Category Archives: potty training

Potty at Daycare

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If you work taking care of other people’s toddlers, then you are an integral part of the potty-learning process. Having several toddlers together gives you some advantages over parents, but it also presents some unique challenges.

Advantages
The main advantage you have is that young children learn through imitation. At Rainbow Bridge I’ll usually take two or three children who are potty-learning to the bathroom at once, and it’s quite a social experience. We have a kiddie-potty on the floor, facing the full-sized toilet that has a wide foot-stool in front of it and an extra kid-sized seat that’s attached to the toilet and opens and closes (see an example here). If I had room in the bathroom I’d put another kiddie-potty, but the bathroom is too small. Still, two children can go to the potty at once, while a third kid stands next to me or sits on my lap (I sit on the stool in front of the sink).

At first, I’ll help the children through every process: pulling down their pants, taking off their diaper, sitting on the potty, getting toilet paper, getting a new diaper, pulling up pants, washing and drying hands. As they get more and more experienced, I’ll let them do as much as they can on their own, until I get to the point where I say, “I bet you can do this all on your own now! This time, I won’t even go into the bathroom with you. I’ll just watch from here.” And I’ll stand in the hallway outside the bathroom door, saying “Are you really going to do this all by yourself today? I can hardly believe it! But look at that! You pulled your pants down by yourself. Maybe you WILL be able to do it all on your own.” If they need some help, I encourage them to ask for it (“you can say, ‘help please!’), but usually they can get it on their own, and I’m super proud of them. After a few times of doing that, when it’s time for them to go potty I’ll send them to the bathroom on their own, then I’ll wait a few minutes before I go and see how they’re doing.

In a group care setting, I’ll also sometimes ask a bigger kid who’s completely diaper-free to take a younger child who’s just learning and show them how they go potty. I go with them and supervise the whole thing, but I try to stay in the background a bit and only step in as needed. This can be a very sweet process: the bigger kid feels so competent, and the littler kid feels so special.

Disadvantages
However, there are also some significant disadvantages to potty-learning in groups. The most significant is that if you are working on your own, you have many children to supervise and can’t spend all of your time in the bathroom, especially if it is far away from your livingroom/play space. If that’s the case, you might consider making a “potty corner” with play-stands or two dressers in a corner of your play-room, or you can just tell parents that their child will have to wait until they’re diaper-free to go potty at your house. You have to do what works for you in your house.

Another serious disadvantage is that children tend to have more accidents at daycare because they’re having so much fun playing with their friends that they don’t want to leave, or they don’t realize they need to go until it’s too late because things are so exciting. I’ve had parents who claim that their children are completely diaper-free at home, but they have accidents all the time at my house. In those cases I work with the parents as I can, but if it gets to be too much the child can arrive at my house diaper-free, but once they have an accident or if they can’t pee in the potty when I take them, they’ll need to wear a diaper for the rest of the day at my house. When their parent comes to pick them up, they can take the diaper off before they leave. As long as the child puts the diaper on and takes it off again while still at my house, they rarely back-slide at home.

And thirdly, children are often having so much fun playing that they refuse to go potty when it’s time. For those children, I’ll either try to take them when there’s a transition going on anyhow, like right after a meal or right when we come inside (so they’re not immersed in play yet), or I’ll say, “Jack, it’s time to go potty soon. Do you want to go now, or will you go after Anna?” He usually chooses to go after Anna, so I’ll tell Anna, “Anna, run to the potty and when you get back, tell Jack that’s it’s his turn.” I’ll remind Jack once while she’s gone that as soon as Anna’s back it will be his turn, and when she tells him, then off we go together, no discussion. This method is usually quite successful. I really like this method of having one child tell the other when they’re done for fully diaper-free kids as well, as it helps the kids learn to listen to each other.

The main thing if you are a childcare provider is to do what feels good to you. I love potty-learning because it’s a great time for me to get some one-on-one or one-on-two time with the kids, and it’s great to watch them as they gain the skills and become more and more competent. But I also always have at least one or even two other adults with me! So if taking children to the potty seems like just one more thing than you can handle, I think it’s perfectly alright to have other ways to bond with the children.

