Lying...

[Willow]

Anyone have any good songs, stories or ways to explain the moral reasons why dishonesty is not a good thing?

I'm struggling with a 5 year old that has openly proclaimed she lies because she "likes to." Talked to mom about it last night, who said she lectured the whole way home and all night long only to have her continue to lie about the stupidest things all in between.

I vaguely ran through the Peter and the wolf bit but she just gave me a blank stare and then lied about it being her pancake on the floor under her chair when no one else ate anywhere near her

Her complete lack of moral awareness about this Is frightening to me, how do I drive the point home?

[Heidi]

IDk-but developmentally, I think a 5 year old still has trouble telling fact from fantasy all the time. Especially if she's getting attention for the untruths.

I have a 4 yo here who tells tall tales now and then, and I just give her the "oh...you are telling me a story, girl". Then I laugh and move on. I've noticed a dramatic reduction since she gets that reaction.

You could also make up ridiculous fibs of your own in response. Things so over the top they can't be true...like you have an elephant in your bathroom or you are the princess of Fantasia. Kind of like "oh yeah....well...I...."

OR

You could make up a circle-time game. Give each child 2 signs...one says TRUTH, the other FIB (or another similar word). Then, say a sentence, and ask the children to hold up which sign is right for the sentence. So...if you say "I am wearing red socks" (and you are), then the children hold up the TRUTH sign. If you say "I have purple hair (and you dont??), then they hold up the FIB sign. Make the lies ridiculuously obvious, the truths very simple.

Then, keep the signs nearby for a few days, and whenever she tells you a fib, give them to her, and have her hold up the right one. Better yet, when she tells you a truth, have her do it to. You might want to do it randomly with the group for a couple weeks. You could even make them available to the kids so they can play on their own.

[Willow]

Love the sign idea Heidi, I am so going to make some up!

The trouble with many of her lies is there is no clear cut way to tell if she is unless she is right here and I see her doing the opposite of what she's claiming. Often times there is no point (like an attempt to avoid consequences) and it doesn't seem to be related to imagination. Case in point, mom said she went downstairs last night to get a drink as she was tucking them in. Took kiddo a long time to come back up so she asked her what that was about. She claimed she was just getting a drink. Mom went back downstairs and discovered a bunch of her Avon boxes were busted open and confronted her this morning about cutting the tape to get them open (there were scissors right there). She denied touching them all the way over here. When mom was explaining what had happened and how we were going to proceed finally she hollared at her "I DIDN'T CUT THEM, I USED MY HANDS." As if she was annoyed mom was getting the details of her lie wrong

You should have seen the look on moms face after trying all that time to get an admission out of her......then it wasn't really an admission but an admonishment because mom misjudged her ability to get into them without scissors.


Mom told me yesterday she'll be talking to her grandma on the phone and if grandma asks her how school is she'll tell her she didn't have it that day. Mom will say yes you did! To which she has replied before shhhh, I don't want her to know that though irritated that mom is interfering with her farce. What would be the point of that kind of lie, other that she's enjoying the lie itself???

I don't know....I'm having a hard time explaining it. She seems to fully understand lying is wrong, but enjoys doing it regardless.

[Cradle2crayons]

I am so going to use Heidi's idea too!!! I have a few of those too..they are three though... And I have to question them several times before I finally get the truth... What a wonderful idea...

[Blackcat31]

I've used Heidi's suggestion before as well and had good results with some and others, not so much but those were the kiddos that DID know the difference but preferred to lie for the dramatic effect it caused.

With those kids, I would show them how lying can hurt feelings and make a person sad etc etc.

(This may not be so nice but it sure proved the point) I announced one day that we were going to have cookies and milk for snack. The kids all came running in to sit down for snack time. I proceeded to serve carrot sticks and yogurt dip. (Of course my biggest complainer was the DCK I was having the lying issue with)

Immediately the child started saying "But you said we were having cookies for snack"

and I immediately said "Oh well yeah, I lied." and continued serving the carrots.

The following afternoon I told the child they did not have to have rest time. They were elated all morning. Of course rest time came and I had them lay down and as soon as the child protested, I replied "Oh well, I lied"

This only happened for the one afternoon and the following day. After a couple lying incidences on my part....they seemed to understand and I haven't had an issue yet.

