My Three Year-Old has a real problem admitting when she's wrong.

[4JP]

My daughter has a problem with admitting she's wrong.  If she does something bad (i.e. hits another kid, throws something, makes a mess, etc.), instead of saying sorry, she will start throwing a fit.  And from that point forward, her behavior becomes more and more difficult.  Her father (my husband) does the same thing.  If he hurts my feelings or something, he will not say sorry.  Instead, he will get mad at me!  

This has become a HUGE problem because both me and my husband work and she is acting out at her pre-school.  The pre-school is a wonderful program.  Very structured and supportive.  My 4 year old son is also in the program (a different class) and he is thriving.  

I realize that part of it is her age, but I need to help her learn that it is okay to say you are sorry and that you can just move on from there.  

Any ideas?

[4JP]

Thank you for your insight.  

I also came up with a little excersize to help her understand that when she makes a mistake that it isn't the end of th world.  We will see how it goes...

Thank you, again.

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

All you can really do is set reasonable limits and pay attention to the behavior itself, not so much to her thoughts about the behavior. In addition, how parents themselves behave is very important, because children absorb that influence. In this esne, your husband's behavior is illuminating - it conveys the very characteristics that you do not want toencourage in your daughter. Hopefully your husband can take a hard look at himself and begin to model a more reasonable sort of response when he is in the wrong.