Warmly,
Miss Faith

Changing out of Diapers

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Great news! I found out where my great article on potty training came from: Julie Fellom, founder of Diaper Free Toddlers and the Waldorf-inspired preschool Neighborhood Playgarden. Julie has helped potty train more than 1,400 toddlers, all under the age of 27 months The bad news is, her website doesn’t seem to be up and running anymore, and I can’t find the entire article. However, you can find the gist of it from a mom who took her class here, and another very interesting blog post about the cultural shift in potty training happening at 18 months of age in the 1950s to 39 months of age today is here. 

Julie Felloms suggests that potty training is best achieved before a child is 28 months, because that’s the age where, in her opinion, it goes from simply being another physical skill that a young toddler is happy to achieve, to something that they can think about whether they ‘want’ to do it or don’t want to do it. And we all know that two-and-a-half-year-olds often don’t want to do what we want them to do!

So, how to make the switch from diapers to diaper-free? I’ve seen it happen successfully several different ways, but here’s what I recommend. Once your child is able to pee on the potty fairly regularly when you take her, start taking her more frequently (every two hours and then every hour). When she starts keeping her diaper dry between pottying most of the time, she’s ready. I’ve had some children who never keep a diaper dry, and were still ready to move out of diapers, but most will keep it dry.

Once your child is ready, make sure you’re ready! You need to be ready for a big push to get out of diapers, then ready to take your child to the potty religiously every hour for several months (taking them regularly while they’re still in diapers will prepare you for this!). Make the switch out of diapers on a long weekend when you can dedicate yourself to the task. Fellom suggests getting three or four little potties and putting them all around your house, so that your child will be able to get to one whenever she needs to go. Then, have your child go bare bottom. If it’s cold, have her wear loose pants with nothing underneath. Now, I’ve read lots of articles that have suggested getting twenty pairs of ‘big boy underwear’ or ‘big girl panties,’ and using the lure of big kid underwear to help the process go forward. But my observation is that what kids want most of all is love and positive attention from their parents, and it seems to me that they only get excited about big kid underwear because their parents are excited about big kid underwear. I feel the same about giving kids food rewards or stickers for going potty: if you put the same excitement into a proud smile and a kiss on the head, you get the same result and your child will be better off for it.

So, once you’re home with your bare-bottomed child and your many small potties, get a good supply of salty snacks (to keep them thirsty) and a good supply of water or watered-down juice. Watch them carefully and whenever you see them about to go or start to go, pick them up and put them on the potty, and say, “Pee goes in the potty,” or “Poop goes in the potty.” If they have an accident, just say to them sadly, “Pee goes in the potty,” and clean it up.

And that’s it. Some kids get it as quickly as one day, most kids take three days. After that they’re ready to be diaper-free. Fellom suggests not putting kids in underpants for about three months, and I agree. I think underpants feel a lot like diapers, and they’re hard to get up and down. Baggy pants with nothing underneath is much easier, and the feeling of pee running down their leg is uncomfortable for most kids, helping to avoid accidents.

You will still need to take your child to the bathroom on a very regular basis; my observation is that most children don’t realize that they need to go potty until it’s right upon them, until they’re three years old or so. I don’t even start to ask a child if he needs to go potty until he’s been out of diapers for several months. Even then, they’ll usually say “no” if they’re playing or having fun. So I’ll ask them if they need to go once or twice during the day, but the rest of the time I’ll just tell them that it’s time to go potty: before going outside, before nap, and more frequently for children who are newly diaper-free.

And good luck! It’s usually not as scary as it seems.
Warmly,
Miss Faith

Going Potty

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So, how to approach the dreaded subject of potty training? Well, I’ve helped more than 35 toddlers go through this process, so let me tell you some of my thoughts. I recently heard the term “potty learning” instead of potty training, and I like it, since I think it more accurately represents what’s going on. My best source for potty learning is an article that was given to me quite a few years ago, which I’ve since lost. I’ve looked for it online, but I don’t see it floating around out there. If find it I’ll pass the info on, because everything that author says seems to be right-on.

