Reply to Did schools used to have behavioral problems like they do now?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Parents don’t parent. DD 16 is a lifeguard and came home yesterday talking about a gentle parent trying to negotiate with her kid for several minutes to get out of the pool during break. Even teen DD could see it was a snowflake approach. [/quote]

The kid whose parent has the wherewithal to be calm and patient in that situation instead of grabbing the kid by the arm and dragging him out of the pool, or screaming at him, is not the kid who is having the massive meltdown in class that gets the classroom evacuated. The gentle parented kid might have other issues if his parents don't figure out how to set limits, but the truth is that a parent willing to spend several minutes talking to their kid when they aren't doing what they've been told is demonstrating patience and emotional regulation, which is still better than screaming and yanking your kid around in terms of teaching them how to behave.

I know making fun of parents doing "gentle parenting" is a favorite pastime around these parts, but that's not what is leading to kids who throw chairs or scream at people in middle school. [/quote]

A parent who negotiates like that is doing a disservice to their future adult child.

A boss isn't going to negotiate with you. A cop isn't going to negotiate with you.
A romantic partner isn't going to negotiate with you.

No one is advocating yanking a child around.

But that isn't the first time that child has ignored their parent. If there were consequences like "Johnny, it is pool break time. If you don't get out like everyone else the consequence is we will leave this pool" I suspect Johnny would have gotten out of the pool the first time.

As it is I bet that child was bribed out of the pool with a promise of snacks which isn't very different from how principals handle things nowadays.[/quote]

You missed the point. It's not that gentle parenting is great and effective. It's that it doesn't produce kids who are violent and disruptive in class. And at least it does demonstrate to the kid what it looks like for an adult to get frustrated but not resort to yelling or violence. It might not be perfect parenting, but it's not the sort of parenting that leads to super disruptive kids and major behavioral problems in school.

Saying "it's the parenting" in a thread about serious behavioral issues in schools, and then describing a parent negotiating with their toddler to get out of the pool is silly. Now if you had described parents leaving their young kids at home alone regularly, spending most of their time high or drunk, or screaming at and hitting their kids, then yes, spot on. That is the kind of parenting that leads to kids with serious behavioral issues in school.

You needs some perspective.[/quote]

I respectfully disagree with you. For one—you’re essentially saying that the only other option besides the negotiating gentle parent is screaming and violently ripping your kid from the situation. When my kids were young we gave them warning when we had to leave a place, set a timer and respected the timer. If they decided they didn’t want to go I wouldn’t beg, cajole, offer treats if they listened. I would count to 5 and if they weren’t complying I would scoop them up and carry them to the car. I wasn’t screening, I wasn’t violent. I sometimes had to wait or them to calm down to put them in the car seat. But the message was that parents are in charge of these decisions, the kids aren’t. And yes I read a ton of parenting books and articles and it honestly was a lot harder for me to do it this way than to constantly avoid conflict by letting my kids do what they wanted to the detriment of our family’s needs.

Gentle parenting these days isn’t just being calm, it’s letting the kids run the show. It’s asking them if they’re ready for the next thing instead of telling them. It’s rewarding negotiations with bribes (and therefore making sure it will happen again and again).

And you better believe it’s showing up in the classrooms. If your kid doesn’t ever or rarely gets told no at home, how do you think they’ll handle it hearing from their classroom teacher, specials teachers, playground monitors, administrators, bus drivers.

School behavior problems are up and it’s not due to abuse. It’s due to parents who are neglectful—neglecting to teach their kid to be part of society and expecting everyone to bend to them instead.

And it’s not working—kids are more anxious and depressed than ever. [/quote]

No. I'm not "essentially" saying the only other option is screaming and hitting your kids. I'm saying that the people who scream and hit, or totally ignore their kids, produce the violent kids who are huge behavioral issues in school. They always have and they always will.

If this was a thread about kids being self sufficient in college or communications and resilience among 20 somethings, that would be different. It's not. Stop acting line gentle parenting is the source of all ills. It just undermines whatever argument you were trying to make and makes you sound nuts. You think parents who negotiate their kids out of the pool are raising the next generation of chair throwers? No. That kid gets three square meals a day (probably organic and nutritionally balanced too), plenty of sleep, has multiple loving caretakers, etc. He might have other issues because his mom doesn't just say "no you have to get out of the pool or we will leave the pool," but he's not causing big disruptions in class. He just isn't.[/quote]

I’m confused at how you know without a doubt that your opinion is 100% correct. Are you an educator? A doctor? Psychologist? [/quote]

It's interesting how when faced with arguments you disagree with, you don't engage with the argument but put up straw men ("you are essentially saying" when that's not what I said at all) or attack my credentials when you haven't provided your own. What qualifies you to blame all school-based behavioral problems on "gentle parenting"?

Again, the person who introduced gentle parenting as a scapegoat in this conversation provided a single anecdote to prove it -- her 16 yr old DD witnessed a mom negoatiating with her child to get out of the pool and came home and complained about it. This is the ONLY evidence provided that behavioral issues in school are the fault of gentle parenting concepts. You don't need special qualifications to question that conclusion. It's ridiculous on its face.[/quote]

I’m a teacher and have been for 20 years. When I first started you could hear parents actually holding their children accountable for their behaviors in school. During meetings where the child was in attendance, before and after school, at school events. Now—parents find anything else to blame except their child or themselves for failing to teach their child how to behave properly. You can see it in restaurants and in public spaces. My proof is that I see evidence of it every day. Students talking back, students pushing boundaries on routines that were laid down day 1 and consistently upheld for the safety and education of the whole classroom. [/quote]

As a parent, I see a lot of parents setting boundaries. When my child misbehaves in public, I do try to hold her accountable, and I feel terrible as a parent when it happens.

I have heard from teacher friends that when they speak to parents about behavior issues, parents don't believe them, which is appalling. I think there is a lot of mistrust between parents and teachers. My child doesn't have behavior issues at school right now (definitely does with us), but it is so hard to get clear information from the teachers about her academics. I ask direct questions and get nonanswers. I actually love the teachers and they have been amazing with my kid, but with me I just don't feel there is good communication. And my sense is this isn't because the teachers are trying to be evasive, but I think there are pressures on them from above that I don't see.[/quote]

There's good ways and bad ways to approach parents. My DD is 6, in 1st grade last year, and we got emails every single time there was any little incident—things like staying at the ST Math station the whole time instead of fully rotating through all the stations, or making paper airplanes during Lexia time. The tone of every single email was dead serious and overwhelmingly negative. It further read like the teacher was attributing defiant intent and character flaws to these incidents. No, DD wasn't being intentionally defiant. Rather, I see a kid who got really focused on challenging herself to beat the ST Math game. I see a kid who already finished all the 2nd grade Lexia levels and maybe needs a new challenge for that time slot, maybe encourage her to read a library book instead? I'm not saying DD couldn't have handled it better, but she is 6. Heaven forbid a 6 year old makes a poor choice once every 6-8 weeks. Perspective helps. Redirect so she can learn and move on. A note home every time is fully over the top. By the end of the year, I was SO frustrated with this teacher that I stopped engaging with her. A different approach would have definitely gone a long way.[/quote]

Do you expect to one day tell her employer to use a different approach?[/quote]

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