Do You Make Your Kids Say Please When You Know You're Going to Say No?

At that age I would say to my daughter
no sweetie you can;t have....but remember we say please

there are enough times you;re teaching them to use their manners (in stores, lines, and everywhere ) that i dont think they need to restate the question J. to be shot down

Now I J. say at 5, Emmy do you want to rethink how you J. said that (if she asks in a very demanding not polite way) and she will repeat and i will give the answer that was intended,

Are you going to say no all that often?

Probably if you know the answer is no, don't push the "please," especially at 2 years old. That does seem a little cruel, and doesn't reinforce what you are trying to teach her.

You will probably say "yes" often enough that you will have many opportunities to reinforce "please."

I think it is too cruel to make them ask politely (since it often takes several tries - adding in the please, the tone of voice and the 'mommy') and then just say no. It's like setting them up and then knocking them down.

I typically don't make them say please if I know I'm going to say no. But we do have times when they say please on their own that I do say no, so they get some reinforcement that just saying please won't let them get what they want. It's funny because one of my toddlers will say, "I said please" after I said no to something. It makes me laugh but it gives me a chance to teach him that just saying please doesn't make a no into a yes.

On a side note, this question gave me a chuckle because a recent (May 20th) Family Circus cartoon had a strip about this very question:
http://www.arcamax.com/thefunnies/familycircus/s-###-###-####

I never thought about this consciously, but no I do not make them ask politely if I'm going to say no anyway.

No-they were taught to say please and thank you-and you're welcome-they also said yes ma'am, yes sir and no ma'am and no sir-and I said the same to them-sir and ma'am were often replaced, however, with a term of endearment.

No I don't make him ask again nicely, but I do point out that he forgot please in my response.

Yes, I did/do. The first couple of times she was quite upset but by 3 she was the best kid I've seen at saying please & thank you. Even when she's really upset she's still quite polite in her words (not so much in her voice tone!)

Are manners a "sometimes" thing or an "always" thing? Once you answer my question, you can answer yours. BTW in my house always!

I had always encouraged my daughter to say please and thank you no matter what. She is now 5 and says it with no problem. I think you should have her say it no matter what your answer will be so that she will say it to other people as well.

Yep! They're manners shouldn't change depending on the answer they're going to get.

Yes. All questions OR requests get a please, and answers get a thank you, or acknowledgement.

Actually, I don't think my son knew that there was a different way to ask a question for several years. The please was tacked on the way a question mark is at the end of a sentence.

It wasn't something I taught on purpose. It was a 'by example' thingmy. As In I phrase all MY questions/requests with pleases and thankyous. And I'd correct any of his lapses as absentmindedly as any other language thing.

Foot, not feets, and yes, absolutely blah blah blah.

"You mean juice please. And nope! Not right now. Thanks for asking. :)"

"Store not stored, and yep! I'm going to store this right here. We store it for years. When we used stored is when we're talking about the catsup, not us. So we store the catsup, or the castup was stored. Wacky, right? So where's your plate? Ah Thankyou. Yes. Please. Gratzia. Molto bene. Oops! Almost squirted that all over, didn't I? Not so brilliant, on my part, quick recovery though saves the day. Thanks for helping, love!"

Meaning that my own running dialogue is peppered with pleases & thank yous.

Hi, cute question. I would say yes always says please. It is manners not manipulation. This way it is understood that we never know the answer but should always present ourselves the right way. If you were to only say "yes" to her please then she might use the please as a gentle form of unknown manipulation.

I love your question.

~J.