1. Mind your own business.
Ex. 1: Child doesn't want to play soccer/read classic English novel/learn piano/do the thing his parents wish they had done and have now decided to inflict on child. Solution? Parent, mind your own business.
Ex. 2: Child: "Mom, (insert sibling name here)
2. Get off your butt.
Ex. 1: Child is doing some annoying thing and won't stop when parent says, "Stop doing that annoying thing!" Solution? Get off your butt. Armchair parents, like armchair quarterbacks, never go to the Super Bowl.
Ex. 2: Child yells, "Will you get me some milk?" Solution? Is child sick or injured or 14 months old? Then child needs to get off his butt. Same answer applies for "Mom, I'm hungry," "Mom, I'm cold," "Mom, I can't find my shoes," and "Mom, I spilled water all over the bathroom floor."
3. Suck it up.
Ex. 1: Parent: "My child is intense/sensitive/introverted/extroverted/stubborn/slow to warm up/whatever other temperamental trait annoys you." Solution? Suck it up. You get what you get. Stop whining about it, stop "putting the I wish above the It is," and suck it up.
Ex. 2: Parent is afraid little Johnny may be forever scarred by mom having a life away from Johnny, by finding out that he isn't the smartest or funniest or fastest, by not winning a trophy, by not getting all the things he wanted for Christmas, or by hearing "no." Solution? Johnny will have to suck it up.
I really think that these rules might be the fundamental ones for all human interaction, but so far, I have only applied them to parenting. I'm pretty sure they would work just as well in romance, friendship, and the workplace.
6 comments:
In general, you're right, but consider the following exceptions:
For 1 -- is this something the child REALLY NEEDS and hasn't recognized? Extracurriculars are optional; learning to read isn't. Likewise, you shouldn't force your kid to play baseball because you like it, but you SHOULD require your kid to have SOME organized form of exercise.
For 2 -- the problem I've seen most often hasn't been people sitting on their butt, but doing too much when they do. Overreaction by parents can be traumatizing and as bad a parenting action as not getting off your butt in the first place.
Additionally -- telling X to get off his/her butt does not absolve you of the responsibility to get off your own.
For 3 -- while the first two, with appropriate guardrails, are things anyone can learn... people quite often have emotional hangups that make it really difficult to learn to suck certain things up. Even if they know that's the answer, they still may not be able to implement it for years on end.
Why should a kid have "some organized form of exercise"?!? What's wrong with running around the neighborhood, playing pick-up games and going on adventures? I had far more fun doing that as a kid than I did in ballet lessons. (Thankfully, I did far more of the former than the latter.)
If anything, organized sports (or "exercise") should be for young adults and adults, not children.
I can see that some kids have a need for regular physical exercise--I've got one of those models myself. He does an organized athletic activity, but if he wanted to drop it, that'd be fine with me.
I have talked with him about this need that he has, and am helping him recognize the symptoms of this need not being met. I help him get exercise by going on daily walks. My husband plays rough with him. And he runs around like a crazy person outside (and in) all on his own.
I don't think the key is to require "organized" activity. Rather, help the child learn about his body and physical needs, and suggest ways/give choices for him to fulfill this need. Support him in his choices, remind him when he forgets, but as much as possible, let the decision be up to him.
Allen,
In my enormous experience of 1 child, kids learn to read if you are a reader. I never had to make her learn to read. I followed #1 and #2, both minding my own business about her reading and getting off my butt and attending to my own. I think that because she sees that I enjoy it and that I find it useful, she eventually wanted to learn (just recently at 6).
Same for organized sports, if it is so danged important, then the parents should be doing it, modeling for the kids how great it is, instead of handing down rules about how the kids have to do it.
And for sucking it up, I think emotional hang ups apply. If you have emotional hangups, then sucking it up might mean accepting the hang ups you've got and doing your best. Suck it up is basically accepting the things that are outside your control, hangups and all, and not letting wishes about what things SHOULD be in your control rule your actions.
And you know, though I do think these rules are good rules of thumb, that this post was kind of tongue in cheek, right?
@Diana: What's wrong with running around the neighborhood, playing pick-up games and going on adventures?
Nothing. I heartily endorse the whole idea. My advocacy of organized exercise, in addition to ensuring a minimum level of physical activity, is the benefits of self-discipline (that's SELF-discipline, not parent-imposed) and social interaction that they provide. The last in particular is one that can prove difficult in homeschooling.
@Kelly: Same for organized sports, if it is so danged important, then the parents should be doing it, modeling for the kids how great it is, instead of handing down rules about how the kids have to do it.
Also agreed.
And you know, though I do think these rules are good rules of thumb, that this post was kind of tongue in cheek, right?
I considered it ha ha only serious.
As for socialization and homeschooling, two points.
1. The only homeschoolers that don't do social stuff are crazy, lock-em in the basement, weirdos, and I have never met one, only read about them in tell all articles. Most homeschoolers do lots of social things - from coops, to sports, to playgroups, to church, to neighborhood friendships.
2. The kind of socialization most people get in organized sports or other age segregated and alult dominated activities is a kind that I am very suspicious of. Where in the adult world do we separate people based on super narrow age ranges? I think the kind of socialization that homeschoolers often get (segregated by shared interests instead of by age) is much more realistic.
Thanks for your comments, Allen. I am both excited and weirded out a little that people from back in the day are reading my blog. :)
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