Does 'gentle parenting' work ?

There’s also a lot of challenging behaviour coming from families where children are in charge. They happily say ‘you have to do this because Mrs X says so’ making us the villain.

I think somewhere in between would be ideal. I never want my child to be frightened of me, or of telling me something. I was battered regularly as a child and humiliated. It left me with a lot of trauma. I was determined never to follow my parents example of shit parenting. But I regularly see out and about useless parenting where kids are allowed to run riot in inappropriate settings.

I have a friend who claims she does gentle parenting- it very much sounds and looks like she just leaves her to her own devices and does as she wants- but my friend says that it's not for her to demand things of her child and she will naturally learn the consequences of her actions -
E.g breaking toys- she will learn it makes her unhappy so she will stop doing it.
Being unkind- she will learn when other kids don't want to play with her

In reality, her poor child has not been taught how to play nicely, how to take turns, how to play nicely with other kids toys etc etc
She struggles with friendship groups in school and my friend can't seem to fathom out why 🫣.

We have clear boundaries and expectations and we are consistent with effects of poor behaviour. We have lots of fun and a very loving house, but our DS knows the rules so he can happily play knowing what his options are. School say he's a lovely child and we can take him anywhere - yes he still tries to push those boundaries at times, but we are consistent and he knows the outcome.

Completely agree.
Im a teacher. A few examples from the last year or two (all children involved between 3-5)
• child wearing too small shoes because she wanted to and negotiated with Mum why she should
• child with no coat on an unpredictable day, parent said they didn’t want to wear one and seemed baffled why they couldn’t stay in if they didn’t want to go out, even though the rest of us did
• lunchboxes full of chocolate, crisps (as in more than one of each) then complaining to us child didn’t eat their one piece of fruit and ate the uhealthy food instead
• child doesn’t like drawing so don’t see why they need to try at school
• child doesn’t like potty training so haven’t tried
• child doesn’t want to wear PE kit so doesn’t
• met my new class and parents, one child didn’t want to leave so parent let them play until they were ready (seemed shocked when I politely but firmly said they needed to leave as it was the end of the visit)
The list goes on.

This is spot on, I think.

DD is a teen and a absolute dream to parent, she is an only and autistic and loves rules those probably factor into it. However I did alot of research into child development etc, set out clear boundaries, allowed her to experience risky activities safely to build resilience and communicate with her the way I expected to be communicated with. Becoming a parent is the most important job any of us that choose to have children will ever do and going into it blind with no 'training' or thought behind it seems daft to me.

I strongly believe that children shouldn't be shouted, sworn at or intimidated by parents nor should parents behave towards their child in a way they would not allow a teacher or care giver to behave.

I do believe in natural consequences and not being permissive. I believe in allowing children to cry, feel angry and frustrated and to deal with those emotions in a positive manner.

However having worked with secondary school children in a disadvantaged area (all children ho wouldhave had good access to surestart centres in our area too) which may be relevant, the most poorly behaved were unsuprisingly from chaotic and often disrespectful families often where MH and other challenges were rife and generally a traumatic environment. The second worst behaved were those with ineffectual and permissive parents that never allowed their children to experience consequences or negative emotions,never held them accountable for their actions and just allowed them to do what they want because they are a 'gentle' parent - but aren't because they only did half the work. The children brought up in respectful households, with clear boundaries and age and ability appropriate expectations of behaviour and academic progress were the best behaved.

Daisy Goodwin wrote a very interesting book called Bringing Up baby, andits a review of parenting trends through the ages and the social economic and political factors influencing them at the time.

I'm in the middle but more towards traditional parenting. I will shout if they aren't listening, pull them up on rude behaviour and if they really cross the line then yes they'll get a smacked backside.

I have friends who gentle parent and their kids without exception are awful. They are rude, selfish, entitled, interrupt constantly, call their parents names, hit, bite, throw tantrums when they don't get their way, even at 10 tears old. They've never been taught that tantrums arent acceptable so just keep having them.

