# Why Telling Kids to Use Their Words Doesn't Always Work \[a Listener Q&A\]

An episode of [Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1082244480), 19 Oct 2026, 14 min.

Audio: https://mgln.ai/e/187/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/fa326977-3de5-4283-9b8b-af3500c58607/b69b2795-5503-4de1-ac91-af460017906e/7fd59dbd-30f5-4f5d-a96e-b4e20189ba7c/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=a05f1702-0c0e-4b0f-8014-af460017907c

Your five-year-old is hitting other children when they're angry, frustrated or feel something is unfair. You've talked about using words, encouraged them to burn off energy and tried everything you can think of. So what actually helps? Justin and Kylie Coulson explain why young children lash out, how to practise emotional regulation at home and what to do when your child comes home after a difficult day at school. Learn how to set boundaries without shame, build better responses and help your child manage big feelings as their brain develops. KEY POINTS • Why five-year-olds struggle to control big emotions • How to practise calming strategies before frustration takes over • Why difficult conversations work better when everyone is calm • Helping children find their own solutions to conflict • Responding with compassion while still addressing hitting • How classroom culture and maturity can influence behaviour QUOTE OF THE EPISODE “When emotions are hot or high, there's not a lot that soaks in or sinks in.” RESOURCES MENTIONED • Happy Families: https://happyfamilies.com.au • Send your tricky questions to podcasts@happyfamilies.com.au ACTION STEPS FOR PARENTS • Practise when things are calm. Rehearse taking deep breaths, walking away or asking an adult for help. • Problem-solve together. Ask your child what they could do next time they feel angry or treated unfairly. • Reconnect after school. Offer cuddles, space and understanding before discussing what went wrong. • Keep the boundary clear. Acknowledge their feelings while making it clear that hitting isn't okay. • Give them time to learn. Emotional regulation develops gradually, and children need repeated practice and support. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to the Happy Families podcast where you
[0:07] Speaker 1: get real parenting solutions every day. Tuesday means tricky questions.
[0:12] Speaker 1: Today we have one about five-year-olds lashing out, being a
[0:14] Speaker 1: little bit dysregulated. What do we do to get regulation happening?
[0:19] Speaker 1: How do we talk to our kids about behaving in
[0:21] Speaker 1: social rather than anti-social ways? That and more is coming
[0:26] Speaker 1: up right after this. Stay with us. Hello, it's the
[0:32] Speaker 1: Happy Families podcast where you get real parenting solutions every
[0:34] Speaker 1: single day. We're Justin and Kylie Coulson. We're parents of
[0:37] Speaker 1: six kids, six daughters, and we have raised six five-year-olds,
[0:43] Speaker 1: which means we've been through it all. Today, it's a
[0:44] Speaker 1: tricky question about a five-year-old who is having a bit
[0:48] Speaker 1: of a struggle. Even though school is almost finished for
[0:51] Speaker 1: the year or in the final term, let's talk about
[0:53] Speaker 1: that in a sec. But if you have a tricky
[0:54] Speaker 1: question that you would like to ask us, you can
[0:56] Speaker 1: hit us up by sending us a voice note to
[0:58] Speaker 1: podcasts at happyfamilies.com.au. That's podcasts with an S at happyfamilies.com.au. Alternatively,
[1:06] Speaker 1: just visit the website, happyfamilies.com.au. When you scroll down on
[1:09] Speaker 1: the homepage, you see a spot where you can press
[1:11] Speaker 1: record and start talking, just like Amy, who sent us
[1:15] Speaker 1: this question.
[1:16] Speaker 2: Hi, Kylie and Dr. Justin. I have a tricky question today.
[1:22] Speaker 2: My five-year-old son, who's in prep, has started to physically
[1:28] Speaker 2: lash out and hit his friends when he is really
[1:32] Speaker 2: frustrated or angry or feels like something is unfair. I
[1:36] Speaker 2: have heard that this is happening with other children in
[1:39] Speaker 2: the classroom as well, which makes me feel like maybe
[1:44] Speaker 2: there are some things that could be done differently in
[1:47] Speaker 2: the classroom to help support the feelings of the children
[1:52] Speaker 2: before they get this big. But at the end of
[1:55] Speaker 2: the day, I just want to make sure my kid
[1:57] Speaker 2: isn't hurting other children. And he's using his words instead
[2:03] Speaker 2: of his hands. I have tried to talk to him
[2:05] Speaker 2: about positive ways to release your emotions, to talk about things,
[2:10] Speaker 2: to use your words. I try to get him to
[2:15] Speaker 2: release a lot of his physical energy throughout the day
[2:18] Speaker 2: at the park, on his bike, on his scooter, on
[2:20] Speaker 2: the trampoline. But I'm just at a bit of a loss.
