Idle threats are usually enough to pursuade a three year old.
“Don’t throw your toy or it will break and we’ll have to throw it away. Is that what you want?”
“Nooo!”
Or when he doesn’t want to leave somewhere:
“OK. I’m leaving without you. Bye”. I usually start walking away for added effect, and after 10 seconds he gets upset and comes running.
It’s a strategy which generally works well, but now I think Thing 3 is onto me.
He insists on standing on his chair at the kitchen table. Literally, every 30 seconds I’m saying “Sit down” and he may or may not listen.
So I tried the idle threat strategy.
“Do you want to fall down and get a boo boo?”
It’s actually not idle, because he has actually fallen down on more than one occasion from standing on the chair, and got hurt. So I know he knows what I’m talking about.
His response: “Yes”
“You want to fall and get a boo boo?”
“Yes”
What do I possibly say to that?