One's son calls her a useless cunt and punches walls next to her head! He's 14! She keeps trying to take his hands and tell him that it's OK to be angry but it's still no then he pulls away and puts a dent in the wall and screams abuse in her face. He was never disciplined when he was young and now she physically can't control him.

My kids are generally well behaved, bit of attitude occasionally but easily corrected with a firm word about respect. They aren't afraid of me but do have a healthy respect for the fact that I won't be spoken to like crap and rude people don't get favours from me. Bit gobby yesterday want money today? Too bad. Its worked. They're happy, confident kids, come to me with their problems, I'll let them vent but they know where the line is.

@DaisyFloop ,

These sound way too gentle and avoiding natural consequences, rather than allowing them to happen.

Natural consequence for drawing on wall is either redecorating it or paying for someone else to do so (so no pocket money for a long time).

If you hit another child, natural consequence isn’t having a gentle chat but misjudging the situation and the other child giving you a very hard thump back.

Obviously depends on age of child, which you didn’t mention, but children aren’t stupid and, if you actually chat to them, they make decisions based on risk assessment (except when they truly lose it). So, they may decide the fun of drawing on a wall is worth losing pens for a bit or teaching another child a good lesson is worth being removed and a parental chat and maybe losing ‘something’.

Fear of serious consequences if you behave badly is not the same as fearing the parent. Parents should be authority figures. I don’t fear the police or jail as I don’t break the law (much) but I know if I did, I would be very fearful of the consequences.

@Thepartnersdesk "Perhaps it's not gentle parenting but this trend of overwhelming small children with choices doesn't really seem positive. Just drags things out forever."

Exactly.

I see that as "parentification" of a child, and to me that's neglectful.

(I would probably have let them eat the gross cucumber, though 😂)

Gentle parenting is authoritative.

Gentle parenting is a load of bollocks. Authoritarian parenting will traumatise your kids but authoritative parenting - firm boundaries, clear expectations, fair and reasonable punishments, along with a lot of love and care and attention in general - will help your children grow up into reasonable people.

It depends what the behaviour is. Natural consequences are a go to. If you break your toy its not replaced, if you draw on the wall pens are put away. If you don't tidy your toys you won't have time for stories.
If it was something major like my child hit another, they'd be removed from the situation and spoken to about why we don't hit and how we could express that instead and because they hit their consequences would be not having something.

Firstly, I don’t think that there is a single style of parenting that is the best. Different children and different parents all interact differently.

One of the things I realised in 10 years of (second career) teaching is there were lots of ‘styles’ successful teachers adopted. When I mentored ECTs and they observed me, they saw that my style ‘worked’ (I like to think I was quite good at it!) but when they tried to imitate me, it generally didn’t work. I always told them they had to play to their own strengths and find out what worked for them whilst being true to their own personalities. I think that this is true of parenting as well.

I do, however, think parents need to be both consistent and in charge. Children (and teens) need to feel that they are listened to, but also need clear boundaries and consequences. All good schools have these and they work.

So gentle parenting can work with some parents and some children, but definitely doesn’t for others. Ultimately, if a child regularly misbehaves and there are no consequences, you are failing in your parenting and need a plan B.

(And, if you give any credence to attachment theory, all of the important parenting is in the first years or even months of childhood).

All of that is part of gentle parenting

I honestly think that what teachers are describing sounds more like neglectful than gentle parenting.
Children "misbehaving" (what do we consider misbeheaviour changes also) is nothing new.

I often cringe when I see labeling in general, although I recognise my aspirations as a parent in your description of gentle parenting. But we are only human, and shouting (specially if we've been shouted at) is part of the experience!
I believe that a lot gets misinterpreted: technical concepts (like attachement) are so diluted that they almost loose their original meaning. Personally, I always go to the sources (Bowlby, Piaget, Winicott, Montessori, Mason... to name a few that interest me).
In general, considering children people in their own right (not mum's little project, or miniature adults), and trying to be attuned to their needs, is what seems to be best for them, regarding of the individual personality of the parent. And, at the base of all that, of course, unconditional love.
We parents need to be brave to face our own upbringings too, first of all.
I love Winicott's concept of the good enough mother, and Gordon Neufeld's idea that children must not work for our love, but rest in it.

