For the next several midweek posts I am going to look at issues that arise in children because of the helicoptering style of parenting. I could also have called this the effects of helicopter regulations because both cause the same effects. This week we will look at the problem of these children having no real sense of danger.
Danger: A Part of Childhood
Up until the recent past, instilling a good healthy sense of danger in children was one of the only ways to help those children see adulthood. When I was a child, my parents understood that childhood was a dangerous time, and I had to get with the program as young as possible. I raised my own children in this way. However, now the name of the game is to shield children from every possible scenario where they might get the least bit hurt because childhood should be all rainbows and unicorns.
Now do not get me wrong, some of the play equipment I played on as a child was probably unsafe. The slides were metal and tall. We did not have fall zones with pea gravel or wood chips, etc. We had grass and sometimes concrete under our play equipment. However, we had a healthy sense of danger whereas children today do not really. I knew that if I fell off that slide it would hurt and probably break something. If we took risks, we understood they were risks. Yes, we were daring, but we had a better understanding of our limits because we had been allowed to experience hurts. Therein is the problem with today's children. They have no concept of their own limits.
Learning Limits
When we shield children from experiencing the bumps and bruises of childhood, we deprive them of a very big part of their development - learning limits. When a child falls off the chair, that child learns about gravity and that climbing on a chair can be risky. The scenarios for this are endless. Whether we like to admit or not, a child learns more from a negative consequence than they will ever learn from a positive experience. I read an article recently that dealt with this very concept. Did you know that our brains are hardwired to experience negative situations differently than positive situations. The negative situations register in a different part of the brain and go straight to long-term memory. That is called the negativity bias and most of the time it is painted as a bad thing. However, in this article it showed how in times past this negativity bias ensured survival. We had to remember the negative experiences in order to avoid doing it again. Guess what? We still need that.
We cannot shield children from negative experiences and have those children grow up to be functioning adults. Children do not learn limits from positive experiences - ever. It just does not work that way. Children learn limits by pushing those limits until they find the point of hurt. Then they back off. They have to be free to explore this on their own. Parents, I am afraid you cannot just tell them where those points occur. It will have no relevance to them unless they have had experience with it themselves. They must experience negative consequences. It has actually been documented that children today are experiencing more injuries per capita than they did even 10 to 20 years ago. Most of the studies I have seen on this subject agree that children today have developed a false sense of security due to not having enough exposure to natural consequences.
Natural Consequences
How do we rectify this? Back off parents. Back off regulations. We cannot plan for every contingency to make sure that children experience a pain-free childhood nor should we. We have to let them take their lumps just like we had to take our lumps. It is called natural consequences, and we should never shield children from them. Otherwise, they will not learn about gravity. They will also not have a working knowledge of their own limitations. We can plan for worst-case scenario, but these days parents freak out when their child gets a bruise or a skinned knee. Good grief, people. It will be okay.
We have actually made childhood more dangerous by trying to usher in the utopia of childhood. Remember it is documented that our children are experiencing more injuries than previous generations and believe me, these children are not more daring than those previous generations. We have taken something out of the equation we never should have touched. Actually, we have believed a lie that has been pushed by every single movement for a utopic experience. We never learn from history. Every time we try to bring utopia on Earth, we end up with a dystopic situation. It is always because we go too far and remove core pieces of our existence in order to bring it to fruition. We need to learn to accept the "good enough." In childhood, that means we need to let the bumps and bruises be. They serve a very important purpose. To remove them as we have tried to do, has brought about bad results.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!!
Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Saturday, September 13, 2014
Language Development for 3 to 4 year olds - Communication (Part 3)
This post will continue the discussion of language development for 3 to 4 year olds. We are still discussing the communication area of learning. We will now switch gears to the component - Expressive Language. Remember I am taking my information from the Tennessee Early Learning Developmental Standards (TN-ELDS).
The learning expectation for this component is: Uses language for a variety of purposes. The first performance indicator is: Tells familiar stories. Unless a child is lagging in language development, most children actually conquer this one by 4 years old. Children that have been read to frequently will conquer this one closer to 3 years old. Children that have hardly been read to will not conquer this performance indicator because they do not have a repertoire of familiar stories from which to pull. It is imperative that we read to children. That one activity touches so many different aspects of development. It cannot be overdone.
The next performance indicator is: Likes to make up stories; likes silly words and stories. Some children conquer this one before 4 years old and some do not. This one is also tied to how much a child has had an adult read to him/her. It is also linked heavily to the amount of imaginative play in which the child participates. We as childcare providers are seeing many children struggle with imaginative play because they are not getting the opportunity for free play as much as children used to get. Making up stories comes directly from the right brain and free play is vital for the development of the right brain. Also, a child's sense of humor develops at a pace with the child's language development. If the language development is lagging so will the sense of humor. I have activities in my childcare that directly build creative thinking skills. I call them creative writing activities because we make up stories together. This activity has greatly increased the children's imaginative play, which was lagging. All of these skills are so interrelated. Take away one and so many others are affected.
Next on our list is: Knows and tells names and sex of family members. Again, this performance indicator is conquered by most children by age 4. Unless a child has a very complicated family, which I have seen, this one does not present a problem. If a child does not have this one conquered by age 4 (unless a very complicated family situation does exist), I would definitely have that child tested for developmental delays.
The next performance indicator is: Engages in imaginary talk; plays both roles. In recent years I have seen fewer and fewer children able to really participate in imaginative play until they were nearly 5 years old. To be truthful, I have not seen very many 3 year olds able to carry on an imaginative conversation where they played both roles. A great deal of the time, I am teaching 3 and 4 year olds to actually play and not just dump and destroy. This level of imaginative play is beyond many of them. We have helicopter parented imaginative play right out the door. We, the adults, need to back off and let the children explore and play without us being all up in their business. It is called free play, people.
