Sunday, July 21, 2013

The Debate About Managing Kids

      When my daughter was here a few weeks ago we got on one of her favorite tops...micro managing kids. Of course, she doesn't have any kids.

     Most of her conversation is that her parents did not micro manage her and she didn't get into any trouble.This is true. She could wander around within for or five houses even as a preschooler. Mom and Dad only knew were she was in a general way. She was predictable so we knew where she would be. As  she got older she went further away and for longer times. It's one of the things she is thankful about that she was not on a tight rope and learned through her experiences.

    It got me thinking about how I was raised and one of the accidents I got into. My  bother and I  were the definition of free range kids. We lived on a farm and my mother had two smaller children and was not always able to supervise us. She was happy that we could be occupied in play so that she had more time for the two younger kids.

     One day we had an accident right in the house. Mom had a set of drawers in the bedroom that were five high. My brother and I decided that we wanted something out of the top drawer. We were too small and short to reach the top drawer. Since we were free rangers we could always figure out some solution. We said, " Let's pull out the bottom drawer and if we stand on it we can reach the top drawer." Simple plan?  We both stepped on the drawer. The whole chest of drawers tipped  over  pinning us against the bed. What made it worse, was there were two old lamps on top of the set of drawers. These lamps  had glass chimneys so there was quite a clatter. There was a four year old and a five year old under the set of drawers yelling their heads off. Mom had another toddler and an infant to look after. So she was frightened as to how she would find her little screaming boys. She got us out from under the drawers and then the clean up started. We probably got something else later on that made us holler again. It also made us think twice about some of the silly plans we made.

     So part of my point is that even if kids are tightly supervised they can easily get into trouble. It only takes a second for kids to act. 

     My brother and I may have got into the odd accident , but we certainly learned independence , judgement and caution  by being free range kids.

    So I really hate to see kids micro managed and I see that these kids have little opportunity to learn from experience. 

    Before I retired from teaching you could see children coming who had little life experience and they were having difficulty dealing with other kids and their own independence and responsibility

    I really wish I had a picture of being pinned under the set of drawers!.

32 comments:

  1. Very good post. Free range kids! I try to tell my son. My only child. Life's experiences. But, his will be different then mine were. He has to fall on his own. But, I will always be here to duct tape his wings back on. He just turned 23. Graduated from college with honors in psychology. Moved a state away to go to grad school. I taught him right from wrong, say please and thank you, to tell the truth, morals and honor from the time he was a baby. Oh, and I also spanked him. Still would if I had too! ha

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    1. When I tell my kids about my childhood I can hardly believe what I'm hearing. Things wee really different.

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  2. Your years growing up and mine too were such different times than now. I remember many times exploring the woods around us and the backroads. We could be gone for hours and no one would come looking for us. Today the world just isn't safe for kids to wander. I live on five acres and my granddaughters are visiting. It is probably 1500 feet to our rural mailbox with a small rise I can't see over but I wouldn't think of sending them (four and five year old) to get the mail on their own. Oh, they would promise to go and come straight back but I don't trust the outside world. Yes, they need life experiences I agree; but I'm afraid the days of young ones exploring on their own is long gone.
    With that said I do believe micro managing a child hurts in the long run. I remember when my kids were fussing with the kids next door I always said they needed to work it out. They might be arguing about who was going to go first or how they wanted to do it. The girls next door always went to their Mom and she always stepped in. I felt they needed to compromise with each other when playing and learn how to do that. I only stepped in if physical confrontation was apparent. You do have to let kids be kids and know when to pick your battles and maybe not hold the apron strings quite so tight.

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    1. I think the percentage of bad guys is about the same as when we were kids. Today there will be more bad guys on the street because in our day many of them were institutionalized and kept away from the general public. Today there is much more publicity and frankly a lot of fear mongering.
      Sometimes it's hard to stand back and let kids learn how to compromise. I think that there is a time to learn compromising and when you pass that age it isn't going to be learned properly..

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  3. You are right here. Children should be allowed freedom. The problem is that when I was young we also had responsibility. At five years old was fetching goats in for milking, feeding hens and putting them away at night. All these jobs were rushed as I wanted to meet my peers. We used to help each other before play time.

    Children today are full of knowledge but are not worldly wise. That skill is only achieved through experimentation.

    Terror is only fear of the unknown. If one faces it then it becomes normal or at the worst manageable.

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    1. What you are really saying is that you had work to do and learned to feel necessary. You were contributing to the family and you felt valued.

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  4. Managing kids is so different today and much of it has to do with the changes in society. Sad to say, but it is no longer safe to have free range kids due to fear of strangers. Unfortunately we have to hover to protect them in order to keep some unknown from harming them.