[2:24] Speaker 2: When I hear that he has hit at school, what
[2:28] Speaker 2: should I do? Please help.
[2:31] Speaker 1: All right, Kylie, kids lashing out at school, a five-year-old
[2:34] Speaker 1: little boy who isn't feeling great. First thing that comes
[2:38] Speaker 1: to mind is that when you are the parent and
[2:42] Speaker 1: you find out that your child has been doing this,
[2:45] Speaker 1: it's just the worst feeling ever. You feel like you're
[2:48] Speaker 1: just not getting it right. And I can hear in
[2:50] Speaker 1: Amy's voice note that sense of, oh, we're trying to
[2:53] Speaker 1: have the conversation. It's not going any, what are we
[2:55] Speaker 1: supposed to do here?
[2:57] Speaker 3: I can remember getting a phone call from the school
[3:00] Speaker 3: when our eldest was six. We had to go and
[3:03] Speaker 3: meet with the teacher. And when we went in, we
[3:07] Speaker 3: were met with a nice, beautiful drawing on the carpet.
[3:13] Speaker 2: Yes.
[3:13] Speaker 3: We had taught our six-year-old that when she had big emotions,
[3:17] Speaker 3: that was really good to draw it out.
[3:19] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[3:21] Speaker 3: And she could do as big a scribble as she wanted.
[3:23] Speaker 1: Right.
[3:24] Speaker 3: We forgot to mention that it needed to be on paper.
[3:27] Speaker 2: Yes.
[3:29] Speaker 3: And the teacher was most upset that she'd taken her
[3:34] Speaker 3: anger out on the carpet. So we have experienced these
[3:39] Speaker 3: emotions a lot over the years.
[3:42] Speaker 1: So as I listen to Amy's question, there's a couple
[3:45] Speaker 1: of things that come to mind. The first, and she's
[3:47] Speaker 1: pinpointed something that I was going to say, but it's
[3:49] Speaker 1: worth emphasising. culture of the school, the culture of the
[3:52] Speaker 1: classroom is important. And it seems that this kind of
[3:56] Speaker 1: behavior is happening beyond just her child. What is modeled
[4:02] Speaker 1: will be replicated. And it may be this child, Amy's child,
[4:07] Speaker 1: it might be other kids that are starting it off.
[4:09] Speaker 1: But when there is dysfunction, dysregulation in the classroom, other
[4:12] Speaker 1: kids start to learn, oh, okay, so this is where
[4:14] Speaker 1: the boundary is rather than having the boundary a little
[4:17] Speaker 1: bit higher. So This is one of those tricky ones, though,
[4:20] Speaker 1: where as a parent, it's very, very hard to sit
[4:21] Speaker 1: down and say to the teacher, tell me about the
[4:23] Speaker 1: culture in the classroom. That's not going to work. And
[4:25] Speaker 1: I wouldn't even recommend it if I was a teacher. Sorry,
[4:29] Speaker 1: I spend enough time talking with teachers to know that
[4:31] Speaker 1: they don't tend to respond well when a parent starts
[4:35] Speaker 1: asking them about what's going on in the classroom or
[4:38] Speaker 1: making suggestions about how they could do their job. I
[4:40] Speaker 1: will share one exception. I wish every teacher could hear
[4:43] Speaker 1: and know this story. There was a teacher... In southwestern Sydney,
[4:47] Speaker 1: who was approached by a parent of a grade nine
[4:50] Speaker 1: girl who was very, very challenging. And this parent just unleashed,
[4:55] Speaker 1: really let the teacher have it. I can't believe you
[4:57] Speaker 1: think you're a good teacher. What are you doing in
[4:59] Speaker 1: this school? My daughter's failing. My daughter's having this experience
[5:02] Speaker 1: and that experience because of you gave him a really
[5:04] Speaker 1: hard time. She was not polite about it at all.