The last performance indicator on our list is: Asks many questions; wants to know how answers fit into her own thoughts and understanding. With the demise of the imaginative play has also come the decline of inquisitiveness. I really am not seeing 3 year olds ask a lot of questions. I am seeing 4 year olds ask questions, but not 3 year olds. These standards were created in the early 2000s. We have seen such a rapid decline in these types of skills in the decade following the creation of these standards that it is scary. What are we doing to our children? Actually what we are seeing is the results of second generation helicopter parenting. The parents of these children were helicopter parented and now we have nearly outlawed what I consider childhood. My childhood experience would probably send my parents to jail these days. I roamed for miles unsupervised until the streetlights came on for the night. I played on equipment that would have people arrested these days. I did things and had experiences so foreign to modern children, but we had imagination coming out of our ears. Something precious has been lost in our quest for the perfect childhood, and it is childhood.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!!
Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Dealing with Children that are Hyper-Sensitive
This post will deal with increasing children's emotional intelligence and teaching them to deal with negative circumstances without coming completely unglued. More specifically we will discuss those children that take everything personally to the point they cannot function in a group setting.
The Hyper-Sensitive
We all know this scenario all too well. A statement is made by either a child or an adult, and a hyper-sensitive child takes offense. Or everyone laughs at something that happens and the hyper-sensitive child falls to pieces because he/she feels that everyone is laughing at him/her. Actually I know adults with the same problem and you probably do, too. We all know those people that require you to walk on eggshells around them because they have no capacity for dealing with negative or embarrassing situations.
Unlike a lot of other character issues I have covered, this one is actually mostly genetic. It can be greatly aggravated by environmental factors, but these people come into the world hardwired with this hyper-sensitivity. This explains why this trait runs in families. This also explains why this one can be so hard to correct because it involves an underlying characteristic of a person's personality. I do not know if some chemical imbalance or other related cause occurs in their brains, but I do know that they have a difficult time with all aspects of what we now call emotional intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence
What do I mean by emotional intelligence? Academic intelligence is not the only type of intelligence we humans possess. We all know people that are not necessarily book smart but are people smart. They understand the inward workings of relationships much better than others. We would call these people emotionally intelligent. They understand how to handle complicated situations that call for handling emotions. Let me give you an example. Some of us find it difficult to deliver bad news to other people. Yet, we all know those people that can give bad news in such a way that the person still feels good about the situation. I do not have this capacity and sit in awe of such people. Just like some people come into this world better equipped for academic endeavors, other people come into this world better equipped for emotional situations. The opposite is also true. However, we all know we can increase our academic intelligence with hard work and persistence. The same is true of emotional intelligence.
Hyper-sensitive children come into this world with very little natural coping skills for certain situations, and those situations can vary from person to person. Some cannot handle embarrassment. Some cannot handle any type of criticism. Some cannot handle people not liking them. Some have all or a combination of the above. Adults with these issues may require counseling and/or life coaching to improve, but we that take care of children are in the unique position to really help these children learn to manage what does not come naturally.
No Coddling
Before we get to strategies, I want to cover what not to do. First and foremost, do not coddle these children. Sheltering them from these types of situations will only leave them emotionally immature. This is why we have adults with these types of problems. No one helped these children work through their issues. People usually do not outgrow these types of issues. They have to learn sometime in their life to work through them. Let me put it this way. If you shelter and overprotect, you are being an enabler in a situation that desperately cries for change. On the other hand, these children do not have the capacity to suck up and deal with it. They honestly do not know how. Tough love without instruction is just as useless as coddling and overprotecting in this situation.
The Power of Logic
How do you deal with this situation? Mostly logically actually. A great deal of the thought processes that these children have in these situations are irrational. To deal with irrational thoughts, you teach logical thought processes. Let me give you an example. You have a child that gets upset every time people laugh because the child thinks they are laughing at him/her. When people begin to laugh and the child begins to get upset, ask the child what are they laughing at. At first the child will reply "me." However, if you continue to make the child look harder, he/she will realize the true source of the laughter, which is usually not the child at all. How many times will this be necessary before the child does this on his/her own? Thousands possibly. I did not say this would be easy or fun. Over time the child will begin to correct the irrational thought processes that contribute to the hyper-sensitivity. Let me give you another example. For this one, you have a child that crumbles at the least little criticism. Avoiding criticism throughout your entire life is not practical. Therefore, you must teach this child how to handle criticism. This must start with the child understanding everyone makes mistakes. When the child makes a mistake, this should be the first statement out of your mouth. The second statement should involve teaching the child to learn from mistakes rather than being crushed because they made mistakes. This will take the same amount of persistence as teaching a child not to be embarrassed. This is how you build emotional intelligence.
When dealing with children that seem to have very little emotional intelligence, be very observant to find the underlying irrational thought process. If you pinpoint the irrational thought process, it is much easier to understand how to help the child overcome that thought process. Sometimes we as adults have our own irrational thought processes. Guess what? Teaching ourselves to think logically about situations will help us just as much as it will help the children.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
The Hyper-Sensitive
We all know this scenario all too well. A statement is made by either a child or an adult, and a hyper-sensitive child takes offense. Or everyone laughs at something that happens and the hyper-sensitive child falls to pieces because he/she feels that everyone is laughing at him/her. Actually I know adults with the same problem and you probably do, too. We all know those people that require you to walk on eggshells around them because they have no capacity for dealing with negative or embarrassing situations.
