4Yr Old Lying

My almost 4 year old is doing this too, and I had trouble with my 6 year old when she was about this age. What I'm struggling with now is a)is he really lying (I have 4 kids, I can't always know who drew on the wall or didn't flush) and b)does he truly understand what a lie is. My friend suggested I use easy black and white things (literally, she suggested colors) to make sure he knew the difference between the truth and falsehood.

If I know for a fact that he is lying, I use Tabasco sauce on his tongue. He hates it. I used this for my daughter as well and truly, I only used it twice before she got the message that lying was unacceptable. I also use it for bad words, disrespectful talk and biting - pretty much any time they use their mouth in a way that God didn't intend. I worry sometimes I will ruin their taste for spicy food when they associate that bottle with punishment...I love the vinegar idea - I may switch.

When I have total proof that the child has lied, I have a travel size spray bottle I keep in my kitchen filled with vinegar. One spray usually does the trick. Tell the child that you are sad that you have to do this because it is your responsibility as a mother to teach them right from wrong, and lying is WRONG and this is the consequence. He will think twice about lying next time if you are consistant. I use the vinegar for blatant disrespect as well or for "Potty words". It doesn't hurt them, it is just nasty tasting. I say I have to clean your mouth out from all the junk that was said. Good luck

Hello S.,

As an educator, I imagine you will find that finding ways to deal with this will help you in the future....as students do not like getting into trouble any more than your son. (Who does?)
There are 2 ways to deal with this. One is to back the child into a corner with proof. But even then a resistant child may just not cooperate. Or just get resentful that you are "picking on" them. (Not supporting them.)
The other is to back down on punishments and try to get child to trust that you do not have any unbearable consequences in mind. (Unbearable is relative here...what does your child find intolerable?)
It would be helpful to find out what is causing the bad behavior, whatever it is. To teach your son an alternative would be best, whether it be something he does on his own, or to seek adult assistance. (that's what we are here for...to help kids avoid too much trial and error...they can't see solutions as well as we can). (Caveat: Kids can be guided to help formulate solutions...this is a good thing... child is more motivated to make it work.

With my three kids we take the approach that in the long run we want them to feel comfortable telling us the truth about anything. So, occassionaly when we run into lying from my 5 yo what we do is get on her level and tell her we don't think that you're telling us the truth. Remember Jesus doesn't like it when you lie and mommy and daddy don't like it when you lie. Then we try and walk her back through what happened slowly, so that she can tell us what she really remembers and we point out as she tells us where her story has changed or where someone else said something happened differently. When we finally get to the bottom of it we tell her how proud we are that she told the truth. We'll ask her, so did you lie to us when you said "...." and generally she will tell us yes she did. We'll maybe put her in a short time out for lying, but we don't punish harshly because we don't want to discourage her from telling the truth.

Lying, as troublesome as it is to us parents, is a natural part of social development. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't talk to our kids about why lying is wrong, it just means that it's a normal thing. So take heart, your son is developing social skills.
That said, my 4 yr old daughter is also in the lying stage, anything she does that she thinks will get her in trouble she blames on her 2 yr old sister who is too little to defend herself. What I do is sit with her privately and talk to her about the incident. Usually if I question her it doesn't take long for her to fess up and then I let her know that I understand she doesn't want to get in trouble but it isn't fair to blame her sister.

Anyway, here is a good article on lying and how it is part of normal child developement: http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=702

The article also discusses ways to deal with lying in preschool age kids.

Did I read that right? Your son is lying and you're stumped on what to do? He needs some consequences for wrong behavior! Tell him what to expect the next time he does it, and follow through. Time to start a discipline program, mom!

I tell my children that you will get in double to trouble for lying. You will still get in trouble if you did something wrong but if you lie, you will get double the consequences. You cannot tell them that they will not get in trouble if they tell the truth because when they have done something wrong, they must have to pay the consequences. Be consistent and he will get it. There are consequences for every action. Praise, praise, praise the good and be consistent with the consequences when they misbehave. Good luck!