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Learning sounds… and the word “No”

Mommy: What does a duck say?
The Munchkin: Quock-quock.
Mommy: What does a cow say?
The Munchkin: Mmooew.
Mommy: What does a dog say?
The Munchkin: Bawc-bawc.

The next test is when I ask her, “What does Mommy say?” She usually looks at me like I’m nuts, but I am waiting for the day when she says “No-no.”

It seems that those words of no-no come out of my mouth every other second when I am speaking to the Munchkin. Sad, but true. Being an eighteen-month-old toddler, she is testing her limits to the extreme. So my dialogue with her is full of reprimands and denials: No climbing on the kitchen table. No playing with the computer. No, you cannot have a cookie right before dinner.

Whoever claims that people are inherently good… has never had to train a toddler. Kids don’t have to be told what not to do – they seem to know that all on their own without any help. We have to tell them what to do.

The long and the short of this is that the Munchkin is learning that life is not fair, and that Mommy is mean. I won’t let her eat all the cookies she wants or get knives out of the kitchen drawers. But who said life was fair? Where is that written?

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