Unlike a lot of other character issues I have covered, this one is actually mostly genetic. It can be greatly aggravated by environmental factors, but these people come into the world hardwired with this hyper-sensitivity. This explains why this trait runs in families. This also explains why this one can be so hard to correct because it involves an underlying characteristic of a person's personality. I do not know if some chemical imbalance or other related cause occurs in their brains, but I do know that they have a difficult time with all aspects of what we now call emotional intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence
What do I mean by emotional intelligence? Academic intelligence is not the only type of intelligence we humans possess. We all know people that are not necessarily book smart but are people smart. They understand the inward workings of relationships much better than others. We would call these people emotionally intelligent. They understand how to handle complicated situations that call for handling emotions. Let me give you an example. Some of us find it difficult to deliver bad news to other people. Yet, we all know those people that can give bad news in such a way that the person still feels good about the situation. I do not have this capacity and sit in awe of such people. Just like some people come into this world better equipped for academic endeavors, other people come into this world better equipped for emotional situations. The opposite is also true. However, we all know we can increase our academic intelligence with hard work and persistence. The same is true of emotional intelligence.
Hyper-sensitive children come into this world with very little natural coping skills for certain situations, and those situations can vary from person to person. Some cannot handle embarrassment. Some cannot handle any type of criticism. Some cannot handle people not liking them. Some have all or a combination of the above. Adults with these issues may require counseling and/or life coaching to improve, but we that take care of children are in the unique position to really help these children learn to manage what does not come naturally.
No Coddling
Before we get to strategies, I want to cover what not to do. First and foremost, do not coddle these children. Sheltering them from these types of situations will only leave them emotionally immature. This is why we have adults with these types of problems. No one helped these children work through their issues. People usually do not outgrow these types of issues. They have to learn sometime in their life to work through them. Let me put it this way. If you shelter and overprotect, you are being an enabler in a situation that desperately cries for change. On the other hand, these children do not have the capacity to suck up and deal with it. They honestly do not know how. Tough love without instruction is just as useless as coddling and overprotecting in this situation.
The Power of Logic
How do you deal with this situation? Mostly logically actually. A great deal of the thought processes that these children have in these situations are irrational. To deal with irrational thoughts, you teach logical thought processes. Let me give you an example. You have a child that gets upset every time people laugh because the child thinks they are laughing at him/her. When people begin to laugh and the child begins to get upset, ask the child what are they laughing at. At first the child will reply "me." However, if you continue to make the child look harder, he/she will realize the true source of the laughter, which is usually not the child at all. How many times will this be necessary before the child does this on his/her own? Thousands possibly. I did not say this would be easy or fun. Over time the child will begin to correct the irrational thought processes that contribute to the hyper-sensitivity. Let me give you another example. For this one, you have a child that crumbles at the least little criticism. Avoiding criticism throughout your entire life is not practical. Therefore, you must teach this child how to handle criticism. This must start with the child understanding everyone makes mistakes. When the child makes a mistake, this should be the first statement out of your mouth. The second statement should involve teaching the child to learn from mistakes rather than being crushed because they made mistakes. This will take the same amount of persistence as teaching a child not to be embarrassed. This is how you build emotional intelligence.
When dealing with children that seem to have very little emotional intelligence, be very observant to find the underlying irrational thought process. If you pinpoint the irrational thought process, it is much easier to understand how to help the child overcome that thought process. Sometimes we as adults have our own irrational thought processes. Guess what? Teaching ourselves to think logically about situations will help us just as much as it will help the children.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Saturday, September 6, 2014
Language Development for 3 to 4 year olds - Communication (Part 2)
This post will continue the discussion of language development for 3 to 4 year olds. The area of learning is still Communication. We will finish up the component - Receptive Language. Remember I am taking my information from the Tennessee Early Learning Developmental Standards (TN-ELDS).
In this post we will cover the learning expectation: Demonstrates understanding of conversations through own actions and responses to directions and questions. The first performance indicator for this learning expectation is: Anticipates correct response to statements made regarding familiar routines (goes and gets coat when told it's time to go outside, finds own blanket and mat when told it's nap time). This performance indicator assumes a child has regular routines. For those children that are in more structured environments, this would be a correct assumption. However, many children do not have regular routines. The downturn in the economy has actually decreased the population of young children in structured environments until those children reach PreK age. Many parents simply cannot afford to put their children in good childcares, which tend to cost to more money. Some childcares can be complete free-for-alls without much structure at all. In order to conquer this particular performance indicator, a child has to have regular routines. Many of today's parents and grandparents do not put much emphasis at all on establishing routines for small children. The children cannot anticipate what does not exist. However, once a child does enter a structured environment even if that is not until kindergarten, they will eventually conquer this particular performance indicator. This is yet another reason kindergarten teachers deserve medals of honor. Many children reach kindergarten completely unprepared.
The next performance indicator is: Knows where he lives (i.e., street name and number). This is a performance indicator from a different era. So many children today live in two or three different places during the same week. Mom has one house. Dad has another house. Grandparents may be thrown in the mix. Most children do well to know which house they will be going to on any particular day. To actually know the street address just might be asking a little much. Very few 3 to 4 year olds know their street address. Many children enter kindergarten not knowing their street address unless the school requires such knowledge in which case the parents frantically try to teach the children their address two weeks before the start of school. I do not personally worry about this particular performance indicator until the child is 6 months out from kindergarten. Some young parents move around A LOT, and if that is the case, I do not even worry about the address at that point, either.
Next on the list is: Understands colors and can identify basic colors when asked (red, yellow, blue, green, orange, purple, and others). As I have said many times before, colors must be directly taught, or they will not be learned. I have had many 4 year olds come through the door not knowing but maybe one or two colors if that many. When colors are directly taught, even 2 and 1/2 to 3 year olds will know their basic colors. What do I mean by directly taught? Teaching colors actually involves two steps. The first step is to name the colors for the child. After that has been done regularly, then you have the child name the color for you. How this is accomplished matters little as long as both steps are involved in the activity. Some early childhood teachers shy away from the second step because it feels too much like requiring rote responses. However, I know from experience that if the child is not required to respond with the correct color, some children will not pay attention to the activity. Learning the names of anything falls on the left side of the brain and requires this "rote" type of instruction.
