How to make brushing fun: creative tips for parents

Is your little one reluctant to brush? It is completely normal for children to find brushing boring or pointless. But good habits formed early save a lot of trouble later, so it is a battle worth winning — ideally without it being a battle.

Here are the tricks that work, from the time-honoured to the modern.

Let them choose the toothbrush

Letting a child pick their own brush gives them a small amount of control over something being done to them, which is often the entire problem. Themed brushes with characters they like genuinely help — Bluey remains undefeated — and a brush they chose is a brush they are invested in.

Play a song

A two-minute song does two jobs at once: it makes the routine enjoyable and it times it accurately. Most people, adults included, brush for far less time than they think. There are plenty of brushing songs on YouTube written for exactly this, and the rule becomes simple: brush until the song finishes.

Try a brushing app

There is an app for everything, including this. Brushing apps turn the twice-daily routine into a story or an adventure and guide children through the quadrants. For a genuinely reluctant child, the novelty can carry you through a difficult few months.

The honest caveat: novelty wears off. Apps and charts usually buy you six to eight weeks, which is often exactly long enough for the habit itself to take over. Plan to rotate rather than expecting one thing to work forever.

Brush together

Children copy their parents far more than they follow instructions. Brushing at the same time, morning and night, turns it from something done to them into something you both do — and it lets you model the technique.

It also gives you a natural moment to check their work.

Use a flavoured toothpaste

There are more flavours available than ever — vanilla, milder mints, strawberry, watermelon and plenty of others. A child who dislikes the taste of standard mint is not being difficult; strong mint genuinely stings a small mouth. Switching flavours solves this more often than persuasion does.

Use a low-fluoride children's toothpaste, pea-sized, from 18 months to about six. Before 18 months, water only unless we have advised otherwise.

Add accessories

A colourful brush holder, a suction-cup character on the mirror, a sticker chart. Small touches make the bathroom feel like their space and the routine feel like theirs.

Give them a job

Let them brush first — badly, enthusiastically, wherever they like — and then say you are going to "check the back ones" or "count them". You get the effective brushing done, they get the autonomy. This works far better than taking the brush off them.

Worth knowing: children do not have the dexterity to brush effectively until around seven or eight. Until then, your brushing is the brushing that counts. Theirs is habit-building.

Games that actually work

Specific enough to try tonight.

Hunt the sugar bugs. Name the plaque, then go looking for it. "There's one hiding behind this back tooth" gives every surface a reason to be brushed
Disclosing tablets. A few dollars at a chemist; they stain plaque bright pink. Children find this genuinely exciting, and it turns an argument about effort into a visible target. Do it once a fortnight, in the evening
Brush the toy first. A doll, a dinosaur, anything with a mouth. Then "your turn"
Swap places. They brush your teeth, then you brush theirs. Expect to be brushed thoroughly and without mercy
Name each tooth, or number them, and announce which one you are on
The mirror commentary. Some children will accept anything if they can watch it happening
Countdown by section — ten on the top left, ten on the top right, and so on. Predictable, finite, and it covers the whole mouth
Torch in a dark bathroom. Slightly silly; very effective for a certain sort of four-year-old

Rewards: what works and what backfires

Works	Backfires
A sticker chart for a week of brushing	A reward for every single brush — it becomes a negotiation
Praising the specific thing they did well	Praising them for being "good"
A non-food reward: the park, choosing a story	A sugary treat, for obvious reasons
Choosing the brush, paste or song themselves	Threatening the dentist as a consequence
Calm consistency, every night	Making it a nightly discussion about whether it happens

The thing worth protecting above all: brushing is not negotiable and not a punishment. It is simply what happens before bed, like putting on pyjamas. Children accept non-negotiable things surprisingly well once they stop being up for debate.

Roughly by age

Age	What usually works
Under 2	Speed, a song, and a good position. Two calm minutes is not realistic — do what you can, twice a day
2–3	Choice of brush and flavour, a toy to brush first, brushing together
3–5	Games, sugar-bug hunts, a timer or app, a sticker chart for the week
5–7	They brush, then you check. Disclosing tablets as a challenge
7–10	Independence with occasional supervision, and a reason that makes sense to them
Teenagers	Appearance and breath are more persuasive than health. Electric brush, and stop nagging

If it is the sensation, not the routine

Some children are not being difficult — the experience is genuinely unpleasant. Foam, mint, the vibration, having something in their mouth, the bathroom's echo.

