Aibu to think is just luck or your parenting that makes your child behave ?

[havinganothertry]

I spent a day last weekend at a picnic with a big group of NCT friends and their partners/ husbands. All our kids are 3 ish now and some have littler ones too. All the kids played nicely ( around 20 kids) apart from two. These two have perfectly lovely parents, who did try to correct their behaviour to no avail. Is it a consistency or wording thing, as in maybe they don't correct them at home? These two children were shouty, grabby, rough and one kept taking other kids food or toys by snatching it away from them aggressively.

Now my DS is a bit of a wall flower these days, he's pretty shy. However he has not been prefect as around 1 yrs he went through a hitting phase. I had to follow him around all the time to stop him before he lashed out and tell him no instead of getting to chat with the other mums

So aibu to think these parents weren't parenting enough or was it just luck for the rest of us ? My DS doesn't get threats like no more tv if you do x at the moment, so I see 3 is a tricky age. However most of the kids would be in some sort of preschool so surely used to being around other and this bad behaviour from a few isn't allowed there ?

I think at 3 bad behaviour is often a temporary result of good parenting. My DD is normally well behaved but when she is told off she can sometimes shout, hit, behave worse and worse because she doesn't like not getting her way and is working through her options of winning and getting her way or just reacting to the negative emotions of being told no.

If I didn't discipline her she wouldn't be reacting but she also wouldn't learn wrong from right.

As she is growing up, her tantrums are becoming less and less frequent. Its just a part of growing up for many children.

Also children act out if they are over stimulated, too tired, unsure of a situation, feeling poorly. The kids could just have been having a bad day. Three is still very little.

Both, especially with such young children.

I think it can be both and also the fact that's there's not a one size fits all parenting, if there was someone would be extremely rich by now giving courses to parents on the key to raising happy, well balanced and well behaved children.

I think different kids respond to different approaches to discipline and for children who are naturally more challenging, some parents are not getting it right, not through lack of trying, but by not using the right approach for the personality type of their child.

Of course there are parents who parent badly and kids who are just born placid and well behaved too!

Depends - at 2 or 3 they can be a law onto themselves.
At 4+ a badly behaved child is down to parenting

Definite combination imo.

Disclaimer - I wouldn’t contemplate it irl at all but I do wonder if smacking used to fill the gap for some kids. There’s a definite section of children who just don’t respond to consequences like losing a toy or sitting in time out. I swear I know a child who makes it his mission to seek revenge for punishment (he’s 99% sweetheart by the way but has perfected his death glare already!)

Part of the reason I say parenting is because one of my DC has autism and what made the biggest difference to his behaviour was how I parented him. I got some fantastic tips from someone from the Green Team in my area - couldn't tell you exactly what or who they were - and it literally transformed our life at home. I was able to apply similar techniques to the other DC and it was amazing how effective they were.

All the TV programmes like Super Nanny and so on, they turn the kids behaviour around by addressing the parenting that's gone wrong.

I bet the people who disagree with parenting have kids they deem a bit ‘spirited’ but other parents probably complain about . Toddlers need immediate consequences to their actions - that means praise when they do something good, and an immediate but calm no with a reason why when they don’t. Violent kids need to be supervised and you need a strategy that works for your child when they tantrum (for one DN it’s a tight hug and carrying him for a bit; for another DN it’s distraction and for another it’s ignoring etc.) Do it enough and eventually you will, provided there are no SEN, have a well adjusted and behaved toddler. But this has to start from the beginning.

It's both.

The "spirited" ones take a lot more work and effort to result in "good" behaviour, but it's doable. It just takes all your effort and sanity to get there.

People with easy going kids have an easier time on the behaviour management. QED.

A lot of luck. Probably 75% luck and 25% parenting.

I'd say both. Although I can see how important good parenting is on spirited children, who need a lot more parenting than more docile children.

My spirired child did turn out to have ASD after years of my feeling like a crap parent and wondering why my friends' parenting tricks didn't work on dd1. Then I had dd2 who is naturally obedient and responds well to conventional parenting. Just different personalities.

Not saying you can actually change a child's personality (or even behaviour) by parenting, but you can at least ensure other people are not inconvenienced by removing them in a fireman's lift.

I spent a lot of time removing dd at one point. And yes, she did later turn out to have additional needs. But from the pov of what went on at the individual party, those other kids had a right to feel safe and not be intimidated either way.

I bet the people who disagree with parenting have kids they deem a bit ‘spirited’ but other parents probably complain about

Nope. I have twins who are almost 3, both diagnosed with ASD (diagnosed at 2 because it’s very obvious - no speech at all, minimal social skills etc). However, when we are out they are generally beautifully behaved - tantrums are extremely rare and the worst thing they do is snatch from each other, mainly because they have no concept of mine / yours / sharing etc.

The fact that I have two with ASD who behave well doesn’t mean I’m parenting better than someone whose child has ASD and is aggressive. I just consider that we are fortunate in that regard, so far.

