Optimal Child-rearing debate

Great Debates
41

There are so many good posts above. The ideas I think are the most important from personal experience and seeing other familes:

Talk to children in adult language but also don’t talk once in a while. Let the kid enjoy some peace once in a while. Also if you’re always talking they’ll stop hearing you.

Let them play by themselves. You can be in the same room doing laundry or reading but it’s sad when a kid doesn’t know how to entertain himself.

Read to them at least once a day and just as important let them see you reading often.

Don’t let them ever get away with anything when they’re young. Even if there’s no punishment for something mild make sure that they know that you know what they did. Always be calm and don’t let them see if they’re making you crazy. Just mention it in as short a way as possible. For example:

Me: did you use my computer last night?
Kid: Yaaaaaaaa???
Me: What were you looking up?
Kid: uuuuuuuuu
Me: were you Googling “adult sex porn”?
Kid: silence, extreme embarrassment

Make them join one individual sport before they’re old enough to think about whether or not they really want to.

Save yelling for extreme situations.

As they get older adjust your way of interacting so that when they’re teens and almost adults you’re not talking to them and bossing them around like they’re still toddlers.

If you’re kids are halfway smart they’ll probably breeze through grade school and end up in later high school not knowing how to study because they never had to. I’m not sure what to do to fix that. Just be prepared for it.

Never say that you can’t buy something that they ask for because it’s too expensive or you can’t afford it. They’ll think that the only reason not to buy something is lack of money and grow up spending everything on impulse purchases. Instead have reasons that show more thought.

Don’t let them take advantage of you.

Have a sense of humor.

42

My mother says the biggest mistake she made raising three daughters was she seldom told us that we were “pretty.” She didn’t want us to have a self image as being “pretty” and she thinks that negatively impacted our self esteem.

I think she’s wrong. I knew my mother thought I was pretty - I knew the outside world thought I was “weird” and that outranked any perky nose or bright eyes. Perhaps the mistake she made was not telling me how important “pretty” was going to be in the outside world - and how outsiders would be turned off by eccentric - but I don’t think thats a level of reflection my mother has.

43

I didn’t read the whole thread, so maybe someone already covered this…

There is a lot of evidence that our general shift away from unstructured play is very detrimental to childhood development. Firstly, Children need to learn how to set rules themselves and in negotiations with their peers. This is a skill they will need later in life. Secondly (and this seems counter-intuitive), unstructured play seems to be necessary for very young children to learn self-regulative behavior (ie, self control). Children who do not participate in unstructured play are developmentally delayed in this aspect, and (here’s the important part) the degree to which young children (5, 6 and 7 years olds) have learned self-regulatory behavior is a better predictor of success later in life even than IQ is.

Unstructured doesn’t need to be unsupervised, but we seem to be loading our children’s lives with sports and other structured activities to the exclusion of just letting them “play”. Now, there is certainly a time and place for sports and band and those types of activities, especially as children grow older, but if they don’t develop self-regulative skills early in life, then they are at a big disadvantage when the are older and have to be able to deal with delayed gratification and future planning.

44

I really think that people generally get too anal about theories and best-practices re child rearing.

For thousands of generations before us, kids have been born and reared and have survived without ‘theories’ about how they should have been born and reared.

My humble opinion now is that there is no optimal anything. Feed your kid, talk to it often and involve it in the day-to-day activities of the household.

Voila!! Kid who can make his way in the world come adulthood!! Simple!!

:stuck_out_tongue:

45

Agreed. That’s about as specific as you can get, given the variable nature of human beings. What works for one child won’t work for another, but I’m sure you already know this blinkingblinking. As you wanted debate I’ll give you this: ideally, toddlers should not be punished in any way at any time. No hitting. No “naughty chair”. No yelling. This is not as easy as it seems because a lot of what is popularly called “discipline” is actually punishment. Examples:

(punishment)
Parent: I need you to put your books away now.
Toddler: No.
Parent: If you don’t put them away you’ll get a spanking.
Toddler: No put books away.
Parent: Spanks child.
Toddler: WHAAAAA (books still on floor).

