What is going on with British kids?

[FrenchAreDoingSomethingRight]

On holiday in France. An upmarket holiday camp and we are the only British family here. It was recommended by a French friend and I didn't realise it only has French families on holiday

Dinner is set 3 course dinner. My kids are 5 and 3. My older boy has ADHD we think (referred by school), our younger one doesn't as far as we know. Both kids are trying their hardest at dinner. There is v loud music playing and the pool party bit is still open. They run off after every course for a dance. Older one tries to stand up sometimes. We have colouring in books etc. Really they're fine. At restaurants and pubs they are totally average in terms of being able to sit at the table. No screens.

Not a single French kid has done anything wrong. No screens or even colouring. They might not all be talking to their parents but every single one is sitting through the whole 90 min dinner and waiting to dance at the end. So patient.

Do no French kids have ADHD or ND? Or even just kid like and cheeky? I have always tried my best with dinner times but these kids aren't even considering running off.

What is going on???

FGS!

No trauma in my family or ds. Yet we are riddled with ASD. Lots of genetic links though.

She's talking bollocks
What do you think these parents gain?

In France à normal meal at home has 3 courses. From maternelle (âge 3) children are used to sitting down for a 3 course lunch at school.
At home/school the starter is often something simple like grated carrots and the désert can be just a yoghurt or a pièce of fruit but it is still 3 separate courses.

No, I didn't deliberately misunderstand it.

I was autistic from birth. I was showing (missed, because it was the 80's) signs in primary school. I was also sexually assaulted and bullied and left traumatised by those events. Believe me, I know fully how having a flashback to my rape during a smear test differs from me being completely unable to tolerate the texture of peas. I know fully how flinching from a raised male voice differs from me not understanding why NT people need so many extra words ("would you mind awfully" "could you possibly" etc) around a simple request in order not to perceive it as rude. The first item of each pair is caused by trauma. The second is part of being autistic.

French children are probably told no once in a while.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say if you were born in France, and your parents and grandparents were all born in France, and you have lived your whole life in France, then you’re….French.

I’d be interested to know how many of the posters on here bashing British children/parents actually have children?

Quite. I've never seen a boulangerie in France ever!

like we see in your average Brit Coffee shop every day, bonus for mum changing nappies on the table😂

If the opposite is being a stuck up, I wish I was living with stuck up French people!

Perhaps not (although hot chocolate for breakfast?) Just for gouter….BN biscuits?!

I’d quite like a French type Revolution on this thread.

Us peasants who don’t use cutlery, feed our kids E numbers, and let them leave the table early shoukd rise up against the smugness and ‘manners’ on this thread.

as having children mean you have to be in contact with other people children the most, I'd say quite a few! 😂

My children can sit through a meal in a restaurant 🤷‍♀️ we’ve never allowed them screens in restaurants, have family dinners at the table at home etc..
But also have realistic expectations, have a card game ready just in case, talk to them so they’re engaged at the table, keep things fun. I loved family meals at restaurants when I was a kid and I want my kids to feel the same.

There would have been behavioural expectations set very young, the French have a very low tolerance for poor behaviour of their kids. Basically, the structure that we try and instil when our children are diagnosed has already been in place as standard, so things never get so out of hand.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/suffer-the-children/201203/do-french-kids-have-adhd?amp

Still curios, is pop tarts a thing in England now? 😂 The two posters talking about eating pop tarts will not reply. I am just curious, as I thought this was just an American thing.

Are French children taken to "proper" restaurants more often? With courses and cutlery and so on? In the UK children have less experience of proper sit down meals. Also school dinners in France are proper sit down lunches which they all have.

I would watch the assumptions wholivesondrurylane.

I would also watch your assumptions about other people and other familes.

...there is no 'we' ....

As a household we don't own a television, never ever have owned one.

So it seems your 'mindlessly shoving' applies to you and not to those who don't have a television in the first place. We actually do stuff like reading books in our house.

Don't ASSUME or STEREOTYPE thanks.

I am assuming most of the posters are Brits. It's funny only a certain few take things that personally. Something strikes a nerve with you?

I think smacking is much more tolerated, encouraged even. It’s a far more adult centric culture. Children are expected to fit into adult’s lives rather than the other way around. I’m not sure it’s a good thing.

I love France but would hate to raise children there. I remember pushing my three year old around a supermarket and getting very dirty looks because she was talking to me and I was talking back to her. She wasn’t rowdy, rude, hyperactive. She was just talking. Her behaviour was absolutely fine but clearly not acceptable in France.

Don't even get me started on the reaction I got when ( discreetly) breastfeeding my 2 year old. Wow. They really don’t do breastfeeding 😂

Most likely not.

Definitely less tolerance to disability and general out of control childish behaviour and so parents who can't control their kids for whatever reason are far less likely to take them to places where that would be noticed.

I was raised much the same way I think many French kids are raised (and we did spend a lot of time in France...)..

We were expected to sit down and be quiet, our presence at the meal was tolerated and only on the proviso we did this - we knew if we were noisy/couldn't sit still/interrupted adult conversation, we would be swiftly removed from the venue and put in the car and generally, left there or if not suitable, parents would then tag team the meal/minding the kid.

That did not happen very often, I think because we knew the consequences would be carried out without any messing about and because we knew we were not the centre of attention, we were there out of necessity, not out of desire to spend time with us, talk to us etc.

We did not interrupt, because we knew we did not have anything valid to add to the conversation (and if we tried and said something stupid we knew about it PDQ) which put us off and taught us to shuttup and listen!

I don't know that harsh threats and humiliation is the ideal way to educate children, and it wasn't always that harsh, in that we were also taken to eat out at more relaxed venues, on occasions when our presence was actually wanted rather than merely tolerated - but it was VERY clear that there were times that were 'for adults, shut up and keep your head down' and times that were more child-centric.

Long term - mm, I know how to eat politely at any kind of dinner table and have no urge to run off to dance floors or stand up and shout etc.

On the other hand it took around 20 years of hard work to learn how to be involved in a conversation without fearing humiliation for having said the 'wrong thing'...

Lol pop tarts!? There were a thing in the late 90’s in England perhaps? Don’t think they exist now.

They*

It’s just the pick me mentality. British children are all feral … except my precious darlings who have ordered their own caviar from 2 and would never dream of colouring at the table.

No poptarts are not really a thing in the UK.

I think you can buy them at those money laundering American Candy stores or whatever they are called because my DC saw them on telly and were interested.