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photo credit: Susan Riedel

When you become a parent, you start getting all sorts of well-meaning advice, including what works and what doesn’t when it comes to potty training boys. Other parents of boys might tell you it takes much longer to potty train a boy than it does a girl, but that’s not always true.  In my experience, it was much harder to train my son then my daughter, however, my sister’s son was very easy to potty train!  So you really have to go by your child.

While there are some obvious differences, potty training a boy is similar to how you would potty train a girl – as far as overall objectives and reward systems go. Your toddler, regardless of gender, needs to understand how using the potty works, why it’s important, and receive praise for a job well done.

There are things that can help when you’re potty training boys, though. For example, there are some cute flushable targets that little boys can aim at that you toss into the potty – making it like a game for them.  You can even use Cherrios for aiming!!

It helps with little boys if they have a male role model to see how it’s done. But if your son doesn’t have one, a book on the subject will suffice. Some parents who are potty training boys make sure they teach them to sit at first – because they could need to urinate and have a bowel movement at the same time.  Make sure to explain that they need to “Aim” down into the potty!  Otherwise you might have pee everywhere!!

Start your son out on a child-size potty chair and then let him graduate to an adult sized potty. When he’s in the potty chair phase, some people recommend having a good pee-guard so that you won’t have accidents splattered all over the bathroom floor and wall.  I found that they didn’t work well with my son-since he had trouble getting on the potty with it there.  But as I said each child is different!!

Check out the Toddler Craft Store for some great Potty Training supplies I picked out!!

Stay Tuned tomorrow for more Potty training tips!!

Did you find training your boy different?  Are you Potty training your child? How is it going? What techniques are you using? Already trained your child? How did you do it? Please share your experiences below!