How Parents Improved the Transition From Play Time to Dinner

Details in this article are drawn from real families. Ages, details, and other identifying information have been changed to protect confidentiality.

The parents of a four year old little boy worked with me several years ago. They described a very active boy with big emotions who was extremely verbally advanced and very much knew what he wanted. All great qualities, and we joked that he would make a great lawyer one day (or doctor like his parents). But, the child was having trouble with anger, and the parents felt unsure how to teach him to navigate those emotions in a healthier way. Their goal was to teach him to communicate more calmly and do so without putting his hands on his family members when upset. It was clear the parents were thoughtful and seemingly kind, reasonable people. They could tell they were in a cycle with the child and verbalized that they felt like they were making things worse with how they were responding to him in the heat of the moment.

I walked through Parent Step 1 (ABC's of behavior) with them which involved explaining the importance of the behavioral sequences when engaging with the boy: what comes right before the behavior (A – antecedent), what does he do (B – behavior), and what happens right after his behavior (C – consequence). They were able to identify the sequences right away. A common scenario was around the transition from play time to dinner and it often played out in these ways:

Antecedent – Told the boy to pick up the toys because it was time for dinner. Behavior – Boy ignored parents. Consequence – Parents repeated themselves while raising voice and within a few minutes, gave him extra time playing.

Antecedent – Parents started picking up toys that boy was playing with due to it being dinner time. Behavior – Boy yelled and hit parents on the arm while they were cleaning up. He started to put the toys away while crying. Consequence – Parents raised voice to correct him and said he was going to get less time to play tomorrow.

Antecedent – Told the boy to pick up the toys because it was time for dinner. Behavior – Boy yelled that he wanted more time. Consequence – Parents walked over and helped him pick up toys (boy then continued to complain, yell, and pout at dinner). Boy kept hands to himself.

Now that the parents understood how the ABCs of behavior works in this common scenario for them but also throughout the day, they were able to break down where to make changes. Parent Step 2 (strategic labeled praise) taught them how to make the first change — shifting their attention to the positive behaviors the child engages in, particularly surrounding those difficult moments they are trying to improve.

During the play to dinner transition, I coached the parent to begin thanking him for cleaning up or putting toys away or coming to dinner, even when he complained, yelled, or pouted. Calmly stated "Thanks for cleaning up" even when it was challenging. He could be crying or pouting but if he picks up a toy and reluctantly puts it in the bin, tell him "Thanks for putting that away," "Nice job helping me," and "Wow you're doing a great job putting those toys back." If he was having a meltdown, ignore it (discussed more in Parent Step 4). Do not give more attention to it or respond to him verbally. Wait until he acted calm and give him strategic labeled praise for calming down: "I appreciate you calming down. Now we can go see what yummy dinner we have tonight."

This principle works well because of a simple behavioral concept: when you give attention to a behavior it increases. When a child does something positive (even if minor or reluctantly) and you respond with a positive labeled praise, you will see the behavior he engaged in more and more, with repetitive praise. Labeled praise is a positive consequence in the ABCs of behavior sequence. Parents are shifting the response to the child, and it will lead to more positive behavior over time, with repetition.

This is how I had them shift the examples above to improve the scenario and lead to less battles:

Antecedent – Told the boy to pick up the toys because it was time for dinner. Behavior – Boy ignored parents. Consequence – Parents repeated themselves while raising voice and within a few minutes, gave him extra time playing. Parents walked over and required him to pick up toys. When he started to cry and put the toy in a bin, they told him genuinely, "Thanks for listening."

Antecedent – Parents started picking up toys that boy was playing with due to it being dinner time. Behavior – Boy yelled and hit parents on the arm while they were cleaning up. He started to put the toys away while crying. Consequence – Parents raised voice to correct him and said he was going to get less time to play tomorrow. Parents told him he was not allowed to hit and would not be able to play as long tomorrow. They quickly noticed he was actually starting to put the toys away (even reluctantly) and told him, "Thank you so much for putting the toys away."

Antecedent – Told the boy to pick up the toys because it was time for dinner. Behavior – Boy yelled that he wanted more time. Consequence – Parents walked over and helped him pick up toys (boy then continued to complain, yell, and pout at dinner). Boy kept hands to himself. Parents noticed quickly that he was upset but keeping his hands to himself. They told him genuinely, "I know you wanted to play more. Great job keeping your hands to yourself while you're upset."

Now there were several other tweaks I had planned to make with this family in the other Parent Steps. Later on I had them make changes to expectations, changing playtime to after dinner, and shifted their consequence to a more immediate one when he hit them. But, for now, we were on Step 2, and I wanted them to get good at this step before moving on. I had them focus just on getting good at praising the positive behaviors first.

I told the family to work on this heavily for the next two weeks. Fourteen days of heavy labeled praise, not only during this one scenario, but throughout the day in all other scenarios where he was engaging in positive behaviors. Praise calming down after every moment of frustration or anger, praise listening when he followed through with instruction, praise transitioning well when he did so, praise using words instead of his hands, and give him plenty of positive warm statements ("I love playing with you.")

The family returned after two weeks and reported significant improvements in the child's demeanor, mood, and listening. He seemed more eager to please the parents, would start to put the toys away more quickly, he was more affectionate with them with hugs, and the arguments or battles were shortening. We still had more to work on to improve routines and anger, but this is a good example of how a parent's change in attention could change their overall day-to-day experience as a family.

As I wrap up this story, I want to point out something that I commonly hear. The parents shared that they felt embarrassed they had not been doing this on their own. They described feelings of guilt that they did not give a lot of attention to the positive behaviors. Here's the thing: humans are wired to attune to threat. No one is immune to this natural process. Parents, especially those navigating challenging child behaviors, focus heavily on a child's anger or meltdown for this reason. You are trying to fix it, change it, help them. But what can happen is as the behaviors continue to worsen over time, the parents' attention becomes even more focused on the yelling, the hitting, the pouting, and less and less on the small positive moments happening right alongside them. The small (or large) positive moments happen and parents often take a breath and just don't acknowledge it at all.

The reason this worsens the situation is that kids thrive on their parents' attention, and negative attention still counts as attention to a child's brain. Yelling, correcting, and negotiating in the heat of the moment can accidentally reinforce the very behavior parents are trying to reduce. This is why the ratio of time spent noticing positive behavior versus negative behavior matters so much. Shifting more of your attention onto what is going right, even in small or reluctant moments, is what changes the overall dynamic in a home over time. These parents saw it happen with more and more positive moments that became more obvious given the shift in attention.

I want to be clear that I'm not suggesting parents don't respond to negative scenarios. Parent Steps 4 and 6 focus on how to implement consequences appropriately in a way that will reduce the problem behavior from happening again. But if the ratio of attention you're giving to your child is leaning more toward the negative behaviors and less toward positive, we're going to have a very hard time making improvements.

This family went on to complete the Parent Steps program and were able to reduce arguments entirely surrounding the play to dinner transition. Have a scenario that you find particularly challenging at home? Try to implement Step 2 and see how it goes.