Like I said, it might be a bit unorthodox but it sure worked. Sometimes I think kids have to live it and feel it to understand it FULLY.

[Evansmom]

It seems to me she's getting a lot of attention for what she's doing. She likes that attention even though its negative, a lot of kids do this, it's quite common.

If I were in your shoes I would try to give attention when she's honest and then totally ignore the small lies when you can. Of course you can't ignore the ones involving hurting other kids or breaking rules, there needs to be consequences for those. But the lies just for lying a sake gets no attention or a brief "it's really hard for my ears to hear you when you talk like that." And quickly move on.

On the flip side start rewarding other kids for bing honest and read books about honesty to the group.

[Heidi]

Love the sign idea Heidi, I am so going to make some up!

The trouble with many of her lies is there is no clear cut way to tell if she is unless she is right here and I see her doing the opposite of what she's claiming. Often times there is no point (like an attempt to avoid consequences) and it doesn't seem to be related to imagination. Case in point, mom said she went downstairs last night to get a drink as she was tucking them in. Took kiddo a long time to come back up so she asked her what that was about. She claimed she was just getting a drink. Mom went back downstairs and discovered a bunch of her Avon boxes were busted open and confronted her this morning about cutting the tape to get them open (there were scissors right there). She denied touching them all the way over here. When mom was explaining what had happened and how we were going to proceed finally she hollared at her "I DIDN'T CUT THEM, I USED MY HANDS." As if she was annoyed mom was getting the details of her lie wrong

You should have seen the look on moms face after trying all that time to get an admission out of her......then it wasn't really an admission but an admonishment because mom misjudged her ability to get into them without scissors.


Mom told me yesterday she'll be talking to her grandma on the phone and if grandma asks her how school is she'll tell her she didn't have it that day. Mom will say yes you did! To which she has replied before shhhh, I don't want her to know that though irritated that mom is interfering with her farce. What would be the point of that kind of lie, other that she's enjoying the lie itself???

I don't know....I'm having a hard time explaining it. She seems to fully understand lying is wrong, but enjoys doing it regardless.

The only other thing I could suggest was trying to ask more open ended questions (I'm thinking of mom). Instead of "why did you cut the boxes open?" she could ask "what happened here?". Not sure if that would be realistic in the heat of the moment, though, or apply to every situation.

I'd really try to go for taking the power out of it for her. Whenever possible, try to difuse it, make it less important. kwim? She's getting a power-trip out of her story-telling, and although she may know she's lying (kind of), she doesn't have the ethical reasoning yet to see it as wrong. Maybe her development in that area is a little delayed, but she's not innately bad, just "trying it on for size" for a while. And she's got all the adults around her paying attention to her over it! Win for her...

My friends' child was pretty sneaky at 4-5 years of age. She's 20 now and an absolute sweetheart. DCG will get it eventually...

[Heidi]

I've used Heidi's suggestion before as well and had good results with some and others, not so much but those were the kiddos that DID know the difference but preferred to lie for the dramatic effect it caused.

With those kids, I would show them how lying can hurt feelings and make a person sad etc etc.

(This may not be so nice but it sure proved the point) I announced one day that we were going to have cookies and milk for snack. The kids all came running in to sit down for snack time. I proceeded to serve carrot sticks and yogurt dip. (Of course my biggest complainer was the DCK I was having the lying issue with)

Immediately the child started saying "But you said we were having cookies for snack"

and I immediately said "Oh well yeah, I lied." and continued serving the carrots.

The following afternoon I told the child they did not have to have rest time. They were elated all morning. Of course rest time came and I had them lay down and as soon as the child protested, I replied "Oh well, I lied"

This only happened for the one afternoon and the following day. After a couple lying incidences on my part....they seemed to understand and I haven't had an issue yet.

Like I said, it might be a bit unorthodox but it sure worked. Sometimes I think kids have to live it and feel it to understand it FULLY.

There you go...with your dcg, maybe you & mom could do this to only cost HER, though, not your whole group. Like, hey, DCK, mom said she was taking you to McDonald's today!