The next performance indicator is: Understands responses to "Hi" and "How are you?" and answers appropriately. I do believe this one might be a performance indicator from another era as well. Unless a child is friendly and outgoing as a personality trait, most children these days are extremely socially awkward when it comes to these types of social graces. When you say "hi" to them, they either hide behind someone or something or completely ignore you. This continues well into their fourth year. I have to work hard to get the children to say "good morning" to me when I say it to them, and this is 4 to 5 year olds not 3 to 4 year olds.
The last performance indicator for this learning expectation is: Carries out a three-part, related direction (three levels would be "Please, would you get the can of dog food out of the refrigerator and feed the puppy?"). I will say that some children can conquer this performance indicator at this age and some absolutely cannot. I have two boys with ADHD, and if I can get them to focus long enough to actually fully carry out one direction, I have done well. If it is an established routine, they might be able to carry out a two-part direction on good days, and they are 4 and 5 years old not 3 years old. Even if you have children you suspect to be ADHD, you still should really work on this performance indicator. Being able to follow multi-part directions lays the groundwork for sequencing and other math skills. If they do not conquer three-part directions before they turn 4 years old, keep after it. They need to be able to do this in order to handle other skills in the future.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
In this post we will cover the learning expectation: Demonstrates understanding of conversations through own actions and responses to directions and questions. The first performance indicator for this learning expectation is: Anticipates correct response to statements made regarding familiar routines (goes and gets coat when told it's time to go outside, finds own blanket and mat when told it's nap time). This performance indicator assumes a child has regular routines. For those children that are in more structured environments, this would be a correct assumption. However, many children do not have regular routines. The downturn in the economy has actually decreased the population of young children in structured environments until those children reach PreK age. Many parents simply cannot afford to put their children in good childcares, which tend to cost to more money. Some childcares can be complete free-for-alls without much structure at all. In order to conquer this particular performance indicator, a child has to have regular routines. Many of today's parents and grandparents do not put much emphasis at all on establishing routines for small children. The children cannot anticipate what does not exist. However, once a child does enter a structured environment even if that is not until kindergarten, they will eventually conquer this particular performance indicator. This is yet another reason kindergarten teachers deserve medals of honor. Many children reach kindergarten completely unprepared.
The next performance indicator is: Knows where he lives (i.e., street name and number). This is a performance indicator from a different era. So many children today live in two or three different places during the same week. Mom has one house. Dad has another house. Grandparents may be thrown in the mix. Most children do well to know which house they will be going to on any particular day. To actually know the street address just might be asking a little much. Very few 3 to 4 year olds know their street address. Many children enter kindergarten not knowing their street address unless the school requires such knowledge in which case the parents frantically try to teach the children their address two weeks before the start of school. I do not personally worry about this particular performance indicator until the child is 6 months out from kindergarten. Some young parents move around A LOT, and if that is the case, I do not even worry about the address at that point, either.
Next on the list is: Understands colors and can identify basic colors when asked (red, yellow, blue, green, orange, purple, and others). As I have said many times before, colors must be directly taught, or they will not be learned. I have had many 4 year olds come through the door not knowing but maybe one or two colors if that many. When colors are directly taught, even 2 and 1/2 to 3 year olds will know their basic colors. What do I mean by directly taught? Teaching colors actually involves two steps. The first step is to name the colors for the child. After that has been done regularly, then you have the child name the color for you. How this is accomplished matters little as long as both steps are involved in the activity. Some early childhood teachers shy away from the second step because it feels too much like requiring rote responses. However, I know from experience that if the child is not required to respond with the correct color, some children will not pay attention to the activity. Learning the names of anything falls on the left side of the brain and requires this "rote" type of instruction.
The next performance indicator is: Understands responses to "Hi" and "How are you?" and answers appropriately. I do believe this one might be a performance indicator from another era as well. Unless a child is friendly and outgoing as a personality trait, most children these days are extremely socially awkward when it comes to these types of social graces. When you say "hi" to them, they either hide behind someone or something or completely ignore you. This continues well into their fourth year. I have to work hard to get the children to say "good morning" to me when I say it to them, and this is 4 to 5 year olds not 3 to 4 year olds.
The last performance indicator for this learning expectation is: Carries out a three-part, related direction (three levels would be "Please, would you get the can of dog food out of the refrigerator and feed the puppy?"). I will say that some children can conquer this performance indicator at this age and some absolutely cannot. I have two boys with ADHD, and if I can get them to focus long enough to actually fully carry out one direction, I have done well. If it is an established routine, they might be able to carry out a two-part direction on good days, and they are 4 and 5 years old not 3 years old. Even if you have children you suspect to be ADHD, you still should really work on this performance indicator. Being able to follow multi-part directions lays the groundwork for sequencing and other math skills. If they do not conquer three-part directions before they turn 4 years old, keep after it. They need to be able to do this in order to handle other skills in the future.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Wednesday, September 3, 2014
Dealing with Children that Give Up Too Easily
This post will tackle the serious lack of persistence evident in many children today. Many, many children will throw up their hands and quit at the least little resistance. This post will look at the underlying causes for this behavior and some strategies to help children develop persistence.
The Scenario
We have all seen this scenario. A child is asked to do a task that he/she does not really want to do. They attempt it for about two seconds, and then throw up their hands and begin whining about how it is too hard. There is always whining. If the adult does not immediately rescue them, the whining and complaining kicks up a notch. If the adult dares to not intervene at this point, the wailing and gnashing of teeth that ensues would make you think the child was being tortured. This particular scenario can produce some of the most intense hissy fits a child throws.