Gentle parenting does work.
Parents who say they gentle parent but basically just can't be arsed doesn't work.

Gentle parenting is hard work. Rather than just yelling 'don't do that! Because I said so! Shut up!' It's taking time to get to their level and ask WHY they want to do it. Explaining why we don't do it. It's setting boundaries and explaining why they're set, it's about acknowledging their feelings and not just discarding them. For example if yojr child is scared by a bee instead of 'It won't hurt you stop it' it's more 'the buzzing can be scary, he's looking for a flower to land on. Let's sit and watch for a minute and see what he does. Can you make a buzzing sound like a bee' it's all about time but a lot of people use the term Gentle when they mean permissive

Hi OP, I completely empathise with you. Bear in mind that the stuff that gets to the top of the SM algorithm isn't always the best info. It's quite easy to spend too much time on IG feeling like a failure 😅

I have three DC, 6, 4, and 1. IME you're in one of the difficult stages, so be kind to yourself.

For me "general parenting" is all about giving due care to your child's inner emotional life.

This doesn't mean being permissive, in fact quite the opposite: there is the idea that permissiveness can leave children feeling insecure, whereas clear, caring boundaries will make them feel more secure. It makes sense to me that a four year old is going to want their parent to look like they know what they are doing, and have everything under control (even when it's actually chaos 🤣).

There is some good info on SM, backed up by research, with a realistic view of what's possible, it just takes a while to find it. I like https://www.janetlansbury.com/

Parenting is the art of the possible. I started out making everything hard for myself. Now I have three kids, I find myself shouting "DON'T POKE THAT STICK IN THE BABY'S EAR!" More often than I'd like to. I which I didn't, but I'm outnumbered!

Hmm I'm not sure the description is accurate. I don't think authoritative parenting necessarily means shouting. It just means having high expectations balanced by high support. Authoritarian parenting would be shouting and bossing kids about!

I'm personally not sold on gentle parenting. In my experience with people who use this style, it doesn't seem to be about having boundaries at all. What I have seen is giving children a lot of agency, choice and grace - which is good to a point - but I've only really seen this result in really stroppy kids who behave quite badly. Possibly because they are not being given simple boundaries and are anxious? Not sure

I’m another who thinks that true gentle parenting is just common sense, but the problem is that it’s been sold as a way for useless people to feel OK about not wanting to parent their children. So they go around telling everyone they’re gentle parenting, and the general public starts to believe that gentle parenting is a euphemism for not parenting.

And there are more of the useless people than the ones with common sense, hence why teachers are leaving in droves.

I was emotionally abused as a kid and had authoritarian parents, which was shit, but at least it produced kids that know how to follow instructions.

I agree that gentle parenting CAN work, but most people don’t apply it properly. Also don’t think it works for all kids even if done properly. Many parents end up not having any boundaries and very antisocial behaviour is normalised.

Makes dealing with said kids a nightmare for anyone else.

I did not do gentle parenting. I couldn’t have even if I wanted to - I was far too shouty (to my shame) and my child was a dogmatic nightmare unmoved by any consequence.

Something in between gentle and authoritarian is better. As for smacking? Mostly no, generally for safety e.g. third time toddler fiddling with plug socket a sharp smack on hand got message over when a nice “don”t do that because” didn’t. Better than an electric shock in my opinion.

I always followed the evidence on this as best as I could, and was careful to be an authoritative parent. I thought my My dad was authoritarian (actually he was a tyrant. ) and my mum permissive (actually she was checked out/absent) so I thought I had seen the damage that both of those parenting styles could do.

