Dear parents: your children are more capable than you think

[Anonymous]

I am a first grade teacher and parent of 2 kids myself and I agree with OP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Start gentle when they are young and eager to be independent. I had a parent shocked at pick up when their 16 month old hustled over and put her own winter boots on.

The same carries well into the teen years. We are looking to raise adults not children. They can make their own lunch, prepare a dinner, do laundry, and learn basic car and house maintenance.

Its a good thing you never dealt with SN kids. Kids can be supported by their parents early and still develop their independence.

So, can you change the oil in your car, replace the toilet in your house, install windows, doors and more?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spoken as a preschool teacher with no training or kids. Spoken as someone who never dealt with special needs and a child who has no understanding of their name let alone a trash can.

Wrong! I work with preschoolers in special ed. You still encourage independence, their timeline may be different then neurotypical children, but you work on it and encourage everyday. Children with special needs learn through repetition and practice. OP, I think your post is wonderful!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Start gentle when they are young and eager to be independent. I had a parent shocked at pick up when their 16 month old hustled over and put her own winter boots on.

The same carries well into the teen years. We are looking to raise adults not children. They can make their own lunch, prepare a dinner, do laundry, and learn basic car and house maintenance.

Its a good thing you never dealt with SN kids. Kids can be supported by their parents early and still develop their independence.

So, can you change the oil in your car, replace the toilet in your house, install windows, doors and more?

Yes to all of the above and change our own brakes, retile our bathroom, change out the sink, installed the bathroom exhaust fan through the roof and more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op,

It’s the parents ability to parent that’s changed. The kids’ abilities are unchanged just untapped.

There’s a lot of dumb information and a lot of it about how to parent. Basics are getting buried in the avalanche.

You see this in potty training. Kids used to Ben potty trained shortly before they were 2. Now they are 3 and counting.

In my case, this is daycare's fault for requiring that children wear pull ups.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The place where I fail is I let her watch TV while eating because otherwise she doesn’t eat. Silver lining is - it’s songs and shows in our mother tongue which is not frequently spoken here, so semi-“educational” since it is helping her be bilingual. She speaks English and the other language equally well. But still, parenting fail...

I do all the other stuff like let her put her jacket on, etc. I start the “getting ready” routine early so I don’t have to rush her.

Quit lying to yourself, it's not educational. She's not going to starve herself. She its in front of tV out of habit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spoken as a preschool teacher with no training or kids. Spoken as someone who never dealt with special needs and a child who has no understanding of their name let alone a trash can.

Oh look, here's special needs mom. It's obvious that OP is talking about a typically abled child and not children with special needs. Get off your high horse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Part of sending them to preschool is for the teachers, like Op, to teach the kids these basic skills especially if "preschool" is daycare and you're with them for 8+ hrs/day.
Isn't that what I'm paying you big bucks for?

What, no? This is MY job as the parent. Preschool is not about life skills, PP.

(signed WOH mom whose youngest is in a play-based full-day preschool)

[Anonymous]

Goos reminder, op. I agree with everything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Spoken as a preschool teacher with no training or kids. Spoken as someone who never dealt with special needs and a child who has no understanding of their name let alone a trash can.

Wrong! I work with preschoolers in special ed. You still encourage independence, their timeline may be different then neurotypical children, but you work on it and encourage everyday. Children with special needs learn through repetition and practice. OP, I think your post is wonderful!

+1

Agree. Very wise!

[Anonymous]

Great post. Agree with all points.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op,

It’s the parents ability to parent that’s changed. The kids’ abilities are unchanged just untapped.

There’s a lot of dumb information and a lot of it about how to parent. Basics are getting buried in the avalanche.

You see this in potty training. Kids used to Ben potty trained shortly before they were 2. Now they are 3 and counting.

In my case, this is daycare's fault for requiring that children wear pull ups.

No one wants to clean your kids pee and poop off everything. Your job to PT them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Spoken as a preschool teacher with no training or kids. Spoken as someone who never dealt with special needs and a child who has no understanding of their name let alone a trash can.

Oh look, here's special needs mom. It's obvious that OP is talking about a typically abled child and not children with special needs. Get off your high horse.

OP and you need to get off your high horse and realize how offensive posts like this are. No reason a toddler or preschooler cannot be nurtured and have things done for them. They are very young kids. Sounds like OP and you are either too lazy or not very nurturing.

[Anonymous]

Spoken from a true cultural bias toward independence. Some cultures highly value interdependence, OP. That doesn’t mean those parents are bad, just have different values.

https://www.dimensionsofculture.com/2013/09/how-individualism-and-collectivism-manifest-in-child-rearing-practices/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spoken as a preschool teacher with no training or kids. Spoken as someone who never dealt with special needs and a child who has no understanding of their name let alone a trash can.

Not the OP, but I am also a preschool teacher with training and 15 years experience, children of my own, and I have special needs children in my class. I fully agree with the OP. I have high exceptions for the kids in my class and all the parents appreciate it, they are all in awe at the things they can do in class. I do set age appropriate goals for the kids and I’m not going to ask them to do something I know they can’t do.