That toddler thing again

Sorry I am not as familiar with pavlov as you are I am just a mother of 3 grandmother of 2 and I go by instinct and experience, also I think my parenting skills paid off the dude is one of them

You did a great job with the dude hehe. He's a great guy.

Dear Janet,
Hi..thedudes mom :-)
Well I did read the reply you got about Pavlov and I understand the correlation that was trying to be made there. It boils down to consistency. If you say no to taking the cookie before supper today and yesterday you said yes it leaves a child uncertain and eventually what appears to be defiant because they learn that you may say no but with enough hounding or with enough time you'll say yes. As grandmothers we take liberties with spoiling since we send the child home; not a good thing but it is a grandmothers right LOL. I didn't read the original question but what I can say is consistency works and time outs are great but remember they are only 1 minute per age. So a 3 year old will have 3 minutes. If they defy you can pick them up and place them back on the time out spot for another 3 minutes. This doesn't take long for the child to learn. Especially if your time out spot is a time out chair away from any stimuli or distractions (never in their bedroom) they will associate time out with that room and this may/will interfere with their sleeping.
Hope this helps,
Sue...good luck