What Is to Blame?
What are the underlying causes for this behavior? Helicopter parenting. We have done this one to ourselves. Parents swoop in at the least little whimper and do nearly everything for their children. I have seen some parents not even wait for the whimper. These children have become accustomed to being waited on hand and foot. Why in the world would they do anything for themselves?
When the children enter an environment where the adults have no intention on waiting on these children hand and foot, issues galore develop. A great deal of a child's first few months in a structured setting these days has to be devoted to teaching self-help skills, and it can get ugly. For those poor souls that live in heavily regulated states, they have to walk such a fine line between teaching children self-help skills and making sure they do not cry for more than a few minutes. What should take only a couple of weeks has to be dragged out over months because the childcare provider ends up having to wait on the child hand and foot in the beginning. The implementation has to be stretched out and incremented in the smallest possible baby steps to avoid the horrible nasty hissy fits. This hinders some children from being kindergarten ready. Therefore, the first few months of kindergarten must be devoted to pulling these children up to speed instead of the actual learning the states are now requiring. I feel very sorry for kindergarten teachers these days. You are being asked to do more with children that come equipped to do less. You all deserve medals in my book.
Dealing with Helicopter Parents
This particular problem really needs to be attacked on two fronts. To simply work with the children and not deal with the underlying parenting issues will only get you so far. Every Monday you will be set back and almost have to start from scratch, which will make you feel like you are taking one step forward and two steps back. However, getting helicopter parents to change their ways presents a daunting task. You must approach this in a respectful and tactful way even though you will feel neither respectful or tactful on the inside. You will also have to have a very calculated plan of attack. Remember these children basically look at adults as large slaves. In your setting you can correct that assumption but that will not transfer to anywhere else unless the adults in that situation dethrone the tyrant as well. Therefore, this will be a constant battle you will have to wage unless you can manage to change the other scenarios at least a little.
In my childcare I always use kindergarten readiness as my weapon of choice when approaching the helicopter parents. Most helicopter parents will about 6 months out from kindergarten freak out over whether or not their precious angel will be ready for kindergarten. I make sure my parents of 3 year olds already have kindergarten in their sights. I have the self-help skills laid out in a logical succession and show the parents how the child must conquer this before we move on to this. I point out that if we do not start on this now, we will not be able to conquer X, Y, and Z before kindergarten. That usually brings even helicopter parents back to reality although I will say they will protest immensely. However, if you can get even half-hearted help with this problem, it will be better than none at all.
Developing Self-Help Skills
On the flip side of this equation is the children. For the children I expect them to do for themselves what they are capable of doing, and I refuse to do it for them regardless of the level of the hissy fit. For the first few weeks this makes for a lot of unpleasantness. With extremely stubborn children this can turn into the first few months. However long it takes, eventually even the most stubborn get with the program at least in my setting. They may try to go back to their old ways but I am one consistent puppy. Most of the time I simply have to look at them and say, "You need to remember where you are. Get busy."
Now some of you may be asking how in the world do you handle the over-the-top hissy fits this will produce? Very calmly. In the Bible it says "A gentle answer turns away wrath." When a child is throwing a massive hissy fit, you will simply and calmly keep repeating what you expect the child to do. Sometimes this may require pulling yourself from the situation and regrouping, but continue to stand your ground. Be that steady, calming influence that does not waver. Work through those hissy fits and not around them. This can be exhausting work in the beginning but it produces a wonderful harvest once you get to the other side.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
The Scenario
We have all seen this scenario. A child is asked to do a task that he/she does not really want to do. They attempt it for about two seconds, and then throw up their hands and begin whining about how it is too hard. There is always whining. If the adult does not immediately rescue them, the whining and complaining kicks up a notch. If the adult dares to not intervene at this point, the wailing and gnashing of teeth that ensues would make you think the child was being tortured. This particular scenario can produce some of the most intense hissy fits a child throws.
What Is to Blame?
What are the underlying causes for this behavior? Helicopter parenting. We have done this one to ourselves. Parents swoop in at the least little whimper and do nearly everything for their children. I have seen some parents not even wait for the whimper. These children have become accustomed to being waited on hand and foot. Why in the world would they do anything for themselves?
When the children enter an environment where the adults have no intention on waiting on these children hand and foot, issues galore develop. A great deal of a child's first few months in a structured setting these days has to be devoted to teaching self-help skills, and it can get ugly. For those poor souls that live in heavily regulated states, they have to walk such a fine line between teaching children self-help skills and making sure they do not cry for more than a few minutes. What should take only a couple of weeks has to be dragged out over months because the childcare provider ends up having to wait on the child hand and foot in the beginning. The implementation has to be stretched out and incremented in the smallest possible baby steps to avoid the horrible nasty hissy fits. This hinders some children from being kindergarten ready. Therefore, the first few months of kindergarten must be devoted to pulling these children up to speed instead of the actual learning the states are now requiring. I feel very sorry for kindergarten teachers these days. You are being asked to do more with children that come equipped to do less. You all deserve medals in my book.
Dealing with Helicopter Parents
This particular problem really needs to be attacked on two fronts. To simply work with the children and not deal with the underlying parenting issues will only get you so far. Every Monday you will be set back and almost have to start from scratch, which will make you feel like you are taking one step forward and two steps back. However, getting helicopter parents to change their ways presents a daunting task. You must approach this in a respectful and tactful way even though you will feel neither respectful or tactful on the inside. You will also have to have a very calculated plan of attack. Remember these children basically look at adults as large slaves. In your setting you can correct that assumption but that will not transfer to anywhere else unless the adults in that situation dethrone the tyrant as well. Therefore, this will be a constant battle you will have to wage unless you can manage to change the other scenarios at least a little.
