly, emotions were high, as tears rolled down cheeks of both boys. As we approached, they stopped fighting to see what the moms were going to do.
I kneeled down to eye level, spoke in a quiet, firm voice and told him he did not need to play with that ball right now. There were plenty of other toys (and other balls for that matter) that he could play with.
The other mom jumped in and said to her son, “Tommy, we need to share. Let Asher play with the ball.”
I looked up at her and smiled and said, “It’s okay, Asher doesn’t need the ball. There are plenty of other toys he can play with.” I’m not quite sure she registered what I was saying. She sort of smiled and then kneeled down to tell her son it was okay. I led Asher away to another toy and the conflict was over.
I am not worried about teaching my son to share.
I am concerned about teaching my son to be content with what he has, to wait his turn, and to realize that even in his little toddler world, whining does not get him what he wants.
I know toddlers understand a lot more than we give them credit for sometimes. Once, I said to myself, “Where is my phone?” and my son went to my coat, whined, pointed, and sure enough, there it was. He knows which of our dogs he can wrestle with and which one is the grumpy one. He seems instinctively to know when he is around a newborn, to sit and quietly look at the baby without totally squishing him.
When you put him in another room full of other toddlers with toys, however, you begin to see a pattern. Crying starts as soon as a toy is snatched from his hands or because he wants someone else’s toy. He will engage in parallel play when he isn’t really interested in playing with the other kids.
