My dear sister is lovely, but I feel the way she treats her DS(9) is not helping him develop and mature. Some of the things that concern me are
- Regularly sleeping with him in his bed (I dread the reaction when he let's this slip at school).
- Regularly back tracking on rules or instructions - I feel he would really benefit from consistency rather than ruling the roost with threat of tantrums.
- Generally having low expectations of ability and behaviour... Eg toys aimed at younger children, baby talk etc. He seems to restrict his interactions to this younger level (less challenging?)
He's way behind at school, has no resilience and has a very negative attitude to homework/learning/being given helpful advice about how to do anything... Quite abrupt and impatient, and missing out on so many opportunities to discover more about the world. (eg "I don't want you to tell me what the equator/marsupial/delta is in this cartoon, I just want to watch it, don't interrupt") (he does have a rewind on the remote!)
I'd like to encourage my dear sister to explore some new parenting techniques, but I realise this is not my business, and I could offend her by suggesting anything. I suppose lots of children grow up perfectly delightful and successful whatever parenting styles they are exposed to - unfortunately my nephew does not seem on track to be doing so well at this rate. I really want to drop some pebbles in the pond to help her... What would MN recommend?