Changing Child Behavior - Manage Over Active Children

Dr. Purushothaman
October 6, 2013

Over active children can be a real handful. This over activity is a form of changing child behaviour and really needs to be monitored. There are a few ways that you can manage an over active child, but first you need to identify if your child's over activity is a problem or not.

To identify if it is a problem, you will have to monitor the way your child behaves in various situations, like at home (easy to monitor), at school (you will have to ask the teacher) and when you go out visiting and / or shopping.

Seeing how your kid behaves at home is easiest, so let's go with that. An over active child is likely to be a child that needs constant attention from their parents and siblings. They will be wanting to play all the time, even at bed time. That is why they are over active.

So let's say that you want to try and sit your child down to draw a picture or read a book quietly. Not difficult with most kids, in fact most kids would be happy to sit down and do something quiet with their parents. NOT the over active child, though. They need to be almost completely tired out before you will be able to sit them down to read a book. The result being tired parents, too.

So the obvious solution is to simply just tire them out, right? or wrong?

Well partially right and partially wrong. You see, over activity is often related to a child being bored. Children naturally have way more energy than they need and as a result, they need to burn it up by moving their bodies. They haven't yet learned to use their brains to full potential, which as you know also burns energy, so physical movement is more natural for a child.

A parent therefore needs to try to teach their kids to compromise. Take a book that your child really likes and try to sit your child down to read it. If your child is pulling on your arm or jumping up and down, then you may need to conduct a wrestling match for a few minutes to burn the energy off then come back to the book.

Learning to manage changing child behaviour in over active children can be quite the task for first time parents, with a little patience it can be done, though.

There are many things that we as parents can do to manage to change a child's behavior. Behavior doesn't usually change overnight, though, and behavior that you think you have quashed may reappear in the future. The only thing is, it will be a little easier to change a second time round.

There are many things that we as parents can do to manage to change a child's behavior. Behavior doesn't usually change overnight, though, and behavior that you think you have quashed may reappear in the future. The only thing is, it will be a little easier to change a second time round.

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