THE great potty debate is upon us.

Pediatric experts are duking it out: Should your tot take to the pot when you, the parent, think the time is right? Or should he keep to his own gastrointestinal schedule, even if it takes until kindergarten?

The age of toilet training, sages say, has been creeping up. What once was a ritual rite of passage for turning 2 is now generally seen as occurring too soon. Now, 30 months is more the norm.

The two main opponents in the battle are Harvard’s T. Berry Brazelton, the spiritual heir to the school of "flexible" parenting pioneered by Benjamin Spock, and Bruce Filmer, a Philadelphia professor. Brazelton warns parents not to train kids before they’re ready. Filmer says that, within reason, kids are ready when you are.

Filmer thinks late training signals discipline problems for parents who cater to their kids like servants. He also charges Brazelton, a spokesman for Pampers, with having a vested interest in the laissez-faire diaper doctrine.

While Brazelton counsels patience, Filmer’s strategy is called "naked and $75." He advises that parents spend a couple of days allowing their 2-year-olds to wander in the altogether, gently waiting until the inevitable happens and then leading the way to the bathroom. (The $75 is for carpet cleaning).

Both methods would probably work, but there’s a third option: Mine.

This system boasts no research and no expert advice. But it’s worked many times, taking advantage of character traits virtually all 2-year-olds have in common. You won’t need any of those newfangled potty chairs from Sweden that cost more than the full-sized porcelain models. In fact, the one helpful piece of equipment is not essential, and even it costs only $15.

If your children are like mine, they consider a bathroom door a permeable membrane. My trying to take a rest stop in privacy always resulted in the kind of howls that could prompt a 911 call. Thus, for many years, I learned to carry out private functions before an audience of short people. By the age of 2, therefore, they knew the mechanics of what a toilet is for.

Around that time, I drew the secret weapon: Gently, mournfully, I would say, "You know, this thing Dad and I do, you can’t do this."

Anyone who has ever raised a child knows that these are fighting words. Limiting toddlers’ behavior in any way is the equivalent of throwing down the gauntlet. Whatever it is you don’t want them to do, they want to do – over and over.

Thus, when you kindly (ever so kindly) forbid them to use the toilet like a grown-up, their toddler code of honor gives them only one choice.

Of course, we had to lift one of our sons to reach the utility, but our youngest child was so determined that she learned to use the toilet seat as a side-horse, vaulting herself up facing backward and holding on for dear life. At a relapse, all I had to do was suggest gently, "It’s OK if you want to go back to using diapers . . . "

Oh, yes. That other piece of equipment? It’s a CD.

Toddlers like teddy bears and juice, but nothing pleases them more than really irritating music. By accident, I came upon Potty Animal, a record by a friend of mine, Kathi Goldmark, who runs a company called Don’t Quit Your Day Job Records (P.O. Box 27901-120, San Francisco, Calif. 94127).

Kathi says she became the lead singer on the disc, which features such anti-diaper ditties as Don’t Pamper Me and Everything’s Gonna Come Out Just Fine, by process of elimination. That explanation is just about the level of sophistication of the whole collection, which is so irritating it makes Raffi sound like Pavarotti. (This is evidently a Goldmark family trait; Kathi’s adolescent son recently recorded a disc called Don’t Bug Me, songs "guaranteed to annoy your parents.")

Some parents clap and smile when their children learn to use the toilet. As our reward, we slapped on Potty Animal, which our children worship, having worn out two CDs (and our tolerance) in a single year.

Doctors, all this spatting is juvenile. Advise your patients of the forbid-now-dance-later strategy. And you can call me in the morning.