Things that help:

A non-foaming toothpaste (avoid strong SLS foaming agents), or an unflavoured one
Less paste. A very small amount still delivers fluoride
A softer, smaller brush, or a three-sided brush that does more per stroke
A chewy or vibrating brush used first, to desensitise
A fixed sequence, announced each time, so nothing is a surprise
A visual chart of the steps, in order
Brushing somewhere else — the kitchen, the lounge. There is no rule that it has to be the bathroom

If your child is autistic or has sensory sensitivities, tell us when you book and tell us what works. We will adjust the appointment the same way.

When it still goes badly

Every parent hits a refusal stage. A few things that help:

Change the time. An exhausted child at 8pm will fight anything. Before the bath, or before the last story, often works better.
Two brushes — one for them to hold and chew, one for you. Removes the fight over possession.
Narrate rather than distract. Predictability calms children more reliably than surprise.
Accept a partial win. A quick calm brush beats a thorough one that ends in tears and makes tomorrow harder.

If your child suddenly resists having one particular area touched, mention it to us. That can be a sore tooth rather than defiance.

Troubleshooting

The problem	Try
Clamps their mouth shut	A different position, a song, brushing a toy first. Never force the jaw
Bites the brush	Two brushes — one to bite, one to use
Hates the taste	Change flavour, or use an unflavoured paste. Use less
Gags	Less paste, a smaller brush head, sit them more upright, and start at the front
Wants to do it alone	Let them go first; you do "the check"
Runs away	Make it part of a fixed sequence rather than an announced event
Fine in the morning, terrible at night	Move it earlier — before the bath, or before dinner if you must
One parent can, the other cannot	Not unusual. Let the one who can do it, without commentary

When to stop worrying about fun

If brushing is regularly ending in real distress, or if your child is in pain, the answer is not another game. Book an appointment. A sore tooth, an ulcer, a loose tooth or an erupting molar all look exactly like defiance from the outside.

And a dentist they do not dread

A good brushing routine at home works best alongside a positive experience at the clinic. Our team includes oral health therapists who work specifically with children, and we take a fun and educational approach — a child who understands what is happening is a child who is not frightened by it.

Victorian Dental Group is a general dental practice in Malvern East and holds no specialist registration. Where a child needs care beyond general practice, we refer to a registered specialist paediatric dentist.

Victorian Dental Group — 291 Wattletree Road, Malvern East VIC 3145 · (03) 9088 5808 · book online

This page is general information and does not replace advice from a registered dental practitioner about your own circumstances. Please see our Disclaimer.

Does letting a child choose their own toothbrush help?

Genuinely, yes. A brush they picked — their colour, their character — gets used with less resistance than one chosen for them. What matters clinically is that it has soft bristles and a small head; beyond that, let them choose whatever appeals.

How do I get them to brush for long enough?

Use a two-minute song, a sand timer, or a toothbrush with a built-in timer. Children have no sense of how long two minutes is, and unsupervised brushing typically lasts a fraction of it. A timer turns an argument about stopping into something external and neutral.

Do brushing apps and videos work?

For some children, very well — they turn the routine into a story or a game and take the nagging out of it. They are a tool rather than a solution: the app keeps them brushing, but it cannot tell whether the brush is actually reaching the gum line or the back teeth. Use one if it helps, and still check the result.

What about flavoured toothpaste?

Worth trying — strong mint is genuinely unpleasant for many young children and is a common reason for refusal. Milder mint, vanilla and fruit flavours are widely available. Two conditions: it must still be an age-appropriate low-fluoride children's toothpaste for under-sixes, and because it tastes good, keep the tube out of reach so it is not eaten.

Does brushing together help?

It is probably the most effective thing on this list. Children copy what they see far more readily than they follow what they are told, and brushing alongside you morning and night makes it ordinary rather than something imposed. Letting them brush your teeth in return usually goes down well.

Can making it fun backfire?

Only if fun replaces effectiveness. A child can brush happily for two minutes and still miss the surfaces where decay starts. So keep the games, but continue to brush for them while they are small and to finish off until around age eight — their enthusiasm is not the same as a clean mouth. The other thing to avoid is treating brushing as a performance that earns a reward, which makes it feel like an ordeal to be survived.

What if nothing works?

Say so at the next appointment rather than giving up or turning it into a nightly fight. There are practical things that help — changing position, changing flavour, an electric brush, or having the technique demonstrated on your own child's teeth. Victorian Dental Group, 291 Wattletree Road, Malvern East VIC 3145 — (03) 9088 5808, Monday to Friday 8:00am to 5:00pm.