In my childcare I always use kindergarten readiness as my weapon of choice when approaching the helicopter parents. Most helicopter parents will about 6 months out from kindergarten freak out over whether or not their precious angel will be ready for kindergarten. I make sure my parents of 3 year olds already have kindergarten in their sights. I have the self-help skills laid out in a logical succession and show the parents how the child must conquer this before we move on to this. I point out that if we do not start on this now, we will not be able to conquer X, Y, and Z before kindergarten. That usually brings even helicopter parents back to reality although I will say they will protest immensely. However, if you can get even half-hearted help with this problem, it will be better than none at all.
Developing Self-Help Skills
On the flip side of this equation is the children. For the children I expect them to do for themselves what they are capable of doing, and I refuse to do it for them regardless of the level of the hissy fit. For the first few weeks this makes for a lot of unpleasantness. With extremely stubborn children this can turn into the first few months. However long it takes, eventually even the most stubborn get with the program at least in my setting. They may try to go back to their old ways but I am one consistent puppy. Most of the time I simply have to look at them and say, "You need to remember where you are. Get busy."
Now some of you may be asking how in the world do you handle the over-the-top hissy fits this will produce? Very calmly. In the Bible it says "A gentle answer turns away wrath." When a child is throwing a massive hissy fit, you will simply and calmly keep repeating what you expect the child to do. Sometimes this may require pulling yourself from the situation and regrouping, but continue to stand your ground. Be that steady, calming influence that does not waver. Work through those hissy fits and not around them. This can be exhausting work in the beginning but it produces a wonderful harvest once you get to the other side.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Saturday, August 30, 2014
Language Development for 3 to 4 year olds - Communication (Part 1)
In this post we will begin our discussion of 3 to 4 year olds. As with the discussion of 2 and 1/2 to 3 year olds, the age range will not be as big a factor as the skill range. We will discuss how to help children reach these milestones regardless of age. Remember I am taking my information from the Tennessee Early Learning Developmental Standards (TN-ELDS).
In this post we will look at the area of learning - Communication. The component is Receptive Language with the learning expectation: Listens with understanding and interest to conversations, directions, music, and a variety of reading materials. The first performance indicator is: Responds correctly to questions about own name, sex, and age. For once, most children in this age range actually conquer this particular performance indicator within the designated time frame. If a child cannot respond correctly to these types of questions by the age of 4 years old, developmental screening should be done.
The next performance indicator is: Understands size comparatives. Conquering this performance indicator depends greatly on how much exposure a child has had to size comparatives. Remember some children drag greatly in language development these days due to lack of exposure to real conversations. In years past, children picked up these types of skills from everyday conversation. That is not necessarily the case anymore. Never take for granted that children at even this age understand size comparatives. In my childcare, these concepts fall into my "position and direction" word instruction. I directly teach these concepts to every child to make sure they have an understanding of these types of words.
Next on our list of performance indicators is: Understands relationships expressed by "if," "then," or "because" sentences. I will admit to you that I laughed out loud at this one. This performance indicator assumes that children will be taught logical thinking. I do believe educational circles stopped teaching logical thinking in the 1990s. I say that because most young adults under the age of 25 have never really been taught logical thinking. My own biological children were taught logical thinking because I taught them myself. I did not realize how much other children their age were not taught this until I had employees in that age range. Sometimes I would just stand and stare at them dumbfounded because they could not process information in a logical sequence. My exact thoughts in those moments were "my own children could have figured that out by the time they were 10 years of age, and you are 20 something?" To say that this type of instruction is valuable would be the understatement of the century. One of the best ways to teach these concepts to children involves natural consequences. When a child understands that if I do this, then this will happen. That is the beginning of logical thinking. However, nowadays we redirect children to help them avoid natural consequences a great deal of the time. We do this to avoid actually having to deal with hissy fits and temper tantrums, but we are also cutting out our greatest tool to teach logical thinking. Childhood cannot be all rainbows and fluffy clouds and unicorns. Children need the hard knocks to truly become functioning adults. Please, let us stop raising 20 somethings that cannot take a train of thought to its logical conclusion. This is ridiculous.
The next performance indicator is: Understands "let's pretend" and "make-believe." In the last couple of years I have seen such a decline in children's ability to pretend it is sad. Unless a 3 year old has had exposure to an environment that promotes pretend play, they are just not developing this. Some three year olds do well to parallel play without a war. This represents another one of those areas where you cannot assume a child will learn this on his/her own. We have to teach them to play. A great deal of the children's lack of imaginative thinking revolves around how little they have someone read to them. Books open up a child's imagination and many parents hardly ever read to their children. I cannot stress enough about the importance of reading to young children. Many, many, many areas of development will fall behind when a childhood is not filled with the pleasure of having someone read books to them.
The last performance indicator for this learning expectation is: Listens attentively and shows understanding of story plot by responding to questions. The first assumption in this performance indicator is a doozy. Listening attentively does not happen among many 3 year olds at all. You do well to keep them actually seated during an entire story without flopping, pestering everyone around them, or simply getting up and walking away. Kindergarten teachers now have an awful time trying to teach children to sit for group times. Sometimes that one skill alone takes them a month or longer to accomplish to any semblance of competency. Since listening attentively does not occur, the second half of that performance indicator also does not occur. I am not saying that children this age cannot be taught to listen attentively or follow a story plot. I am saying that certain philosophies among early childhood experts and trainers really complicate teaching these particular skills. If a child has the choice to not listen or sit, chances are that they will not listen or sit. This skill must be taught. People, you cannot have both ways. If you want children to have complete choice, you will complicate trying in instill a great deal of other very necessary skills. It does not harm children to have to sit long enough for a short book at all. I have an almost 3 year old that can sit for fairly long books. It is all in what you expect.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
In this post we will look at the area of learning - Communication. The component is Receptive Language with the learning expectation: Listens with understanding and interest to conversations, directions, music, and a variety of reading materials. The first performance indicator is: Responds correctly to questions about own name, sex, and age. For once, most children in this age range actually conquer this particular performance indicator within the designated time frame. If a child cannot respond correctly to these types of questions by the age of 4 years old, developmental screening should be done.
