I Need A Refresher On Appropriate 1 And 2 Year Old Behavior

[Heidi]

sorry-I wasnt meaning to criticize! It just sounded like so many in your original post, and I got an (innacurate perhaps) vision in my head. sorry... :-)

[Blackcat31]

They aren't all here all the time, and with my full time assistant, I could have 8 under the age of 2 full time.

Oops, sorry, I misunderstood. Now it makes much more sense!

I feel for you right now because I also went from having an older group of kids to having a really young group of kids and now there are days where I feel I am doing nothing but putting stuff back where it came from, righting furniture, picking up messes and putting things out of reach. My books were being destroyed and my daily routine was flying out the window!! It got bad before it got better.

What I did do to make it better was to eliminate almost half of the toys and materials I had out. I allow the kids to simply pick up everything at one time and put it in one giant container rather than expect toddlers to put things back correctly all organized and neat like they were when I had mostly 3-5 year olds. Now instead of a whole row/shelf of books out, I have 5 books (one for each of my "busy" kids). Instead of a box of hot wheel cars, I have 3-4 big chunky trucks and cars. Instead of ALL my arts and craft materials out, I have paper and crayons.

Simplifying the environment makes a huge difference. I also rotate the toys and number of toys allowed out at one time. Keeps their behaviors in check and allows them to have more control over their play spaces. Simplify. It really does work.