There will always be an exception to the rule - great parenting, difficult kid. But there is a correlation between effective parenting and children who know how to behave. There is no way all good manners, respectful behaviour, kindness and respect is just luck, otherwise we would be seeing children with truly dreadful, negligent parents growing up wth wonderful manners, as often as we were seeing children with responsible parents who make the effort doing the same. And we don’t see that.

Both. If dc1s behaviour was the test of my parenting skill, I'm perfect. Dc2 shows I'm just normal. They have very different personalities and have done from the start. Obviously that also means they need slightly different approaches to discipline... And so the circle goes!

Both. One of mine was incredibly well behaved. A stern No! worked every time. Second dc just laughed at me. We really had to work on the behaviour. Fortunately neither of them were hitters or biters with other children.

I think it can be a mixture of both, but the personality of the child is a massive factor in it!
I’ve parented both DCs in the exact same way - leaning more into attachment/gentle parenting.
DC1 is a very bright little girl, with endless amounts of energy. But she is also extremely strong-willed, stubborn and is like talking to a brick wall 99% of the time. She also gets frustrated very easily and doesn’t like to try and solve problems herself.
DC2 is so laid back he may as well be horizontal. Again he has a ridiculous amount of energy, and is practically hyperactive most of the time. But he doesn’t seem to possess the same kind of stubbornness as DC1 - for example if I tell him a certain behaviour needs to stop he’s just kind of like “meh, ok then” and will stop and move onto something else with very little fuss normally. Whereas DC1 will lose her shit spectacularly over very little.
They are both subject to the same household rules, both face the same consequences to bad behaviour etc but are just very different children who require different parenting approaches to different situations.

My 2 year old gets glowing nursery reports, loves dancing and stories, has great speech ability and plays well with others but doesn't listen when asked to stop or stay away from somewhere/ something and will scream and cry very dramatically when I or dh step in. I often have to physically carry a screaming toddler away from whatever it is. I am quiet and firm and consistent and have no idea whether I'm doing something wrong or if this is a personality/ age thing. I'm reading lots of parenting books and hoping it settles down as she understands more. Distraction/ acknowledging feelings and offering an alternative/ negotiation works sometimes but not when she's got her heart set on something. A clear firm no still results in bursting in to tears even though this might be several times a day. Maybe by 3 she will be one of the well behaved children crosses fingers and downloads 10 more books about toddler parenting

Both.
I have two boys. The oldest is very calm, laid back and a rule follower. The youngest is very feisty and pushes boundaries all the time, at home and at school.
My parenting style has been the same for both.

That's a good point a pp made about difficult behaviour sometimes being effectively exacerbated in the short term by good parenting. Some of them do struggle a lot more with boundaries than others. Like anything else, not all kids pick the skill up quickly. It's worth it in the longer run, but with eg a 3 year old, teaching them they cant have everything they want may well lead to more acting up now, as they learn. Equally, some of them need much less parenting to avoid the sort of behaviour mentioned.

I bet the people who disagree with parenting have kids they deem a bit ‘spirited’ but other parents probably complain about

Nope. I have the kids the other parents ask if they're just putting on a show being so good, that got thanked (not kidding you, we were gobsmacked) by two teachers for bringing up such great kids. . .

But I know it's not all down to our fantastic parenting. We are very lucky that we had two reasonable malleable, intelligent, positive natured, and neuro-typical girls.

They are lucky that they have been brought into a calm, positive, ordered environment that was very child-centric, where everything they needed and a lot of what they wanted, was provided.

It’s 50/50.
My eldest is 5 and I have to be very strict with him or he will misbehave - he has always been quite ‘difficult’ really and takes a lot of guidance and discipline to behave properly - he is thoroughly lovely just very energetic and stubborn so does need reminding about things.
My DD on the other hand is an angel. Honestly she does have her moments but they’re very few and I need to tell her off once and that’s it. She is the type of child you can take anywhere and she behaves impeccably with pretty much no input from me. And that is absolutely not all down to my parenting at all. Perhaps if she was my only child I would believe that I am an amazing parent and I’very got it all figured out, but I know better!

For a NT child i think behaviour is down to parenting.
I think boundaries need to be set at toddler stage, obviously at an approximate level.
For me parenting is about having boundaries and consequences, showing emotional warmth, having a conistant approach and being concise with instructions.

You're oversimplifying a complex issue because it was easy for you (albeit tedious).

There are multiple factors including how well the parent's personality meshes with a particular child and that child's needs and way of experiencing and interacting with the world.

Hence why two siblings can seemingly have the same privileged childhood with the same caring parents but one grows up with, say attachment issues and the other doesn't. Parents' relating styles, personality etc suited one child but not the other. (Other factors around too, obviously).

You were just lucky that everything came together in your favour on this occasion.

Personality. I had twins, at 3 one twin was and Angel the other a demon. They were parented EXACTLY the same way.