[Willow]

I'm all about ignoring it Heidi but I think that's what we've been doing all this time not knowing she was actually lying as much as she was. Many times she fibs I'm sure we have had no idea and therefor don't even have the chance to ask those open ended questions. Save for the last couple of days she hasn't gotten much if any attention for it because we had no idea it was as bad as it was!

I'm going to try offering cookies for lunch and talk to mom about playing through a few of those at home as well to drive the point home how it feels to be lied to. Although it might seem harsh by some standards I do think it might be the only thing that works for this kiddo and mom will more than be on board.

[Blackcat31]

I'm going to try offering cookies for lunch and talk to mom about playing through a few of those at home as well to drive the point home how it feels to be lied to. Although it might seem harsh by some standards I do think it might be the only thing that works for this kiddo and mom will more than be on board.

I think certain methods of teaching kids can appear harsh if you don't know the details of the situation and while I agree, that an eye for an eye isn't always the best way to go about things, in your case this child IS old enough.

She DOES know what a lie is and she is FULLY aware that it's wrong. So you aren't trying to teach her though things, you are trying to show her what it feels like and what the implications are for lying.

Just like telling someone something is soft. They can understand the difference between soft and hard and can even tell you things that are probably soft but they really don't UNDERSTAND soft until they have felt it and experienced it.

So this little gal doesn't need an ethical or moral lesson, she simply needs an "experience".

[Play Care]

When I have kids go through the typical lying phase, I do as some of the others have suggested. There are also times depending on how badly the child is doing it, they have to be my shadow (and I make that as boring as possible!) because "When you tell fibs, it's too hard to trust you."

But it sounds as if this girl has gone over and above the typical "story telling" and I do like Black Cat's advice for that

[Laurel]

I've used Heidi's suggestion before as well and had good results with some and others, not so much but those were the kiddos that DID know the difference but preferred to lie for the dramatic effect it caused.

With those kids, I would show them how lying can hurt feelings and make a person sad etc etc.

(This may not be so nice but it sure proved the point) I announced one day that we were going to have cookies and milk for snack. The kids all came running in to sit down for snack time. I proceeded to serve carrot sticks and yogurt dip. (Of course my biggest complainer was the DCK I was having the lying issue with)

Immediately the child started saying "But you said we were having cookies for snack"

and I immediately said "Oh well yeah, I lied." and continued serving the carrots.

The following afternoon I told the child they did not have to have rest time. They were elated all morning. Of course rest time came and I had them lay down and as soon as the child protested, I replied "Oh well, I lied"

This only happened for the one afternoon and the following day. After a couple lying incidences on my part....they seemed to understand and I haven't had an issue yet.

Like I said, it might be a bit unorthodox but it sure worked. Sometimes I think kids have to live it and feel it to understand it FULLY.

Absolutely, I agree.

When I was a little girl we had neighbors who had seven children. They would always steal toys from us. Mom probably didn't even know she had so many kids, . So my mom talked to the children but they didn't admit doing it. So one day she took one of their dolls when my playmate left it. When the little girl asked for the doll and said it was hers my mom said "I'll give it to you when you bring Laurel's doll back." Not only did I get my doll but she had a whole armload of stuff." :: Problem solved.

Laurel

[AmyKidsCo]

It seems to me she's getting a lot of attention for what she's doing. She likes that attention even though its negative, a lot of kids do this, it's quite common.

If I were in your shoes I would try to give attention when she's honest and then totally ignore the small lies when you can. Of course you can't ignore the ones involving hurting other kids or breaking rules, there needs to be consequences for those. But the lies just for lying a sake gets no attention or a brief "it's really hard for my ears to hear you when you talk like that." And quickly move on.

On the flip side start rewarding other kids for bing honest and read books about honesty to the group.

My initial reaction was to wonder what benefit she's getting from the lies, because if she weren't getting something from it she would't do it. Then figure out how to provide that "thing" in other ways so she won't need to lie to have that need fulfilled.

Here are some Love & Logic tips on how to handle lying:
http://www.mynewsletterbuilder.com/email/newsletter/1410581224

[MissAnn]

Liar, liar....pants on fire! LOL

[lovinkidsinchelsea]

lyin

find some biblical quotes with strong repercussions; I use the prison story about the man who bit his moms finger when she came to visit because he used to steal small things and she never corrected him