[5:06] Speaker 1: Most teachers would be understandably aggrieved and probably aggravated. This
[5:11] Speaker 1: particular teacher, he paused and literally he said to her,
[5:15] Speaker 1: I really appreciate that you've come to talk to me
[5:16] Speaker 1: about this. I am struggling with your daughter. And the
[5:18] Speaker 1: fact that you care so much means a great deal
[5:21] Speaker 1: for me and for her. And in that gratitude that
[5:25] Speaker 1: he expressed, he essentially turned her from an enemy into
[5:28] Speaker 1: an ally. And I ought to work on that. However,
[5:30] Speaker 1: that's a very unusual response. And I wouldn't be recommending
[5:33] Speaker 1: it to you, Amy. Next thing that strikes me... as
[5:37] Speaker 1: being really important to highlight is just the developmental trajectory
[5:41] Speaker 1: of young boys. Girls and boys are fairly similar in
[5:44] Speaker 1: their trajectory, although boys tend to be a little bit
[5:47] Speaker 1: slower in their social development, even their cognitive development, and
[5:52] Speaker 1: certainly their regulatory development, the ability that they have to
[5:55] Speaker 1: regulate their emotions. And so Amy used the words I
[6:01] Speaker 1: want him to use his words rather than his hands.
[6:04] Speaker 1: And that's right. That's an appropriate desire. And also at
[6:07] Speaker 1: this age, it's something that we do want to be teaching,
[6:09] Speaker 1: but not all kids are quite there yet. And the
[6:13] Speaker 1: great irony from a neurological point of view is that
[6:16] Speaker 1: when somebody gets really emotional, all the blood and all
[6:18] Speaker 1: the oxygen that is required to run the brain moves
[6:21] Speaker 1: away from the areas where our words are created and
[6:24] Speaker 1: where our thinking happens, and it flushes and floods our
[6:26] Speaker 1: emotional system instead.
[6:27] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[6:28] Speaker 1: And so if you don't have any blood or any
[6:30] Speaker 1: oxygen going to the areas that you need, it's all
[6:32] Speaker 1: going to that emotional center. That means that the areas
[6:34] Speaker 1: that you need can't function. They can't fire. The areas
[6:39] Speaker 1: that I'm talking about here, can I just flex for
[6:40] Speaker 1: a moment? They're called Wernicke's area and Broca's area. That's
[6:43] Speaker 1: where speech production, language production, that's where all that happens.
[6:47] Speaker 1: The ability to hear and understand and compute the words.
[6:50] Speaker 1: There's no signaling happening there. There's no blood. There's no
[6:53] Speaker 1: oxygen there. It's all in the emotional part of the brain,
[6:55] Speaker 1: which is further back and a little bit lower down.
[6:58] Speaker 1: And so essentially what happens is you say, I want
[7:00] Speaker 1: you to use your words. But just like you and
[7:03] Speaker 1: I as adults, when we get really emotional, sometimes we
[7:06] Speaker 1: can't find the words we need. It's even more the
[7:08] Speaker 1: case with kids because their brains just, they haven't learned
[7:11] Speaker 1: the regulatory requirements that we have.
[7:14] Speaker 3: So one of the skills that we taught our youngest,
[7:17] Speaker 3: because she really struggled with this as well, motion regulation
[7:21] Speaker 3: was huge for her. Instead of trying to focus on
[7:23] Speaker 3: words that were hard to find.
[7:25] Speaker 1: Yep.
[7:26] Speaker 3: It was encouraging her to take a breath. If she
[7:29] Speaker 3: could take one or two deep breaths, when you could
[7:32] Speaker 3: see the frustration building in her, it was enough to
[7:35] Speaker 3: break the circuit. The challenge is you as the parent
[7:40] Speaker 3: are not standing there as you're watching this.
[7:42] Speaker 1: No, this is happening in the classroom.
[7:43] Speaker 3: Happening.
[7:44] Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly.
[7:44] Speaker 3: And it's really tricky. But if you can practice that
[7:47] Speaker 3: with your child when you're in their space, hopefully over time,
[7:51] Speaker 3: they're actually going to take that on board.
[7:52] Speaker 1: Yeah, there's this really awesome quote from an ancient Stoic
[7:55] Speaker 1: philosopher whose name escapes me right now. And he said,
[7:58] Speaker 1: under pressure, we revert to our most practiced habits. So
[8:00] Speaker 1: what we're really trying to get to here, and after
[8:01] Speaker 1: the break, I'm going to talk about the habits that
[8:03] Speaker 1: we can practice and the way that we can help
[8:05] Speaker 1: Amy's son. But it's really about getting the reps in
[8:09] Speaker 1: when there's less pressure so that when the pressure comes.
