Posted on 01/03/2004 6:50:17 PM PST by Holly_P
Is the parenting culture poised to come to its collective senses in the new year? Well, probably not. But at least common sense is getting some attention in some quarters.
In the article "Are You a Parent or a Pushover?" in the January issue of Parents magazine, author Kellye Carter Crocker reported on a Parents survey that showed most mothers expressing "deep concern over today's discipline methods."
For starters, 88 percent said parents "let children get away with too much."
Magazine surveys may be notoriously inaccurate, but still this reveals some level of angst over how kids are being raised.
As Crocker wrote, parents may be "sensing what mounting evidence is starting to reveal: Some of the discipline strategies that have been in vogue in recent years just aren't working."
"Elaborate systems that give kids multiple chances, prolonged discussions about the 'feelings' behind bad behavior, negotiations about consequences and so on are often ineffective."
Well, excuse me, but, um, "duh."
Time magazine, in its Dec. 15 edition, ran a compelling piece titled, "Does Kindergarten Need Cops?" It was subtitled, tellingly, "The Youngest School Kids are Acting Out in Really Outrageous Ways. Why?"
As the authors, led by Claudia Wallis, put it, "Temper tantrums are nothing new in kindergarten and first grade, but the behavior of one little 6-year-old in Fort Worth, Texas, had even the most experienced staff members running for cover."
"Asked to put a toy away, the youngster began to scream. Told to calm down, she knocked over her desk and crawled under the teacher's desk, kicking it and dumping out the contents of the drawers. Then … she began hurling books at her terrified classmates, who had to be ushered from the room to safety."
A child with "oppositional defiant disorder"? Well, no. As Time revealed, this kind of outrageous behavior is escalating dramatically among so-called normal, healthy, middle-class kids, like this one.
Time reported the child-advocacy group Partnership for Children just completed a survey of child care centers, elementary schools and pediatricians throughout the Fort Worth area.
It showed 93 percent of 39 schools responding said kindergartners today "have more emotional and behavioral problems than were seen just five years ago." A majority of day-care centers, which host the tiniest tots, revealed that "incidents of rage and anger" have increased over the past three years.
Ronald Stephens, director of the National School Safety Center in Westlake Village, Calif., said this is true across the country. He told Time, "Violence is getting younger and younger."
Time cited such problems as "economic stress," though youngsters have lived through far more stressful times without 3-year-olds stabbing classmates with forks, as the authors describe one tyke doing.
Time suggested there may be too much time in child care, a politically incorrect but at least sane observation, and the authors looked to academic pressure, though it's helpful to note that's waxed and waned for a century.
The authors largely blamed violence in the media. Well, OK. But then why do many kids who see the same images not act this way, and how is it then that adult criminal activity has been on a significant downward spiral for years?
What the Time authors didn't do is give anything more than a glancing nod to parents and how they raise their kids.
Talk about a root cause.
As Ronald Simons, a sociologist at the University of Georgia in Athens, told Parents: "Without structure, children become self-absorbed, selfish and unhappy - and they make everyone around them miserable, too."
He cited studies that show kids raised by authoritative parents, meaning loving moms and dads who set firm limits and stick to them, "excel academically, develop better social skills, feel good about themselves and are happier overall" than peers raised by lax or excessively harsh parents.
Interestingly, Simons echoed other research that finds the longer the child behaves poorly the more permissive parents become, setting in place a terrible cycle that ends - who knows where? With a healthy 6-year-old attacking her teacher?
I call it a modern-day commitment to the "cult of the always-contented child." We parents are committed to our own pleasure and to the constant pleasure of our kids, too.
We worry they won't like us if we give them anything less. Tragically, we don't worry about the consequences of sending them down such a self-destructive path.
In more technical terms, Simons told Parents, "There's an (unfortunate) fear that it's traumatic for a child to be disciplined and to hear 'no' too often."
Ah, a slim ray of common-sense advice on parenting. 2004 may already be looking up.
Jax has been making noises about wanting a brother or sister - sometimes both! I was old when I had her........I'm too old to do it again!
I give you and the rest of the homeschooling parents a great deal of credit. I am not disciplined enough, nor do I feel capable enough, to do anything more than what I have already done and am doing. But I guess we're doing something right - the teachers are thrilled with her progress.
Now if we could get her to understand that she can't talk all the time.............(I wonder where she gets that from?)
I do the same thing. It doesn't happen too often, but I have noticed that when it does occur, regardless of what type of store we are in, it is usually late in the day and she is either tired or bored with having done too many grown-up things and no fun stuff.
It only happened once in a restaurant and then never again - she likes restaurants. Before I had a child I had no use for unruly kids in restaurants (McDonald's is a different story) and I will danged if I will subject other diners to something I never liked just because it is "my child."
Good point. My concern would be that it isn't the being alone, as such, that is a punishment.
Right. Spanking is reserved for defiance, which my son is struggling with at this time. However, I'm winning the battle....and I will always win. LOL
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