Hitting Habits

​​Nip a new-found hitting habit in the bud before it blossoms into a big behavior problem with these parenting tips for your young child:

• Teach your child that hitting is wrong. Tell him to use his mind and feelings to resolve conflict and solve problems rather than his fists or a loud and angry voice.
• Sit down with your child and come up with some basic rules that he and everyone else in the family must live by. Write down these rules and have everyone read and sign them. Then, come up with a list of consequences and rewards for both bad and good behavior.
• If your child displays a pattern of violent behavior, even after you’ve tried to teach her non-violent ways to resolve conflict, you may want to have your child evaluated for an underlying medical condition that might be causing her to have these outbursts.