Pish time on the iPone

A likes my iPhone. Actually, she calls it my "ipone," on which her favorite toddler game right now is Fish School (which she calls "pish!"). We used it in Mallorca and then Milan in the car to help get over tired, cranky times. And on the trams or buses here, to help get over tired, cranky time. Or at a restaurant, to keep her at the table for more than 2 minutes when shes...you guessed it, tired, bored or cranky. That is correct, I use an iPhone as a babysitter for 5, or even 10, minutes!

But as tired and cranky time seems to be getting longer, and more enthusiastically cranky (ok, let's just say tantrum), I went back into child raising literature and found an idea that is working really nicely. In the book, the example was actually about an 8 year old girl and computer time, but it works with our little one, too. The concept that lack of structure is frustrating translates to A asking for "pish" almost anytime she realizes she is bored, and my having to decided on an instance-by-instance basis whether I say yes or no. If I say no, she protests. A lot. Loudly. And I was really sick of having to decide based on some unknown rules, or make some up, constantly. Anyway, the book suggests to schedule in an activity like this, and for us it has coincided very nicely with helping A get ready to leave the house in the mornings. We are trying to give her more structure to help ease tantrums, and now, 5 minutes before Mama or Papa are leaving to take her to school, she gets to play on the iPhone. She has to have her shoes and sweater on, or at least allow them to be put on, and be in her stroller. And after the first 2 days of toddler protest with the taking the iPhone away when the stroller is leaving the apartment with said parent, today she was fine with it. Now she knows there is a time for "pish" and we get a more cooperative little person, ready to leave for school.

All around win.

By the way, the app is called Fish School, from a company called DuckDuckMoose, and so far I love all their apps. Especially the music and sounds - I have yet to want to throw the phone across any large distance after hearing the same song 50 times. Well done, DuckDuckMoose.