Parenting Professor says that she supports smacking children

Someone’s forgotten what this stage is like. How old are your kids now?

While I do understand this argument I think a slap or smack is with an open palm and hit is with a closed fist.

I would not do either to a child FYI. (Or an adult!) But that is the distinction, I think.

My toddler head but me in the face so hard she broke my nose. The lump is still there. My other child kicked me in the foot hard enough my toenail went right back and went black. And one of them scratched me in the eye to the extent it was bleeding. All whilst screaming at me. It fucking hurt. I’ve never smacked them but I think a LOT of people forget how strong, persistent and aggressive 2-4 year olds actually can be.

Oh, the terrible twos. Calm and consistent then. I assume her brother is older since she is just two? Was he hurt and upset when she pushed him off? I think a bit of physical pushing and shoving between siblings is normal behaviour at that age so would see this more as a 'hmm, she's getting a bit tired, time to deflect' so assuming he was OK I'd just say 'OK, who wants a snack before we go home?' And get her off the climbing frame that way. If her older brother was hurt I'd concentrate on him and check he was alright and offer him a snack. That would no doubt get her to come down and demand a snack at which point I'd say 'you have to give DBro a cuddle and say sorry you pushed him first' and once she'd done that give her a snack. If she refused to apologise then I'd say 'OK. Right DBro, time to go home' and walk away with your son. At which point a 2 year old will either run after you and apologise or start having a tantrum. If she has a tantrum keep walking with your son until you're a decentish distance away but can keep an eye on her then wait for her calm down but chat to your son about other stuff so he is getting the attention. Once she calms down and comes to you then tell her to cuddle and apologise again then snack and home.

Tantrums are developmentally normally and are a way of testing boundaries. But she can't hurt her brother so you endure the tantrum and stick to that boundary. Most toddlers will cave before a determined parent will, and if they don't you are bigger than them and can pick them up and can carry them home. Don't shout, don't negotiate, just be boring and calm as you repeatedly hold the line.

To minimise it. There's a reason nobody would ever say "did he smack you?" to a woman suffering domestic violence.

But surely that’s physically abusive? You wouldn’t do that to an adult, etc

So then you would use physical force to drag, push and pull and hold back.

I don’t see that as greatly different tbh. Maybe because I know just how much force it would take to contain her.

That’s not what I’m saying.

I am saying both are damaging. If you’re having to use a lot of physical force because your toddler is so wound up, that’s got the potential to be dangerous.

Smacking is not something I’m ever going to condone but I don’t think wrestling and manhandling a toddler is really something o am comfortable with either.

But mine is being a fucking nightmare at the moment and it’s possible not all toddlers are quite so forceful when angry. Mine is, though. All I can say is trust me: to get her to get off a climbing frame and keep her off it you’d have to rip her off and hold her down with a LOT of force.

Sometimes small children do need to be restrained for safety reasons and I agree, in that situation I would drag them off a climbing frame and hold them tightly if they wouldn't sit still.

The"study" and smacking = lower GCSE results is the biggest correlation evidence going.

IME parents who smack their children as a regular form of discipline generally also have other problematic parenting traits and generally have very chaotic home lives- involvement with addiction services/ regular monitoring and reports to SS/ very low conflict resolution abilities/ in contact with police or prison services. All this chaotic environment does not bode well for GCSE achievement.

They do a good deal.of shouting at the whole group and a good deal of making examples of unruly children by singling them out for individual shouting, that's how.

Children are also picked up physically and toys wrested from their hands if they are refusing to follow the instructions.

Agree. The mental health of parents is at rock bottom. Not only are standards ridiculously high and expected to be ‘in character’ 100% of the time, the general duties of parents is MASSIVE compared to even 20 years ago.

I regularly see the following on here:

1. Parents asking for clothing suggestions for their 20 something year old child
2. Parents asking to how to get their basement dwelling, non-rent-paying, universal-credit-claiming violent adult child out of their house
3. Parents phoning their adult kids multiple times a day and expected to be available for ‘emotional support’ day and night
4. Parents driving their 18 year olds around everywhere as ‘getting a bus after 6pm is so dangerous’
5. Parents wanting to know the ins and outs of their child’s degree modules and scoring - wtf?
6. Parents asking whether they are being unreasonable not to let their 14 year old’s girlfriend/boyfriend stay over

I could go on. Fucking madness

There are some posters suggesting that a slap is better for the child than restraint. how? What does this teach?

Are you trying to claim that no parent has ever squeezed a child harder than strictly necessary when doing that? Or carried them or set them down pretty roughly?

This topic needs some nuance. I'm not condoning smacking and don't do it but it's obvious that there are a lot of miserable parents being treated like crap by their kids in a way that they would not have dared to do with their own parents.

children behave very differently in childcare settings than home. It’s fairly well documented.

@AmberTigerEyes but whatever you do, in that situation you’re using physical force to overcome a toddler - otherwise she’s definitely getting straight back on that climbing frame! So I guess my question is: it’s acceptable to pull her off and to pin her down and to grab her and manhandle her and all of that is firm boundaries but smacking her is abuse?

As I’ve said, I didn’t do either, so please don’t anyone interpret that as me being in favour of smacking. I’m not and never will be. Just the same, I can see why people do it in a way that once I’d have been appalled at.

@SomersetSausage

Your comment on insufficient pushback and the unintended but actually very predictable effects of validation of emotions behind violent behaviour perfectly articulated everything that is wrong about the gentle parenting approach.

Thank you.

I wasn’t smacked by my parents, but educated at a time when corporal punishment was occasionally used. The threat was usually enough to nip poor behaviour in the bud. I’m not sure if I’d want to go back to those days, equally teachers seem to have it tough.

Picking up a toddler and even carrying them away while they are screaming is not at all like hitting a child.

Wholeheartedly disagree, in the vast majority of circumstances you should be able to.

How on earth do you think nurseries have a whole bunch of 2 year olds stop play to eat when it’s lunch time, go to the toilet on command, coexist with relative order? They don’t go around smacking them all.

I managed to parent my autistic DC without physical violence. Surely you can parent NT kids without losing it and resorting to violence? We really need to talk about lack of resilience in parents.

Yes I would have physically removed them. If it was getting to the point where I couldn't hold them safely without hurting them then we would have gone home. I can't equate that with hitting a child.

We just let ours roll about screaming until they tired out. Maybe tossed them a pillow or stuffed toy to ravage. kept our distance until they were calm enough to understand our words and respond to gentle instructions.

Mostly we’d watch for the flags of an impending tantrum and head it off before it got that bad.

Why isn't it 'beating'?

If you're going to resort to hyperbole, why not go the whole nine yards?

And sorry, I know that sounds like I’m being really irritating and splitting hairs. But I do think the ‘just remove them from the situation / make them to a time out’ underestimate just how much physical force this takes if you have a toddler in the throes of a tantrum.