I have 2 boys, aged 3 and 16months who have the most incredibly high pitched screams which they do whenever they are excited. The older boy has done so since a small baby and i think his younger brother has simply copied. The problem is that the younger one is doing it more and more - at the dinner table, in the car, during Tumble Tots sessions etc and we are becoming very unpopular with the other parents as it really is the sort of scream that goes right through you, and it makes having a conversation very difficult. The 3 year old is improving as he is old enough to understand our explanations, and use of sticker charts etc to deter him and only forgets himself occasionally, but i desperately need advice on how to get through to his brother. We have tried saying/shouting a firm 'no' every time, but it seems to encourage him and it becomes a 'conversation' - no, scream, no, scream! Help please before we are banned from public places!!

Hi, my good friend has 2 boys who came to stay. They seemed to use screaming as a way of communicating and I would dash upstairs thinking that someone had been murdered, fatally wounded ... etc ... etc. They were much improved when I gave them a couple of examples when screaming was GOOD AND NECESSARY and like the boy who cried wolf if they used daily screaming the real screams would be ingnored. Simple but it worked ... meanwhile I have my own dire problem with 10 year old who refuses to go to her room for 10 minutes having thumped her sister in the car, thrown all school bags across wooden floor scratching it and then smashed a hairbrush!! Good luck!!