The next performance indicator is: Understands size comparatives. Conquering this performance indicator depends greatly on how much exposure a child has had to size comparatives. Remember some children drag greatly in language development these days due to lack of exposure to real conversations. In years past, children picked up these types of skills from everyday conversation. That is not necessarily the case anymore. Never take for granted that children at even this age understand size comparatives. In my childcare, these concepts fall into my "position and direction" word instruction. I directly teach these concepts to every child to make sure they have an understanding of these types of words.
Next on our list of performance indicators is: Understands relationships expressed by "if," "then," or "because" sentences. I will admit to you that I laughed out loud at this one. This performance indicator assumes that children will be taught logical thinking. I do believe educational circles stopped teaching logical thinking in the 1990s. I say that because most young adults under the age of 25 have never really been taught logical thinking. My own biological children were taught logical thinking because I taught them myself. I did not realize how much other children their age were not taught this until I had employees in that age range. Sometimes I would just stand and stare at them dumbfounded because they could not process information in a logical sequence. My exact thoughts in those moments were "my own children could have figured that out by the time they were 10 years of age, and you are 20 something?" To say that this type of instruction is valuable would be the understatement of the century. One of the best ways to teach these concepts to children involves natural consequences. When a child understands that if I do this, then this will happen. That is the beginning of logical thinking. However, nowadays we redirect children to help them avoid natural consequences a great deal of the time. We do this to avoid actually having to deal with hissy fits and temper tantrums, but we are also cutting out our greatest tool to teach logical thinking. Childhood cannot be all rainbows and fluffy clouds and unicorns. Children need the hard knocks to truly become functioning adults. Please, let us stop raising 20 somethings that cannot take a train of thought to its logical conclusion. This is ridiculous.
The next performance indicator is: Understands "let's pretend" and "make-believe." In the last couple of years I have seen such a decline in children's ability to pretend it is sad. Unless a 3 year old has had exposure to an environment that promotes pretend play, they are just not developing this. Some three year olds do well to parallel play without a war. This represents another one of those areas where you cannot assume a child will learn this on his/her own. We have to teach them to play. A great deal of the children's lack of imaginative thinking revolves around how little they have someone read to them. Books open up a child's imagination and many parents hardly ever read to their children. I cannot stress enough about the importance of reading to young children. Many, many, many areas of development will fall behind when a childhood is not filled with the pleasure of having someone read books to them.
The last performance indicator for this learning expectation is: Listens attentively and shows understanding of story plot by responding to questions. The first assumption in this performance indicator is a doozy. Listening attentively does not happen among many 3 year olds at all. You do well to keep them actually seated during an entire story without flopping, pestering everyone around them, or simply getting up and walking away. Kindergarten teachers now have an awful time trying to teach children to sit for group times. Sometimes that one skill alone takes them a month or longer to accomplish to any semblance of competency. Since listening attentively does not occur, the second half of that performance indicator also does not occur. I am not saying that children this age cannot be taught to listen attentively or follow a story plot. I am saying that certain philosophies among early childhood experts and trainers really complicate teaching these particular skills. If a child has the choice to not listen or sit, chances are that they will not listen or sit. This skill must be taught. People, you cannot have both ways. If you want children to have complete choice, you will complicate trying in instill a great deal of other very necessary skills. It does not harm children to have to sit long enough for a short book at all. I have an almost 3 year old that can sit for fairly long books. It is all in what you expect.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Wednesday, August 27, 2014
Dealing with Children That Do Not Take Adults Seriously
This post will look at the growing issue of children that do not take adults seriously. These children have been so accommodated by the adults in their life that they tend to look at adults as large slaves rather than authority figures. Of course, this is directly related to the lack of respect for authority that I covered several posts ago. We will look at the underlying causes and some ways to help these children learn to truly respect authority.
The Scenario
This problem has to be one of the most frustrating issues childcares face today. You ask a child to do something, and they look at you like you are crazy. Then they turn around and demand you do something for them. Many children today take your instructions and treat them like suggestions that they can follow if they want, but if they do not want to do it, they can completely ignore you. If you persist in asking them to do something, they will fall in the floor and act like they are being tortured. This happens most often at pick-up time or anything else that remotely resembles work.
The Right to Refuse
Some in the early childhood field have no problem with this behavior. They believe children should have the right to refuse to do anything they do not feel like doing. Unfortunately for everyone in this industry the people that have that opinion represent the ones that make all the rules. They believe that adults should coax and beg or trick children to do what they are supposed to do rather than simply tell them to do what they are supposed to do. In their philosophical world, children choose to do the right things because they have been lead gently to the right choices not because they have been made to do what is right. I will refer you to the previous paragraph to show you how that philosophy plays out in the real world. This philosophy is so upside down and backwards I do not even know where to begin.
The Need for Obedience and Respect
I understand the why behind this philosophy. They feel that making children be obedient and respecting authority makes them more vulnerable to child abuse. They will also tell you that teaching children to be obedient really does not work. They may do what you want, but they do not learn anything unless they choose to do it themselves. Oh really? How is it that people within the last 50 years have decided that every previous generation for thousands of years did not learn anything through obedience and respect for authority. That has to be the most ludicrous statement I have ever heard. It also shows a complete lack of knowledge of history. Obedience teaches a child to do what is necessary whether they like it or not. Respect for authority keeps children from acting on their immature impulses and doing things that are not wise. When you remove obedience and respect for authority, what happens in the real world is that you turn adults into slaves of the children in which they provide care. Look around you. Children are becoming tyrants not learning good choices.
