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???

It was always the case that there was a diverse range of personalities and psychology, yes. But it's only in recent decades that much of what was once regarded as fairly normal diversity is now regarded as pathological and requiring medication.

I don't mean to downplay serious cases where medication is clearly required. But with these diagnoses now becoming much more frequent, it's important to ask how much of the more problematic behaviour is due to social and other environmental factors that unintentionally encourage it.

Teacher here and I'm also going to be unpopular. When they go on residentials and we don't allow screens, running about at dinner , and se insist on them just chatting with friends, they do it as its a strict rule

You should see the "other side" of France....

I dont get it. What's wrong with that? 😂 sounds really nice!

It's not rocket science that if you wallop kids or otherwise create a culture of fear around "misbehaviour", those with less pronounced neurodivergencies may manage successfully to mask a lot more, so they are less noticed. This comes at great cost to the children though.

God the disability bashing on this thread is unreal. You think that by not saying it we can’t understand what you’re implying.

How about people like myself who have ADHD for nearly 40 years? Or my sibling who has autism for the same length of time? And I wasn’t the only one in my class looking back. Being disruptive isn’t an indicator of not having an illness, masking is a very real (and exhausting) thing. I’m so glad that children of today are getting more support and better medical understanding than I did.

Your child/ren have a disability which means it's impossible for them to behave as if they're neurotypical. I've read previous threads on here about the way ND children are treated in France - parents whose children are disabled don't go out a lot.

It's nothing to do with screens or colouring. It's to do with your child being allowed to be their neurodivergent self without judgement.

And because ND children often mask when they're out. Mine mask at school, then all hell breaks loose when they get home because they can unmask in their safe space and they need to process all the stress and anxiety of living as Audhd children in a neurotypical world.

It doesn't make you a great teacher because you can force a bunch of kids to sit and eat nicely. Of course you can. You're not their parent. Behaviour at home and behaviour at school is often very very different. Bit weird that you don't know that as a teacher.

Autism and ADHD aren't personality types. They're disabilities caused by a difference in brain development.

Absolutely agree.

In Britain we indulge children in the wrong way - we let them get away with bad behaviour.

Other European countries indulge them in the right way - they give them time and boundaries.

Food and eating in French culture has far more importance than in the UK. It is a cultural difference. French children have this reinforced by every adult they interact with as well as through peer pressure.

As @stargirl1701 says - other adults would remonstrate with a child not their own. That used to be acceptable here, too - now you'll get a mouthful of abuse from the parents if you so much as asked a child not to throw chips about.

It takes a village to raise a child.

So? She/he was just saying that they don't allow screens and get the kids to chat to each other? Weird you've taken umbrage to a simple explanation of what is expected on a residential 😂

What makes you think the teacher doesn’t know this?

Haha love this. The most boring drivel imaginable 😂😂

You need to try living in other European countries. Spanish kids are not ‘well behaved’. In Czech, children get hit in public if they don’t ‘behave’, very young children too.They don’t give them ‘time and boundaries’.

This bonkers belief that British children and parents are bad is absolute crap.

Perhaps they come here for help 🤷🏽‍♀️

I can't believe people are taking Pamela Druckerman seriously. She's an American who worked out she could make money telling anglophones that the French parent and eat perfectly.

until a few years ago, psychoanalysts were still in charge of autism in France, claiming it was caused by refrigerator mothers. The French approach to autism and neurodiversity and learning disabilities leaves a lot to be desired.

I'll freely admit that French school dinners are better than either British or American ones. But the French system is really quite rigid. I would say that the British approach of keeping kids out of places like restaurants ultimately doesn't serve children well. There's quite an individualistic anglophone approach these days to "deserving" child free spaces in public.

in any case, neither British nor French children are the worst behaved that I've met. Americans either.

Unbearably smug.

I’m British and my kids have always behaved like the French family you describe. What made you attribute your children’s behaviour to their nationality?

I don't agree. My children are 3 and 4 and do have about an hour of screen time a day during school holidays. But they can sit down during a meal for about an hour without any screen time.

Im with you. My kids weren't allowed screens / gamers when out, they were for at home or long journeys only.
If we were out they interacted with us and enjoyed the food or the activity with us. Yes I would take colouring for if they finished before the adults. But they didnt misbehave because that was normal for us as a family

Agree with this. Also applies to most parts of Africa and the Caribbean as well.

OP, if it’s any consolation I work with a number of French people and these well behaved children often grow up into lazy, arrogant and entitled adults. HTH!

I'm sure that's true for the serious cases, yes. But diagnoses appear to be increasing alarmingly and are now more about people "being on the spectrum" rather than exhibiting actual disability.

Yup. We USED to be able to do this in the UK, but you can't even look at a kid in the wrong way anymore without getting yelled at. I told a horrid little aggressive girl very firmly "NO" a few months ago and the dad, who had been standing there allowing to yell obscenities at us, started yelling saying "You don't tell off other people's kids! You don't tell off other people's kids!" over and over and over (I replied well if you'd done it instead then other people wouldn't have to!).

When my dh was younger and freshly arrived in the country a number of decades ago some kids on the bus were calling him the 'n' word (he's Far east asian), his step grandmother who is white English clopped the boy right round the ear and gave him a verbal bollocking on being a dirty little racist. The other adults on the bus nodded. Couldn't do that now!

Exactly this, Shouting.