I read countless studies because of my own dysfunctional upbringing, my son was a really well behaved kid and I took credit for that

Roll on adolescence and it stopped working quite abruptly, our relationship fell apart over time and things became utterly intolerable at home.I tried to use the authoritative strategies I had and it just made everything worse. Eventually he was diagnosed with asd and adhd , anxiety and other health issues and I finally discovered low demand parenting, which is a very particular and counterintuitive way of interacting with children who get overwhelmed easily. it would be very easy to misrepresent low demand parenting and criticise without actually understanding it properly and seeing it in action, so I won’t try and explain or defend it here

whilst learning about this, I discovered that actually there is much debate about permissive parenting, for example see parentingscience.com/permissive-parenting/ We are generally terrified of being the permissive parent and quick to judge others, but it’s a complicated subject.

for now we are sticking with low demand parenting, and my son is flourishing compared to where he was a few months ago, it’s working and it’s saved our relationship and both of our mental and physical health. I would have judged a parent doing the things I’m doing now, I’ve had to unlearn so much and start again but I’m so glad and relieved to have found this method and shudder to think of what would have happened if we hadn’t found it

guess what I’m saying is that the parenting style not only has to work for you and your child, but also the time of life you are in and things change, both in your family and in our understanding of child development and best parenting practices, so it’s a dance over time and something to keep coming back to.

i think it 100% depends on the child

youngest I think we did gentle parenting worked well

oldest needs assertiveness firm boundaries and clear instruction and absolutely thrives off that

IMO the issue with gentle parenting arises when it is half assed. I.e. the parents speak gently, but don’t have any expectations or boundaries to go with it, and don’t actually do anything.

so if little Johnny is throwing rocks he merely gets a “oh Johnny, don’t throw rocks” and then both parent and Johnny continue what they are doing.

I agree that communication is important, but it drives me mad when I see parents talking to misbehaving children far too much and trying to reason and negotiate with a toddler whose powers of reasoning and understanding are simply not developed enough yet. Young children need simple, clear, calm instructions about what is and is not acceptable. Some parents talk on and on, in a hideously calm, reasonable voice, striving for agreement, and their child clearly just tunes out.

By all means let them feel they have some choice and agency but it should be along the lines of "Do you want to put on the blue socks or the red socks today?" rather than "Do you want to put some socks on?" Adults are the ones in charge (or should be).

Teachers get fed up because when there is a problem too many parents choose to believe their children's version of events rather than the teacher's even when there is indisputable evidence that the child is not telling the truth. They say things like "My child never lies" or "No, I can tell when my child is lying".

One true example: a child brought a toy to school. The toy vanished from the child’s bag and several other children said they had seen Child A, who had admired the toy and had a record of taking and keeping other children's property (something her parents would never believe was deliberate) near that bag. Child A was adamant she knew nothing about it, despite being given opportunities to own up easily ("Perhaps you just wanted to look at it again and then put it back in your own bag by mistake?") Child A complained to her mother after school. The mother, a proponent of "gentle parenting", came in full of indignation. Her child never told lies, how dare we, etc. The mother finally agreed to our request for her to look in her child's bag. The toy was there. We left the two of them alone to talk about it.

When we returned, the narrative had changed: the child had "obviously" taken it because she wanted to give it to someone else. Couldn't we see that she was an unhappy child who was trying to buy friendship? It was all the school's fault! (The parents had actually previously refused to give consent for the child to be included in a "nurture group".)

Obviously those parents had poor parenting skills quite apart from their "gentle parenting" beliefs, but they just could not bring themselves to tell their children clearly and firmly that some behaviour was just plain wrong and would not be defended.

Its hard to get a grip on what it actually is, as any criticism is immediately met with 'thats not gentle parenting, that's permissive parenting' This suggests to me that at best GP is merely coining a phrase for a common sense, kind but firm, non abusive style that most would advocate for long before it was monetised through book sales. At worst, it is a cause of confusion leading to poor boundaries and children who lack empathy, believing their rights and feelings should be centred at all times.