Children Learning: Calm Accountability
I’m getting slower and developing more patience the older I get. Not slower moving, though that seems to be creeping up, but rather slower to anger. My mind sees more, understands more and when I talk with my children, I find myself a councilman more than laying down ‘The Law’.
Kids (the non-goat type) get to a certain age where no matter what you tell them, there’s a break in the wiring between their ears and brains. It somehow reconnects itself as they mature, but for a few years you’re left with a virtual rebellious/semi-retardation stage.
Well, I found a neat little system that seems to work on bringing a child’s attention to their monstrous behavior. It’s called calm accountability. Here’s how it works.
Your kids argue. Calmly, quietly, ask them to stop arguing. At least in my house, the arguing will come to a climax and most kids will seek for favoritism of a parent to back their position of bad behavior. This is when you simply ask them questions. Have them enact/repeat what they have done and then ask one, simple question:
How does acting that way make sense?
I found it forced their little rebellious minds to contemplate and blow out the lazy cobwebs between their ears and look at themselves in a light they don’t always like, but they have to admit.
Try it on your kids. It may not work perfectly…but it is fun to use as a parent.
**grin**
Read MoreSecurity: Associations
This is a touchy subject for me as a parent, because I feel it’s so important. Some will agree, some won’t and I have met many who simply don’t care.
A child should have good associations. That means having friends that you approve of and have influence in such connections. Can you monitor everything? Not likely. Should you? That’s debatable. The general concept here I want to make, is that your children should have associations that minimize the risk of ‘contamination’.
That’s the word that seems to offend: “contamination”.
Here’s what I specifically mean:
I don’t want my children to be associating with others who influence or boldly take them away from the values, beliefs and structure we teach in our home…until such a time that my children display an ability to reason and work out the matters on their own. From there they can choose for themselves, knowing full well the consequences of making such connections and how it will affect their life.
Now in English:
If your kid cusses, tells dirty jokes about whores and plays with Tarot cards, they won’t be welcome in my home, nor will my kids be hanging out with them. Why? Because I don’t want my kids to be like your kid. Plain and simple.
Am I over protective? I don’t believe so. Tool strict? Most likely, but proud of it, actually. I’ve had a great deal happen to me in my life, especially while growing up, to know that no one is going to actively protect my children but Kathi and I. No one loves them like we do. No one wants the very best for them like we do. No one would sacrifice for them like we do. Thus it stands to reason that no one else should have a say in how they are raised like we do. So if you feel like arguing, zip it.
Children are a lot like water storage. If you have ever stored water over a long period of time, you know to place river rocks under and around the barrels. Why? For the taste. If they are left in dirt, they eventually taste like dirt. It seems water has a perfect memory and hold an impression. So do our kids. How many times does a kid of 3 yrs. old have to hear a swear word before they start repeating it?
So consider the youth who are smoking, drinking, having sex,doing drugs, looking at pornography and actively talking badly about their parents and ask yourself if you’re willing to take the chance with your children associating with those types of personalities.
If you create structure in your child’s associations, always letting them know why you are doing such things, I promise you that a situation will arise that will vindicate your efforts in the eyes of your child. Something will happen that they will see your reasoning and support the work you have done. It’s not always easy to stand firm, but again I promise you…it’s worth every battle.
Rights of a Child: Love
The basic foundation principle of a parent, at least in my own mind, should be love.
Now love is actually a big subject, especially when the world has distorted, misused, chopped up, mutilated and all but destroyed the definition of the word. From a loving mother, holding her new child in her arms after birth, whispering it for the first time….to the perversions of what Hollywood would have you believe, “Love” is defined as many things.
We have tough love, unconditional love, paternal love, brotherly love, the love between a husband and wife, even a ‘love of violence’. So where do we place ourselves as parents when it comes to love in conjunction with out little ones?
I have spent some time reading, talking with my children and even heard a great sermon in church Sunday ON Love, and it deserves to be looked at closely.
My sweet little daughter: Leilani Alyse Uapafutiolevaaoalii Buckley
In wondering how my children felt, I set my yellow pad down and called out to a few of my older children, Cesilea (18), Leilani (15) and Jessica (14). I asked them if they knew mom and I loved them. They just chuckled and said “Of course!” But when I asked them how, they looked puzzled. They couldn’t clarify at first. Nothing came to any of them, until Ditto (Cesilea) jabbed Leilani in the shoulder and laughed: “I know you love Lei, because you didn’t send her back for a working model!”.
It took them some time, but they finally told me they knew they were loved because of a structure we had in our home. When they thought about it, every action and decision Kathi and I made concerning them was engineered for their development. For their progression and their good. Ditto added that the pattern was there, even when they didn’t see it at first.
There were times when my children interacted with their friends, and they would witness conduct from their friends towards their parents, especially the mothers which would make them cringe. It was completely unacceptable behavior and they would come home, embarrassed for themselves…and their friends. “Why would they do that (or say that) to their own mother?” they would ask. Oh, my kids have struggles like any other youth, and they have good days and bad days. My goal is just to help them have far more of the good days.
I took the question next to my Sunday School class. I’m a strict adult, very abrupt, but for some strange reason, the kids want me back every year. That’s gone on for nearly 15 years now.
Standing before 14 twelve year olds (mostly girls), I snapped “Do I hate you guys?”
The room burst into giggles and an occasional laugh. “No.” they replied.
“But I yell at you often!” I bellowed.
One young lady smiled back. “But you love love us anyway.”
I smiled back. They were right. I loved each of them and prided myself on having the brightest kids in Church. Hmmm. I don’t hug them. I don’t change their diapers or feed them. In fact, I tell them stories and frequently call them ‘little craps’ when they act badly. Yet they come back, week after week, parents thank me and say their child has never loved church so much as in that class.
So what kind of love produces that type of result? Is it the same type of love my own children experience in our family?
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