[8:11] Speaker 3: It's your natural response.
[8:13] Speaker 1: Spot on, yeah. So the last thing I want to
[8:14] Speaker 1: say before the break is this. When it comes to
[8:17] Speaker 1: effective emotion regulation... researchers believe that kids have it figured
[8:22] Speaker 1: out reasonably well in most circumstances, somewhere between the age
[8:25] Speaker 1: of eight and 10. Now, obviously, we know plenty of
[8:27] Speaker 1: adults who are not very good at it, plenty of
[8:29] Speaker 1: teenagers who struggle with it. Emotion regulation is not guaranteed
[8:32] Speaker 1: to be in place by eight to 10 years of age,
[8:34] Speaker 1: but kids usually get pretty half decent at it by
[8:36] Speaker 1: about then. So we're talking about a five-year-old, a six-year-old.
[8:40] Speaker 1: This is something that is still developing and developing slowly,
[8:43] Speaker 1: not nearly fast enough for us. So we're After the break,
[8:46] Speaker 1: let's talk about what we can do to help kids
[8:48] Speaker 1: to regulate better, given that they don't have theory of mind,
[8:51] Speaker 1: they don't have emotional regulation capacities, they don't have behavior
[8:54] Speaker 1: regulation capacities, and they don't have the ability to use
[8:57] Speaker 1: their words the way that we want them to.
[8:59] Speaker 3: That's next.
[9:08] Speaker 1: It's another tricky question that we're answering on the Happy
[9:10] Speaker 1: Families podcast today. Kylie, you've highlighted the importance of practice
[9:13] Speaker 1: at home as one useful strategy that parents can use
[9:15] Speaker 1: when kids are becoming dysregulated at school. Before I jump in,
[9:19] Speaker 1: is there any other strategy or idea that you've found
[9:22] Speaker 1: helpful with our six kids or that comes to mind
[9:24] Speaker 1: for you?
[9:25] Speaker 3: When your child comes home and you know that they've
[9:27] Speaker 3: had a hard day, or you may have had a
[9:30] Speaker 3: message from the teacher to say that something's gone wrong
[9:33] Speaker 3: in the classroom that day, berating our children or flooding
[9:37] Speaker 3: them with questions and Our own emotions around those experiences
[9:43] Speaker 3: are only going to impact them negatively. So creating a
[9:47] Speaker 3: beautiful space where your kids can come home, they can
[9:50] Speaker 3: have some cuddles, they can spend some time, you know,
[9:52] Speaker 3: just kind of letting it all go before you sit
[9:56] Speaker 3: down and have gentle conversations with them. about how they
[10:00] Speaker 3: might respond differently. It's really important.
[10:03] Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. So let me jump into two things. I'm
[10:05] Speaker 1: only going to share two brief ones because I don't
[10:07] Speaker 1: want to give Amy too much to have to comb through.
[10:10] Speaker 1: The first is this. When we have conversations with our kids,
[10:13] Speaker 1: it ties in with what you're saying here. When emotions
[10:16] Speaker 1: are hot or high, There's not a lot that soaks
[10:19] Speaker 1: in or sinks in. And so therefore, it's way better
[10:21] Speaker 1: to have conversations when emotions are cool. And that includes
[10:24] Speaker 1: maybe a role play or a bit of a dress rehearsal,
[10:26] Speaker 1: those kinds of things. When emotions are cool, the kids
[10:29] Speaker 1: get to practice it so that when they're in the
[10:30] Speaker 1: hot seat and they're ready to blow up, they can remember, oh,
[10:32] Speaker 1: hang on, yesterday afternoon I did this thing and it worked.
[10:35] Speaker 1: But the second thing that I want to emphasize is
[10:37] Speaker 1: that we're talking about five-year-olds here. And so usually on
[10:40] Speaker 1: Thursday afternoon, they're not going to be in the middle
[10:42] Speaker 1: of this moment with another classmate where they're ready to
[10:44] Speaker 1: lash out and go, oh, hang on. Yesterday afternoon, mum
[10:46] Speaker 1: and I did a little practice and I'm going to
[10:48] Speaker 1: do it right now. They might, but it's unlikely. So
[10:52] Speaker 1: the best thing that we can do outside of talking
[10:55] Speaker 1: about it and practicing it at home is just literally
[10:59] Speaker 1: sitting down and problem solving. The more that the kids
[11:02] Speaker 1: can come up with their own solutions, come up with
[11:04] Speaker 1: their own ideas, even if it's as simple as saying,
[11:06] Speaker 1: I need to go and get help. I need to
[11:08] Speaker 1: ask somebody if they can be involved. I need to
[11:10] Speaker 1: walk away. I need to go get a drink. I
[11:11] Speaker 1: need to go to the bathroom. Anything that they can
[11:14] Speaker 1: do to make safer, healthier, wiser decisions in the moment.
