sillysami
asks:
Q:
How do I stop my child from stealing?
My 7 year old step-son is constantly stealing and lying. Over the last week he has stolen a video game, traded his mom's play station for a bike, and ran off to "friends'" house. Worst of all, in one day he stole almost $600 dollars in cash from our bedroom and safe, as well as a digital camera from our closet. After being caught and lying repeatedly about where the money was and being grounded with all of his video games and such taken from him. He still continues to steal, he goes into our room and takes change from out change bucket and lies about it. I'm fed up with his behavior but we have no idea what to do or how to handle all this constant stealing. Help!!
In Topics:
Discipline and behavior challenges
> 60 days ago
What the Expert Says:
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Additional Answers (3)
Sorry to hear you're having so much trouble! The first part of solving behavior problems is figuring out the underlying reasons behind them. Think of yourself as a detective - gather more info, piece together the clues, etc. It's hard to give ideas beyond this detective phase because "what to do" will depend a lot on what you find. Let's say you discover that he's doing these things to impress a friend in the neighborhood - the solution you'd come up with would probably be very different than if he were doing it because he was angry at you and was trying to get back at you.
So, I'd say step 1 is to do some good detective work. While your doing that, I'd try to keep him as occupied and engaged as positive in fun things with someone you trust, such as yourself. It's really hard for kids to do bad things when they're having a lot of fun doing something positive. If you two are playing a game, for example, he's not very likely to get up, pick up the playstation, and walk off with it. Stealing and running away tend to happen when kids are either bored, unsupervised, angry, or otherwise not with someone trusted.
I'd suggest coming back and posting an update, or starting a new question, once you have some information about the "why," and hopefully that will generate some more ideas for strategies!
So, I'd say step 1 is to do some good detective work. While your doing that, I'd try to keep him as occupied and engaged as positive in fun things with someone you trust, such as yourself. It's really hard for kids to do bad things when they're having a lot of fun doing something positive. If you two are playing a game, for example, he's not very likely to get up, pick up the playstation, and walk off with it. Stealing and running away tend to happen when kids are either bored, unsupervised, angry, or otherwise not with someone trusted.
I'd suggest coming back and posting an update, or starting a new question, once you have some information about the "why," and hopefully that will generate some more ideas for strategies!
> 60 days ago
My personal experience, is when my mother took me back to the store to return the hair spray I took. She also made me talk to a cop that was there. I felt so embarrassed I never did it again. I was 10 years old.
> 60 days ago
When my daughter was six she stole a lollypop from a convenience store and when I found out about it in the car I turned right around and drove back to the store. We went in and I made her look at the clerk and tell him that she stole the lollypop and made her hand it to him. He was helpful by telling her to never do that again and that she could get in big trouble. She is now eight and has never done anything like that again. I hope this helps.
> 60 days ago
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