Super nanny

[Marmaladeoncrumpets]

Watched what I assume was an old show on tv today (is super nanny still going?) and fairly shocked by the tactics used. I remember seeing it on Sunday mornings many years ago, before dc and Dh and I saying to each other, what a nightmare having kids looked, as we lounged around probably hungover and with no commitments for the day 🤣
I do remember thinking she was great, but then, I had no kids or no idea 🤷🏻‍♀️
Did you ever follow her?

Anyone remember her

She’s awful

Yes I remember her but her parenting methods are out of date and bad for development.

I remember reading somewhere that you got $1500 to go on the American one!

We tried to follow her model/pathway of consequences, but, it never said what you should do if you put the kid on the naughty step and they just would not stay there. At all. For a moment. No matter how long you tried.

One family mentioned that the kids where worse when she was around due to filming everyday for 2 weeks. No privacy, tired children having tantrums not because of parenting but due to tiredness and stress from filming. Afterward the children s behaviour was worse than when she arrived

It did tell you what you should do. Pick the child up and put them back on the step and restart the timer. Repeatedly. No matter how long it takes.

However, all the “naughty step” and other time out methods teach is that when you’re dealing with big feelings your parents don’t want to deal with you and you need to figure it out on your own.

She's useless. I actually saw an old clip the other day where she was telling a couple they were over feeding their newborn baby... you can't over feed a baby and the baby has 'no routine' this baby was about 2 weeks old!!

That’s not strictly true. You cannot overfeed a breastfed baby directly from the breast.

You can overfeed a bottlefed baby.

She is a fucking idiot who only ever bullied children into submission

We did follow the back to bed technique which worked really well and I also agree with telling a child the behaviour you expect from them when you leave the house but the rest of it is rubbish.

I thought her naughty step method was brilliant. Until i spent what felt like a billion hours (no idea how long it was) putting a toddler back on the step. He got more and more upset and by the end I don't think he even knew what he did wrong. Talking to him about it was much more effective.

Like @Rosebel there are some things I did follow. I liked the back to bed part, and I found the clear boundaries helpful. I also liked her ethos about not making food a massive deal.

Other stuff was useless and daft. But surely that’s the point of any of these parenting “models”- you select the bits that work for you and junk the rest?

Did she ever have kids? Reading books by "experts" only gets you so far.

Worked a treat with my ds who was a holy terror, he soon figured out that his big feelings weren't appropriate when he decided to spit at people ( the joys of having an older cousin 🙄😂)

The whole point was consistency, keep retuning to bed or step so they got the message that you meant business.

I didn't like her American series at all, she comes across as really quite rude and nasty where as the old UK series she was firm but fair. I stopped watching after the episode she threw a chicken nugget at a parent.

@SafeAsAHero You can't.
You cannot physically force feed a child. If they are not hungry they will not take it. Just like they wouldn't with being breastfed.

I think she gets a hard time now actually.
If you watch the programmes, alongside the time out stuff, there is vast amounts of getting families to communicate, making parents step up and parent, and getting routines and boundaries in place. She did a lot of teaching parents how to play with their kids.
She emphasised sitting down to a family meal, and talking to your kids, listening to what they have to say
All of which are good, and also tending to get 2 minutes compared to the long clips of temper tantrums which make better telly.

I remember clips of her talking to some of the men and giving them a verbal kick up the arse.

At the time, everyone did time out, so she was just of her time with that. (and no it didn't bloody work) but her back to bed does.
I find her annoying (and SOO LOUD) and over simplistic, but she had a lot of good stuff as well.

Yes this. I tried it was and never again. He need a calm mum and hold him untill he calmed down and a quick discussion about what he did then it was forgotten about.

@PinkButtercups that makes sense in theory, but if you’re not pace feeding a bottle the teat will trigger their suck reflex and they will drink that bottle whether they’re truly hungry or not. Especially when they’re very small and can’t easily push away or resist the bottle

South Park did an episode on her where Cartman called her a sad lonely woman who couldn’t have children of her own.

@Intrepidescape That’s horrible.

The whole naughty step bollocks is so outdated and it makes me sad people still do it. Little children don’t have the brain development to ‘think about what they’ve done’ in that way. Just removes connection which is the opposite of what they need

errrrr, it's South Park..........

She did a new season in more recent times, 2018 perhaps. She's since gone on to do a few more shows that dealt with bigger problems and families with trauma.

She's not completely rubbish. It very much depends on your starting position. Some parents only solved problems by yelling, smacking or walking away and leaving the other parent to deal with it. Her techniques are better than those approaches. She always encouraged staying calm, never using physical force, adapting the environment to suit the child, giving clear expectations and using positive reinforcement and lots of praise. Those core elements are still important. The original show ran from about 2005 so it was made for a different time and it's obviously aimed at parents who are in over their heads. I'd you look at the participants in the USA version it was always wealthy families, with huge homes, the majority of children under 6 and at least one parent who worked all the time and had no idea. Screaming, giving up and depression were quite common so it offered a ear path forward for those types of parents. There were quite a few parents who smacked, uses hot sauce on the tongue or used a belt so her techniques are obviously much better.

As a society we have changed our approach and not many high quality parents would endorse all of her techniques. The beauty step ages particularly badly I think. Teaching a child that they must comply immediately for any request or will be punished by being forced to sit away, with no engagement and support to learn to manage behaviour is pretty bad. The back to bed technique was solid but I hated the idea of sitting with your back to the child. I did like that she seriously considered the impact of boredom on behaviour and valued parents having fun to rebuild the relationship. She never blamed the kids either but always the parent which was great.

She wasn't all bad! Yes I remember the family with the baby. It was a bottle fed child and they did seem to be over feeding him as he gagged up the milk. She encouraged them to write down the feeds and they spoke about it being revolutionary 😂 I think that they would have been familiar with the concept.

I get what you're saying I just don't think you can overfeed a baby. None of mine have ever latched onto a bottle if they do not want it and that's from birth. Maybe I'm going off my experience so in my opinion you can't over feed a baby.