[11:20] Speaker 1: That's what we're working towards. Amy, I would recommend that
[11:24] Speaker 1: no matter how much you talk about this, it's going
[11:26] Speaker 1: to be a little bit of hard work with a five-year-old.
[11:29] Speaker 1: The good news is he's going to get better at
[11:30] Speaker 1: it over time. And the more you work on it
[11:33] Speaker 1: together and have nice, easy, comfortable, relaxed conversations about it
[11:37] Speaker 1: and solve problems together, the better he will get at it.
[11:40] Speaker 3: I think coming from a place of compassion, So often
[11:44] Speaker 3: we see them as the aggressor and so we want
[11:46] Speaker 3: to get them in trouble because they've done the wrong thing.
[11:49] Speaker 1: Well, we just want to teach them to not do
[11:51] Speaker 1: it anymore, right? Best of intentions.
[11:52] Speaker 3: Yeah. But if our children feel like their emotions and
[11:56] Speaker 3: feelings are understood and that you're coming from a place
[11:58] Speaker 3: of compassion, today seems like it was a really hard day.
[12:02] Speaker 3: And acknowledging that, it gives them, they feel safe to
[12:06] Speaker 3: be able to then explore.
[12:09] Speaker 1: Yeah, perfect. Let's wrap up with this. A lot of
[12:13] Speaker 1: this has to do with maturity. This is very much
[12:16] Speaker 1: a developmental issue. But some of it has to do
[12:19] Speaker 1: with culture, potentially, in the classroom. And one other element
[12:24] Speaker 1: really matters here. If you were to never have a
[12:27] Speaker 1: conversation with your child about this stuff at all and
[12:29] Speaker 1: just hope that they'll mature out of it, there's a
[12:32] Speaker 1: chance that they might. But depending on the surrounding prevailing culture,
[12:37] Speaker 1: there's also a chance that it will be aggravated. It
[12:40] Speaker 1: will get worse. We had one of our children in
[12:42] Speaker 1: a class where there was some really disturbing behavior and
[12:46] Speaker 1: it did not get better. It required our ongoing intervention.
[12:50] Speaker 1: But with conversations combined with your child's development, there's every
[12:58] Speaker 1: reason to expect that he will start to get the
[13:01] Speaker 1: hang of it sometime in the next three months or
[13:04] Speaker 1: six months or nine months or perhaps the next 12 months.
[13:08] Speaker 1: Every child works on a different developmental time frame. You
[13:11] Speaker 1: can create or at least influence the culture enormously by
[13:16] Speaker 1: the quality of the conversations that you have. And those
[13:20] Speaker 1: conversations really matter. So good luck, Amy. Thanks so much
[13:24] Speaker 1: for your tricky question. We hope that's been helpful. If
[13:27] Speaker 1: you have a tricky question, email us, podcasts at happyfamilies.com.au.
[13:32] Speaker 1: Send us a voice note and we'll do everything we
[13:34] Speaker 1: can to answer it on the pod. Alternatively, happyfamilies.com.au. Scroll down,
[13:38] Speaker 1: press the record button and start. talking we appreciate so
[13:42] Speaker 1: much the work of justin raw from bridge media he
[13:44] Speaker 1: looks after sound and audio engineering and also mim hammond
[13:47] Speaker 1: who provides our admin and other support more information to
[13:50] Speaker 1: make your family happier is available at happyfamilies.com.au the pod
[13:55] Speaker 1: is back on thursday with a conversation with dr joe
[13:58] Speaker 1: winchester about kids deciding on careers it's that time of
[14:04] Speaker 1: the year where school is starting to wind up for
[14:07] Speaker 1: our seniors what do you want to do with the
[14:10] Speaker 1: rest of your life We'll talk about that question and
[14:12] Speaker 1: more in our next episode of the Happy Families podcast.
[14:16] Speaker 1: See you then.

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