metaphortunate son (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
metaphortunate) wrote2013-12-04 09:21 am
metaphortunate) wrote2013-12-04 09:21 am
Entry tags:
advice: other people's children?
Internets, I come to you for advice.
In my previous incarnation as a much more attractive person who had no children, I didn't come into contact with a lot of kids. And when I did, in retrospect, I realize, I kind of interacted with them on their own level. I didn't do much dealing with them as an authority figure. I set boundaries more in the way that kids set boundaries with each other: rather than as parents do, with rules.
Now that I have kids, I have rules. No spitting in the house, spitting is only for outside. Use your inside voice inside, outside voice is for outside. You may only throw things if they are squishy. You can climb into the baby's crib but not stand in it because it is not stable enough. You can poke Mama gently but not hard. You must be gentle with the baby. If food lands on the floor, your meal is over. You must ask before picking up my phone. That sort of thing.
So that's easy enough to do with my child - relatively speaking, I mean. Mr. E and I decide what the rules are, and the Junebug decides whether he would rather follow them or take the consequences, and we decide what the consequences are and enforce them.
But then there are other people's kids. Other people's kids come over to our house or whatever, and now there are questions. Do they have to follow our rules? If they don't have to follow our rules, why does the Junebug have to? Especially if it's rules about not grabbing toys or hats from each other/taking turns/not hitting: I want to enforce good manners from my child, but I really do not want to teach him that I will enforce rules about respect on him but not on anyone else. If other kids have to follow our rules, do I enforce consequences if they choose not to? Their parents will have Opinions about that. If I had infinite time to discuss with the parents in advance, I'm sure we could come to reasonable agreements, because my friends are all reasonable people: but we don't, and consequences need to happen in real time for kids to take them onboard.
And how do I back up other parents' consequences? If a kid does something to me or my stuff that their parent has told them not to do, how do I reaffirm that it's bad and I don't like it without implying that their kid is bad or that their parenting is bad?
Internets, how do you deal with other people's kids, when you're not in an official position of authority over them? (Nannying is different, I expect.)
This question brought to you by the frequent interaction of:
Junebug: *grabs at someone on the bus, or at their phone*
Me: Stop. Do not grab at the people. They do not want to be grabbed.
Stranger: Oh, it's okay, it's fine.
Stranger: *wants to make me feel better about my ill-mannered child*
Junebug: *learns that Mama is making up rules for no reason*
Me: *is frustrated*
In my previous incarnation as a much more attractive person who had no children, I didn't come into contact with a lot of kids. And when I did, in retrospect, I realize, I kind of interacted with them on their own level. I didn't do much dealing with them as an authority figure. I set boundaries more in the way that kids set boundaries with each other: rather than as parents do, with rules.
Now that I have kids, I have rules. No spitting in the house, spitting is only for outside. Use your inside voice inside, outside voice is for outside. You may only throw things if they are squishy. You can climb into the baby's crib but not stand in it because it is not stable enough. You can poke Mama gently but not hard. You must be gentle with the baby. If food lands on the floor, your meal is over. You must ask before picking up my phone. That sort of thing.
So that's easy enough to do with my child - relatively speaking, I mean. Mr. E and I decide what the rules are, and the Junebug decides whether he would rather follow them or take the consequences, and we decide what the consequences are and enforce them.
But then there are other people's kids. Other people's kids come over to our house or whatever, and now there are questions. Do they have to follow our rules? If they don't have to follow our rules, why does the Junebug have to? Especially if it's rules about not grabbing toys or hats from each other/taking turns/not hitting: I want to enforce good manners from my child, but I really do not want to teach him that I will enforce rules about respect on him but not on anyone else. If other kids have to follow our rules, do I enforce consequences if they choose not to? Their parents will have Opinions about that. If I had infinite time to discuss with the parents in advance, I'm sure we could come to reasonable agreements, because my friends are all reasonable people: but we don't, and consequences need to happen in real time for kids to take them onboard.
And how do I back up other parents' consequences? If a kid does something to me or my stuff that their parent has told them not to do, how do I reaffirm that it's bad and I don't like it without implying that their kid is bad or that their parenting is bad?
Internets, how do you deal with other people's kids, when you're not in an official position of authority over them? (Nannying is different, I expect.)
This question brought to you by the frequent interaction of:
Junebug: *grabs at someone on the bus, or at their phone*
Me: Stop. Do not grab at the people. They do not want to be grabbed.
Stranger: Oh, it's okay, it's fine.
Stranger: *wants to make me feel better about my ill-mannered child*
Junebug: *learns that Mama is making up rules for no reason*
Me: *is frustrated*
no subject
When we go to other people's houses, we follow their rules. If I am also at other kid's house, we follow both their rules and my rules -- for example, total meltdown of my kid because of being overwhelmed by slight frustration is more likely to be treated leniently by another adult because they do not realize that we have been working on her not doing this for lo these many months. If I am there it will be treated the same way it is treated in our house (immediate removal from situation until she calms down).
When a parent is present in my house and the kid does something the parent doesn't agree with but which is not a rule in our house, I usually look to the parent to see what they want to do and follow the parent's lead.
I looked after 1.5-almost-4 kids for quite a while at church, so I'm used to taking a more active disciplinary role with respect to other people's (small) kids; if not for that, I am not sure I would be quite so forward about telling other people's kids what they should/should not be doing. (And I don't tend to do this with kids who are older than 4.) As it is, though, I'm pretty used to talking to kids about personal space and grabbing and taking turns. And I think it's a good thing. Kids have to learn that they should behave like civilized human beings, and that even when one adult may not expect it of them, another one will.
ETA: After posting that, I realized there are exceptions, as there are. For example, E's friend doesn't really eat vegetables, so when we had her over for dinner E got her normal small bowl of green beans and L got three green beans, and E wasn't quite sure about this. But we still held L to our family's rule of "try it once, then you don't have to eat any more."
no subject
This. I don't usually say anything about what their mom or dad might want, but rather establishing that X is a house rule, please follow it. I've only had one kid fail to deal with that situation, and his mom was there (he is autistic and his parents don't let him have unescorted playdates).
Sometimes when kids are getting too rough, I've dealt by temporarily separating them to cool off, or changing venue (going for a walk, moving from the living room to my son's bedroom, going outside).
no subject
no subject
It is also possible the other kid isn't ready to be left at another person's house without a parent even if they are ok in a more structured day care like environment...
no subject