article on compliant children versus rebellious ones, just appeared on guardian.co.uk

[moanyoldbag]

check this out - it's just gone up on the Guardian's website. Brilliant Annalisa Barbieri questions whether compliant children are really the aim of the game when it comes to parenting. Join the debate or forward the link on...

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/jan/19/are-obedient-children-a-good-thing?INTCMP=SRCH

Ah makes me feel better for DS refusing to brush his teeth earlier

Ah I'm doing it right after all!

That's a great article.

Oh I like that article!

I think she makes a very good point about the drink spillage.. very timely considering some of the opinions people had about whether a toddler could ask his parents to keep their talking down when he was trying to watch Thomas!

Nice to have my parenting methods backed up for once. My aim has always been to bring up people able to make their own decisions. So I have always let them make decisions in a controlled environment.

My father railed and raged for years about how badly behaved my older children were (they weren't, but I was actively not aiming for the blind compliance he expected of us) but has been forced to admit now that they are all teenagers that they are decent and balanced individuals.

It's an interesting article. But I don't think most parents mean "mindlessly compliant and cowed" when they label a child as well-behaved, just capable of reasonable social interaction and a bit of self-control.

And there's a risk that parents take sides and accuse each other's children of either being automatons or feral, depending on which side they find themselves on. Where most parents would like an adequate amount of respect for things they need the child to do, and will return an adequate amount of respect for what the child feels is important, won't they? If we see each others approaches as being the opposite of what we find acceptable, then we won't be able to learn either to apply a bit more control on one side, or a bit more leeway on the other. In reality we could all look at what works well or badly for other people and consider adapting a bit!

oh very interesting, my ds is quite compliant always aiming to please. he can be petsistamt if he wants to do something.

that article makes me feel that how we parent is maybe old fashioned, this is our housr type thing.

i think i will question more, i do give ds choices.

my concern would be that an article like that gives rise to liberal/lazy parents justifying excusing bad manners etc

i do insist on proper table manners, i would expect ds to conform to a law aniding citizen depends how far you are either way.

Most parents will expect blind compliance on certain things, and, for the most part, do not even realise that they do so - most adults have a lot of unconscious behavioural norms embedded within them, which they pass on to their children.

Bringing all your behaviours to consciousness, examining them and deciding whether to keep them or discard them is the work of a lifetime.

One of the mums at school is a psychiatrist with 4 children and she believes in this kind of parenting. All of her children are horribly behaved and have massive behavioural problems in school. The oldest is actually a bit of a bully. It all sounds very nice when written down in the guardian, but children who repeatedly don't do what they are told are just tiresome and a pain in the neck to live with.
No doubt I'll be berated now for being too restrictive with my kids.

It's a good article. Certainly there is a generational difference- my mother is amazed that we offer DD choices and listen to her as though she is a person. But it's all about balance innit? DD needs some boundaries too. Interestingly I too know a psychiatrist who used to find it very very difficult to discipline her two kids, and the outcome wasn't pretty (for a few years- interestingly they are gorgeous now).
On balance I agree that compliance is over-rated.

Thanks for sharing btw moany- I would have missed this article otherwise...

I 'believe in this kind of parenting' googlenut but my son isn't a bully, doesn't have behavioural problems and does as he is asked. Not sure what your psychiatrist friend is up to but it doesn't sound like the sort of thing advocated by Alfie Kohn et al. This debate always becoms polarised and it never gets anywhere. The best we can all do is agree to differ and not judge one another's parenting choices.

I'm not quite convinced. I don't want mindlessly compliant children, but I do strongly encourage respect for other people's needs. For instance if an adult goes to a friend's house and spills a drink they don't just wander off, they usually apologise, perhaps go and fetch a cloth, try and mop it up. I expect that from children too, some degree of awareness of their actions and other people's needs and property. If they just spill or break things and are oblivious or unconcerned, I am totally unimpressed. I might not yell at them (depending) but I would be annoyed. Just as we would see that as bad behaviour in an adult.