Develop Interest
There are several distinct phases in a child going from diapers to underpants. The first piece is that the child has be interested in it. This usually happens sometime between 18 and 28 months of age, and when you notice it happening, jump on it! If you miss the cues, or want to give the interest level a little nudge, start talking about going potty. Be excited when you’ve gone potty, be excited when your husband goes potty, be excited when house-guests go potty. This can be really funny and fun for you and your spouse, and it often gets the interest level up pretty quickly.

And, since kids learn through imitation, expose your child to as many people going potty as you can. Invite him to come with you when you go, have dad invite him when he goes, and invite families with slightly older children, who are going potty but need adult assistance still, and let your child be part of the activity. Daycares and play-programs are great for exposing kids to other kids learning to go potty. My first few years of teaching the potty-area was in the classroom with a short wall around it (you can see it in the photo above), and all of the children stood on a bench and watched each other learn the ropes.  I’ve never had an easier time potty training! They cheered each other on, and they inspired each other. I’m not kidding: one little boy saw another boy poop in the potty, and he looked at me and said, “I want to do that.” He sat down on that potty for literally (I counted) twenty minutes. And finally, he did it! He was quietly proud of himself.

Peeing on the Potty
After a child develops some interest, she starts sitting on the potty, and usually not much happens. Then one day pee goes in the potty (by accident? Who know?) and you’re so excited! Soon enough your child figures out how to ‘push’ the pee out, and you’re halfway to having your kid in underpants. The next few months are spent with your child refining the skills of peeing on demand, and developing the skills of pulling their pants down, pulling them up, flushing the toilet, washing hands, etc. This long-ish time can turn into a mire where your child loses interest in going potty, and you get stuck, so watch out.

The trick to having this time be successful and keep moving forward is to have going potty be a special time with you that kids look forward to. Here’s what I do: I have a stool in the bathroom so I can sit facing a child while she’s sitting on the potty. I sit down and have her pull down her own pants and take off her own diaper, helping her just as little as she needs, and giving lots of smiles, encouragement and eye contact. Then when she sits down on the potty I might sing a little song or nursery rhyme with her, again with joyful eye contact. Then I say, “Do you think some pee will go into the potty? Let’s listen for it,” and I turn my head to the side and cup my ear, listening intently (without eye contact, so she can concentrate on her body). I’ll wait for awhile, perhaps repeating, “Do you think it will come?” If it does come, I smile as I listen, and when the flow is done I turn to her wonderingly and say in a quiet, happy voice, “I heard it!” Don’t get too excited while it’s happening, or she’ll clench up and stop the flow. If no pee comes, I’ll say, “No pee this time! Maybe next time it’ll come.” Either way we wash hands together, and I give her a kiss, and we go back to our day.

Some kids enjoy the process so much that they never want to get up off the potty if no pee is coming. If that happens, I hold up my hand in a fist and say, “When my fingers are all up, then it will be time to get off the potty.” Then I silently watch my hand as I very slowly raise my thumb and each finger in a steady, inexorable, slow-motion stream. When the pinky reaches the upright position, suddenly a ‘bell’ goes off, and I sing out, “Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding!” and I swoop them off the potty, laughing and giving them a kiss. “Would you like to get your own new diaper?” I’ll ask. This method usually stops the ‘discussion’ you’re having about whether they should get off the potty or stay on, and you can move on with your day.

Moving Beyond Diapers
As your child gets better at peeing on demand, start taking him more and more often, and soon you’ll probably get to a point that your child is keeping his diaper dry between pottying. Then it’s time to move out of diapers. I’ve found that there’s a window of time when it’s the natural progression to move on, and if you don’t make the switch during this window, children will often decide that they either aren’t interested in going potty anymore, and/or they don’t want to move out of diapers.  Now you’ve got a power-struggle on your hands.  I’ll leave you with this cliff-hanger, and I’ll write about making the switch from diapers to underpants in another post!

Warmly,
Miss Faith