Blow to let go!
I have heard other parents mention that their children do not like going to the toilet and will “hold on to it” rather than do it whilst sitting on the loo. A great tip that we learned is to make sure your child is seated comfortably with their feet resting on a step then give them a whistle to blow. Any blowing instrument will do, we even invested in a saxophone! When pushing out of one end it is actually extremely difficult for a child to hold anything in the other end. You may even end up with a budding musician into the bargain!

Getting them to sit on the toilet
I used a magic toy box!  I selected some new washable toys from gimmick shops and normal toy stores.  My son was ONLY allowed to play with them when he was sitting on the toilet.  There was no pressure in that he didn’t need to produce anything; he just had to sit there.  For the first time he actually wanted to sit there.  The important thing to remember is that the ‘magic’ is in the fact that they do not play with these toys in any other situation or else they lose interest in them.  I used items like washable bath books and colourful slinkys as well as sensory squeezy balls that light up.  In fact anything that could be washed.  I spent about £25, which to me was well worth it, but in retrospect, I could have borrowed some old sensory toys off friends which would have been new to him.

Give the boys something to aim for
My son is easily distracted and by giving him a target to aim for made concentrating on what he was doing much more interesting for him.  Ping Pong balls work, but as they need to be fished out eventually (and preferably not by your child who thinks they’ve found a new toy!), we opted for the cereal Cheerio’s which flushes away.