The Bandwagon Effect
At this point I want to have a discussion about propaganda techniques. One of the most popular tricks is called the "bandwagon effect." This technique says that if you say something often enough with enough authority behind it, everyone will believe it to be true whether it is or not. We have this used on us as a society every single day. It makes me sick to my stomach how easily the American public falls for this technique. If the media uses the words "latest research," we believe what they say hook, line, and sinker. I guess I understand how easy it is to bias research especially in the humanities. However, even in the scientific fields where they use hard data, they can still skew results nearly any way they want. If you do not understand that, you are doomed to follow a lot of fads that will be proven false in a few years. Why do Americans have such short memories? They do not realize that what was the "latest research" just last year has been completely debunked. They just simply latch onto the new "latest research." Good grief, people. Please, start thinking for yourselves. In the early childhood field, we are thrown the words "best practice." I can guarantee that the majority of the "research" that proves "best practice" has a liberal slant and has been intentionally made to disprove the conservative point of view. If you think they chose the words "best practice" randomly, I am afraid you might be a bit nieve. This is probably the most blatant use of the bandwagon effect out there at the moment. I am now off my soapbox.
How do we fix this problem?
The answer is quite simple unless you live in a heavily regulated state or have to follow accreditation criteria. Children must be taught that obedience and respect for authority are important, very important. How do you do that when you are forced to give children choices? When children have the right to say "no" to anything, it is nearly impossible to teach them obedience. However, let me just throw out this example. Are children allowed to say "no" to handwashing in any regulations? The answer to that question is "no." Liberals have double standards. You have to understand. They want you to force children to do what they think is important, but not anything that falls under what conservatives consider character training. The same way that you enforce handwashing can be used to enforce all the other. You simply just do not give them the option to do otherwise. Will this get you in trouble with the regulators? Possibly, but sometimes you have to make a choice and do what it is truly right for the children in your care.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
The Scenario
This problem has to be one of the most frustrating issues childcares face today. You ask a child to do something, and they look at you like you are crazy. Then they turn around and demand you do something for them. Many children today take your instructions and treat them like suggestions that they can follow if they want, but if they do not want to do it, they can completely ignore you. If you persist in asking them to do something, they will fall in the floor and act like they are being tortured. This happens most often at pick-up time or anything else that remotely resembles work.
The Right to Refuse
Some in the early childhood field have no problem with this behavior. They believe children should have the right to refuse to do anything they do not feel like doing. Unfortunately for everyone in this industry the people that have that opinion represent the ones that make all the rules. They believe that adults should coax and beg or trick children to do what they are supposed to do rather than simply tell them to do what they are supposed to do. In their philosophical world, children choose to do the right things because they have been lead gently to the right choices not because they have been made to do what is right. I will refer you to the previous paragraph to show you how that philosophy plays out in the real world. This philosophy is so upside down and backwards I do not even know where to begin.
The Need for Obedience and Respect
I understand the why behind this philosophy. They feel that making children be obedient and respecting authority makes them more vulnerable to child abuse. They will also tell you that teaching children to be obedient really does not work. They may do what you want, but they do not learn anything unless they choose to do it themselves. Oh really? How is it that people within the last 50 years have decided that every previous generation for thousands of years did not learn anything through obedience and respect for authority. That has to be the most ludicrous statement I have ever heard. It also shows a complete lack of knowledge of history. Obedience teaches a child to do what is necessary whether they like it or not. Respect for authority keeps children from acting on their immature impulses and doing things that are not wise. When you remove obedience and respect for authority, what happens in the real world is that you turn adults into slaves of the children in which they provide care. Look around you. Children are becoming tyrants not learning good choices.
The Bandwagon Effect
At this point I want to have a discussion about propaganda techniques. One of the most popular tricks is called the "bandwagon effect." This technique says that if you say something often enough with enough authority behind it, everyone will believe it to be true whether it is or not. We have this used on us as a society every single day. It makes me sick to my stomach how easily the American public falls for this technique. If the media uses the words "latest research," we believe what they say hook, line, and sinker. I guess I understand how easy it is to bias research especially in the humanities. However, even in the scientific fields where they use hard data, they can still skew results nearly any way they want. If you do not understand that, you are doomed to follow a lot of fads that will be proven false in a few years. Why do Americans have such short memories? They do not realize that what was the "latest research" just last year has been completely debunked. They just simply latch onto the new "latest research." Good grief, people. Please, start thinking for yourselves. In the early childhood field, we are thrown the words "best practice." I can guarantee that the majority of the "research" that proves "best practice" has a liberal slant and has been intentionally made to disprove the conservative point of view. If you think they chose the words "best practice" randomly, I am afraid you might be a bit nieve. This is probably the most blatant use of the bandwagon effect out there at the moment. I am now off my soapbox.
How do we fix this problem?
The answer is quite simple unless you live in a heavily regulated state or have to follow accreditation criteria. Children must be taught that obedience and respect for authority are important, very important. How do you do that when you are forced to give children choices? When children have the right to say "no" to anything, it is nearly impossible to teach them obedience. However, let me just throw out this example. Are children allowed to say "no" to handwashing in any regulations? The answer to that question is "no." Liberals have double standards. You have to understand. They want you to force children to do what they think is important, but not anything that falls under what conservatives consider character training. The same way that you enforce handwashing can be used to enforce all the other. You simply just do not give them the option to do otherwise. Will this get you in trouble with the regulators? Possibly, but sometimes you have to make a choice and do what it is truly right for the children in your care.
I hope you have enjoyed this post. Goodbye and God bless!! Check out Natalie's children's books at: https://www.amazon.com/author/nataliewade7457
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)