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    1. With the huge amount of publicity people have become very fearful. The percentage of bad guys is the same as 75 years ago. More are on the street now as 75 years ago many of them were in institutions. I have been watched when I talk to my friend's 9 year old daughter. One woman went so far as to park and watch me. this is fear out of all proportion.

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  5. I have to agree with you, I think it is very important that kids become "street wise". Mind you, it is easy for me to say that, if I had my way I would have mine microchipped - and he is 23!

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    1. We're always parents. I was 68 when Dad died. He was still my Dad and I his son.

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  6. I wish you had a picture of that too:)
    I think kids have to have a little free rein to grow and learn. I had two girls and they tipped over a dresser once too:) B

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    1. I wonder how many kids pull the trick of climbing on drawers?

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  7. oh, you're lucky she could free you! just read a headline today that so many tvs fall on top of kids these days.

    i was a free range kid, too. 13 yrs on the farm, my sis and i would disappear into the woods, creeks, pastures. or we'd jump on our bikes and head miles away to another small town to buy an ice cream cone. as long as we were back for meal times, no one worried.

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    1. My Dad had a huge bell from an old locomotive and they would ring the bell when they wanted us.We knew that the bell meant business and we had to hurry home.

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  8. I lived with lots of freedom, but would have received a swat when I irritated a parent.

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    1. I think we developed true self esteem when we were able to roam at will.

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  9. I think I tried something similar when I was a kid, Red. It sounded so familiar! And you're right: kids don't need any time to get into trouble. :-)

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    1. I think that some mishaps come with the territory. Little kids don't have the judgement but have lots of curiosity.

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  10. Interesting how these childhood experiences mold our later years. I don't think I was raised as a "free range kid."

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    1. I don't think city kids had as much freedom as we had. We rarely saw anybody except other farm neighbors.

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  11. I love it! You dpn't need a photo, I can't imagine it!!!!
    They are different times, aren't they?
    So much bad can happen in an instant. In the city or the country; indoors or out.

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    1. I still think kids should have some freedoms. Bad guys are not all over the place. In the old days most bad guys were institutionalized.

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  12. Generally you're right, Red, but there are many angles of looking at this, many of them mentioned in the previous comments. I'll add one more point. Once I heard of a case of a woman, a mother, who was accused of neglecting proper care for her child because the child found a chemical used for cleaning at home, drank a bit and ended up in a hospital. Perhaps the mother was careless or perhaps not, we all know that children are resourceful and one can't have their eyes on them each and every second. This case made me think of the measure of supervision needed. If a child 'gets experienced' without getting hurt (which applies to any age), it's positive but if something nasty happens which could have been prevented by the supervision? It's a tricky issue.

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    1. You make a solid point. Safety is a very serious issue. I'm really thinking about the parents who direct their kids in very simple things without danger. Your village looks like a very safe place,

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  13. I kept a tight lead on our girls we lived in a fairly large city when they were young..they had rules..I had to know where they were and who they were with. The abductions started about that time.. Then we moved to the boonies..and I let them free range until Jacob Wetterling..after that I wanted to know who they were with and what time they would be home.
    Sometimes in some situations you have to micro manage them for their own safety:)

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    1. One cannot take chances when the issue is safety. I'm more concerned about the parent who hovers over the child and tells them what to do all the time . the kid doesn't get a chance to act on their own. I think you knew when it was safe and when there was risk. Always err on the side of safety.

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  14. Free range kids was a new term for me but it fits my growing up experience exactly. And I don't believe I was the worse for it...:)

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    1. I think the parents of today do have more to worry about.

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  15. I was the opposite of micro-managed and had many accidents, but I also had a lot of fun and fortunately survived my childhood! :) Parents seem very fearful these days...

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    1. I think many of us have close calls and get lucky. I think some of are more adventuresome. Farm kids have much more leeway.

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  16. Micro Managing - didn't even know that existed. I grew up free ranging around the ocean and the bay - we hung out out in a pack of 5 to 7 - we had to tell our parents where we were heading and the rest was up to us to make decisions. We were taught right from wrong, always keep an eye out on the swimmers, go together, don't wander from the pack and come home together. WE learned how to deal with life because we were free to learn - the rest came from someone wiser than us. I vote for FREE RANGE.

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  17. It is a remarkable when we think of all the risks then compared to risks that exist today. Certainly a topic of discussion on its own.

    I think I had a blended upbringing. Certainly had more freedom that my own children. We were kept busy with sports but our days weren't crammed with activities. We had free time and freedom. Too many kids are kept too busy.

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