By the time your toddler is 2 years old, you can probably hardly wait for him to be toilet trained. The pressure to reach that goal may be particularly intense if you want him to enter a nursery school or child-care program that requires the children to be trained. Be forewarned, though, that pushing him before he is ready, may actually prolong the process. Studies indicate that many children who begin training before 18 months are not completely trained until after age 4. By contrast, most of those who start around age 2 are completely trained before their third birthdays.

Chances are, toilet training won't be very successful until your child is past the extreme negativism and resistance to it that occurs in early toddlerhood. He must want to take this major step. He'll be ready when he seems eager to please and imitate you, but also wants to become more independent. Most children reach this stage sometime between 18 and 24 months, but it's also normal for it to occur a little later.

Introducing Toilet Training

Once your toddler is ready to begin this process, things should proceed smoothly as long as you maintain a relaxed, unpressured attitude. Praise him for his successes, while not even mentioning his mistakes along the way. Punishing him or making him feel bad when he has an "accident" will only add an unnecessary element of stress, which is bound to hinder his progress.

The best way to introduce your toddler to the concept of using the toilet is to let him watch other family members of his sex. (Watching people of the opposite sex may simply confuse him.) The first goal is bowel training. Urination usually occurs with the bowel movement, so at first it is difficult for the child to separate the two acts. Once bowel training is established; however, most children (especially girls) will quickly relate the two. Boys usually learn to empty their bladders in the sitting position but gradually transfer to the standing one, particularly after watching the "older boys" do it that way.

How to Toilet Train

Obtain a potty chair and place it in your child's room or in the nearest or most convenient bathroom. Then do the following:

1. For the first few weeks, let him sit on the potty fully clothed while you tell him about the toilet, what it's for and when to use it.

    

2. Once he sits on it willingly, let him try it with his diaper off. Show him how to keep his feet planted solidly on the floor, since this will be important when he's having a bowel movement. Make the potty part of his routine, gradually increasing from once to several times each day.

    

3. When he's comfortable with this, try changing his diaper while he's seated, and actually drop the contents of the dirty diaper into the pot under him to let him know that this is the chair's real purpose.

    

4. Once your child grasps how this process works, he'll probably be more interested in using the potty properly. To encourage this, let him play near the chair without a diaper and remind him to use the potty when he needs to. He's bound to forget or miss at first, but don't show your disappointment. Instead, wait until he succeeds and reward him with excitement and praise.

    

5. After he's using the potty chair regularly, gradually switch over from diapers to training pants during the day. At this point, most boys quickly learn to urinate into an adult toilet by imitating their fathers or older boys. Both girls and boys may be able to use adult toilets outfitted with training seats.