(punishment disguised as discipline)
Parent: I need you to put your books away now.
Toddler: No.
Parent: I’ll be happy to help you - let’s do it together.
Toddler: No put books away.
Parent: If you don’t put them away you won’t get a story at bedtime.
Toddler: WHAAAAA (books still on floor).
Parent: When I ask you to do something I expect it to be done. You’ve made your choice so I’m afraid there will be no story tonight.

(discipline)
Parent: I need you to put your books away now.
Toddler: No.
Parent: I’ll be happy to help you - let’s do it together.
Toddler: No put books away.
Parent: When I ask you to do something I expect it to be done. (Takes child’s hands and helps child to put the books away.)
Toddler: WHAAAAA (books put away).
Parent: Next time when I ask you to do something I expect you to do it straight away. Then I won’t have to help you.

The other absolute is that children should be made aware from a very early age that everybody is different, and those differences are to be completely accepted. Everybody has lots of great things about them and some things that are not so great, but those things can be worked on.

46

I’m sort of a Stephen Pinker groupie, and he’s written an interesting book called The Blank Slate. In it, he argues among other things that, as long as you raise your kid within certain general middle-class ideals (not beating your kid, not parking them forever in front of a TV, etc.), how you raise your kid will have very little impact on how they turn out as an adult. Their adult personality will be based on their genetic makeup and on their peer group, not on your specific parenting quirks. Therefore, he suggests, you should parent in a manner that allows you to have a loving, trusting relationship with your kid, not in a way designed to maximize his or her potential.

Daniel

47

Never criticize a child. Criticize their behavior. They are not stupid; they do stupid things. They are not mean; they do mean things. There is a world of difference between “You are so stupid” and “You did a really stupid thing there. Don’t do it again.”

Let children know in detail what you expect them to do. “Clean up your room” is too vague. “Put your toys in your chest and the dirty clothes in the laundry” is good.

48

I agree with the gist of this (which incidentally would be better attributed to Judith Rich Harris as laid out in The Nurture Assumption), but that begs the question: is the main goal of parenting to raise a well-adjusted adult? For me it’s not, as that’s basically a given (within the afore-mentioned constraints). Why do you clean your house? Why do you paint it when it needs painting? Is the main reason so that when you sell it in 20 years it will be in good shape? While that may be a benefit, I would guess that people mainly keep their homes clean and tidy because they enjoy it, and it’s so much easier that way. This may be a lame analogy, but parenting is the same. The goal is not so that in 20 years you can say that you did your job well. Rather, doing it right makes life easier everyday, and not just for the children. Just as it’s easier to maintain a house that is already pretty clean, it’s easier to parent when a good framework has already been set. I know my heart sinks when I wake up in the morning with a dirty kitchen (and that happens more often than I care to admit). Similarly, many parents have that sinking feeling when it’s dinner time, or bedtime, or wherever the familiar battles start. This is why effective parenting is so important. Kids may not like the battles, but it’s probably even worse for the parents, who may feel very stressed out and overwhelmed about something that should be enjoyable family time. They just need to know how to do it properly, the same way I could benefit from somebody helping me to organize my home.

49

Yes - especially for little ones.

I know what you mean, and certainly the former is much worse than the latter, but I wouldn’t even say that. Of course so much depends upon the particular circumstances, but saying “stupid” or “mean” implies intent. Chances are that the kid was not fully aware of the consequences of the action, and so may not even know what specifically to not do again. This would be a time for teaching (as opposed to lecturing). Why do you think this happened? Do you see any way to prevent this from happening again? etc.

50

Reading to kids isn’t valuable because it makes them want to read. You read to your kids to expose them to new words and let their little heads process language. A side benefit is they get a feel for how the written word should flow and, if you’re lucky, they’ll like to read, too.

My theory is that you should never talk down to kids. I was very, very aware of when adults were condescending and it seriously affected my development. I wouldn’t talk to girls, lest I hear “is that your little girlfriend”?" followed by knowing winks and nudges amongst the adults about how damned “precocious” I was.

They’re kids, but they’re people.

51

There’s a Margaret Atwood quote I really like; it goes something like: “Little girls are not little to each other; to each other, they are life-sized.”