Children can be spirited without being encouraged to be thoughtless and selfish.

I think the idea that children who misbehave are just challenging boundaries and will be better for it in the long run is far too simplistic.

So many other factors play and have an affect.

A child who misbehaves may very well not be liked by his teachers for example. This will most definitely have an affect on his schooling, which might outweight any benefit brought by being challenging per se.

Similarly a child who is a PITA might be exhausting his parents and again this will have a detrimental impact on the child.

A child who is challenging might be making the life of a more amenable sibling an utter misery. Does that sibling's right to a peacefule xistence take second place to the growth of the less obedient sibling?

So what happens when these children who have lots of 'choices' go to school and erm, don't have any choice? WHere they have to be compliant? Is it the teacher's fault that tey can't behave in school? DO we need to bring more discipline back to schools?

Just wondering (as both teacher and mother of 2 yr old and 2 month old).

DS challenges boundaries with us but is very good for others

That's the sort of thing I think this article is covering? Not blind disobedience?

yes i don't think the article is suggesting that you just let your kids do whatever they want.

you can discipline and teach children boundaries without expecting mindless compliance no?
and you can teach that there are choices in some things but not in others

There were a series of artciles int eh Times this weekend about French parenting and how their culture expects children to be more compliant than the British.

C'est moi qui decide.

Astronaut79 - my DD has always been given lots of choices and is no compliant angel at home, but at school she is right up there with the best behaved children - her school report described her as "calme, consciencieuse et appliquée" and she has never lost a point for behaviour etc.

IMO, from what I have observed, the children who are least well behaved at school are the ones with the least engaged parents (parental disengagement can take many forms).

thisis I suppose we all set our own boundaries don't we?

In casa wordfactory you can have what you liek for breakfast but you must have breakfast.
Some families would insist what the child actually ate. Ohters would allow them to leave wihtout food.

What she calls 'mindlessly compliant', is IMO just teaching children to be considerate towards other people and understand their own needs have to be balanced with those of others: they can't hit other people, they have to respect other people's possessions, you can't always get what you want straight away. It's not saying 'your voice isn't valued' - it's teaching them to listen to other voices as well as their own.

I don't see any research in this article that backs up the claim that children who are taught to respect their parents grow up to be 'doormats' and that rebellious children are wonderfully independent. What is that based on, her own hopes and justifications?

bonsoir, you're in france aren't you? do you think the articles on compliant french children are true? are french children generally better behaved when out in cafes etc?

my DS is the same Iggly, I suspect it's their age! :o

I think this article is nice, but can clearly be misinterpreted - I read it to mean that micromanaging and bullying your children to always be compliant is a bad thing, but teaching them some basic boundaries and good manners, and questioning why they are misbehaving, rather than just flying off the handle when they do, is a good thing.

So, basically, it is saying to use common sense and don't be too controlling. Have I read it all wrong?

Unconditional Parenting is very good.

It's not about whether or not your child is compliant - it's partly about whether or not you should manipulate your child to make your life easier.

Thinking about why you want your child to comply. Some things they have to comply with (not running onto the road etc.) - but an awful lot of things we 'fight' about a child doesn't have to comply with. (Eating at the table etc.)

Supernanny and naughty steps are a very short term view of parenting. Yes they work - in the short term. But are they the right thing to do?

Unconditional parenting is about respecting your child, bringing them up with a long term view, and teaching them what is right and wrong by teaching them rather than by using rewards and punishments to manipulate encourage the behaviour you want.

But mostly it's about respecting that your child is a person with thoughts and feelings and rights.

Parisian children are, generally speaking, (very) well behaved when out in restaurants, cafés, at friends' homes etc. The standards of table manners and conversation expected of children are higher across the board than in England (for a similar socio-economic group) and, to be honest, I do find it easier in France than in England to be out and about with children, both my own and others'.