Bluemood, both your points are excellent: the source is originally Judith Rich Harris, only I haven’t read her book and I’ve read Pinkers, so I talked about Pinker instead. Good call! Also, short-term benefits of childrearing are, as you point out, very significant. Making life easier for both parent and child is a good goal.

That said, things like deliberately exposing your kids to a wide vocabulary does not strike me as especially helpful. In other of Pinker’s books, he compares it to a culture in which parents deliberately teach their babies how to sit up, something we don’t do here because we realize that kids will learn that on their own without our help. A kid won’t learn language in a language-free environment, but as long as it’s spoken around the tyke, that’s sufficient for language acquisition. You don’t need to make any special effort to get the kid to do what the kid’s going to do anyway.

Daniel

52

That’s a good point, and is one of the reasons that I only listed two absolutes before (no punishment for toddlers, and teaching respect, acceptance, and understanding of differences). It’s not something I go around preaching in case it gets misconstrued, but any necessary acquirable skills will at some point be acquired (assuming “normal” kids and parents), whether it’s reading, toileting, getting dressed, or whatever. That’s not to say that guidance shouldn’t be given in these areas, but rather to recognize that some parents may see large vocabularies as an early goal to strive for, other parents may think it’s more important to be good at sports, and still others that social skills are what really matters. It may be tempting to say that one of these things is more important than the others, but in doing so we risk imposing our cultural and personal values onto somebody.

53

I think this is good, though it seems most appropriate for older children who have a better handle on language and can therefore verbally express their emotions better. Asking a toddler why something happened or why they did something can be very difficult and potentially even confusing to the kid - in many cases, they won’t have an answer or may not be able to articulate it, which can add to the frustration that maybe caused the behavior in the first place. With toddlers, I’d recommend telling them what they did, why it wasn’t a good idea and then provide a directly-related consequence.

In other words, “You hurt me when you threw that block at me, so I’m going to put them away for a little while. You’ll get them back, and when you do, let’s try not to throw them - that’s how you get to keep them.” Or something like that. Little ones seem to need explicit, limited explanations rather than questions* in my experience. Also, I’ve noticed that a lot of my son’s misbehavior stems from being tired, hungry or simple attention getting. By the time he’s throwing things or doing something else he shouldn’t, asking questions will usually make him more upset. So usually I clearly identify what he did that I don’t like, why he shouldn’t do it, what we’re going to do about it, then once he’s calmed down, try to meet whatever need he’s trying to get met.

Of course, when he gets older, that’s going to change. Good grief, kids are hard. I remember when he was much littler and one day, all of a sudden, he was deliberately pushing my buttons. I couldn’t imagine how it just happened over night, much less how I’d ever keep my cool. I can’t imagine what it’ll be like when he’s too big for me to pick up.

*Edited to add that I think you should ask them questions, but usually when they’re calm.

54

Yes of course. The context must not have been clear - my statement was in response to Annie-Xmas’ post, where she pointed out that one should not call a child “stupid” or “mean”, but rather say that it was the action that was “stupid” or “mean”. She was obviously not talking about a toddler, but an older child.

It’s the same with my son. The problem is that if he’s tired or hungry (and therefore grumpy) there’s a good chance that I will be too. Good thing I have a lot of patience!

55

I don’t think there can ever be a set of rules for raising children because they are so different in attitudes and emotion. I suggest you read to him and bring a lot of variety into his life as he grows up. Classical music is good while they are young, good literature and poetry. But the most important thing is love, and plenty of it. Spending time with him and letting him make mistakes. There is a fine balance between over-protection and running wild. Try to find it.

56

Developing a large vocabulary (mostly through books, I admit) has been useful for me - it helped me score higher on tests, which makes adults happy and acts as the social lubricant between the generations. It helped me communicate my desires, needs and thoughts more effectively with those older than I, which in turn meant I could enjoy more complex and fulfilling relationships with adults than my peers did. It’s gained me the type of respect and interactions I find pleasurable here on this message board.

That being said, I don’t think books are *required *for vocabulary building, especially if you’re the kid of a large-vocabulary parent. Like I said before, my son didn’t read as a little kid, but he’s always had a large vocabulary simply because I use lots of different words around him and I’ve always taken the time to explain and then continue using new words with him, instead of dumbing down my talk to “a kid’s level”.

57

That’s not why we don’t emphasize sitting up at all. We don’t emphasize sitting up because we don’t care about it and we have no need to care about it unless it does not happen on its own.

Cultures in which it is not necessary to individuate and be independent – to assert one’s individual will – in early childhood will tend not to emphasize language and making choices as early as we do. They have no need to care about those things unless they don’t happen on their own, so they don’t work at them.

58

I think you’re really mistaken about this.

Women get vicious about child-rearing practices. Hyper-vigilant, hyper-critical, just eighteen kinds of rude with judgments towards strangers. The online debates, oy! Cloth diaper rants that go on and on and on.

Don’t even say “breastfeeding” in a roomful of new mothers.

And it’s not restricted to American (or Western) women – one of the popular magazines ran a piece a while back on mothering practices around the world. There’s one tribe somewhere that gives their newborns colonics. Others feed them things we would consider strange. And there’s the whole issue of female circumcision (or circumcision in general, actually).

I don’t think we invented this passion for finding the “right” way to raise kids. It’s all about teaching our offspring how to survive. Tribal pressures are huge, that’s how we ensure that our group will continue.

That’s why I laughed at the question - usually our parents and other relatives are the first source of influence. And rightly so, because that’s our immediate “tribe”.

The question is as old as society - “What’s the ‘best’ way to raise a kid?” We talk about “optimizing their development” today, because that’s our particular cultural bias right now. We believe that if their “true” potential can be realized, that will give them the best life.

A few generations ago, it would have been about teaching girls how to catch a husband, how to adopt the pose that society expected of them.

A few generations before that, it would’ve been all about obeying God’s laws.

In reality, there’s no way of training them in the present to inhabit the future; but, hey, we gotta give it our best shot anyway.

59

Hmm? I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying–or perhaps you don’t understand my point.

My point is that sitting up, like learning to speak, are both activities that most children will learn without specific teaching from adults. You no more need to teach a kid to speak than you need to teach a kid to sit up. IIRC, teaching a kid to speak does not have longterm effects on the kid’s linguistic ability, either: while in the short term they may have a bigger vocabulary than their peers, in the long term, other factors will determine the kid’s vocabulary, factors other than what Baby Genius videos or the like that they saw as infants.

Daniel

60

Ooh, we may have the makin’s of a debate yet! :wink:

I’m a little confused by what YOU mean about “teaching a kid to speak”, nor do I know anyone who’s tried. Like sitting, there’s nothing you can do to make them speak (verbally) any earlier. We’ve all babbled to our pre-verbal baby, “say Mama! Come on, you can do it, say Mama!” but we don’t really expect them to say it, do we? We’re just keeping ourselves entertained. Baby Genius videos are entertaining, and may (or may not) get them attracted to music and learn colors or shapes, but I don’t think they claim to hasten language acquisition, do they? Their focus seems to be on music, not language.

I’ve had two kids now, and use pretty much the same technique to “teach” them to speak: talk to them. When they start using words of their own, I don’t offensively correct their errors, but I model back correct usage in as natural a way as possible:

“Gog!”
“Yes, that’s a dog!”

And then I add on more words for educatin’:

“Do you see his tail wagging? Back and forth, back and forth - tail wagging means he’s happy!”

The kid’s just learned three fairly advanced vocabulary words: wagging, *back *and forth. He’s also learned something about interpreting the body language of a dog, which will come in handy when he’s a little older and able to approach dogs on his own. Finally, he’s learned (learning) about the proper construction and intonation of questions vs. statements - grammar rules.

I understand your author’s point about peers being a very strong influence in how a child “turns out”: behavior, study skills, hobbies, etc. are certainly determined more by peers than parents after elementary school. But seeing as most little kids already have language acquisition before they have peers (preschool starts at 3 or 4 even in our early childhood education happy city), I think it’s overusing his premise to attach it to language and vocabulary. Even if my son were to start using “fo-shizzle” in imitation of his classmates, he wouldn’t lose the word “certainly” from his vocabulary.

Actually, if his vocabulary is limited by his peers, that makes it MORE urgent that I increase it at home, since it’s not his peers (initially) that will be hiring him, and I need to prepare him for an early adulthood of interacting with the generation older than he, not his peer group.