Do you do things/activities as a family all together?

[staryeyed]

If so what do you do and how old are your children?

TBH, I'm quite amazed at my calmness and patience on this thread anna! Especially given what you have been implying about me and accused me of!

Been calm and patient that is. I keep cross-posting.

Janni
ditto My DD would love to smell like a dog. Our old english is her fav thing in the whole world and she frquently tries to persuade me to let her sleep in his bed.
Smell like a dog would guarentee that she never brushed them again....

Anna, don't you feel that asking rhetorical questions which make it very clear what answer you want the respondent to give is a little unecessary?

pagwatch - I really think that, interesting a subject as the upbringing of SN children may be, it was not what this thread was about at all. Everyone knows that bringing up SN children is full of specific challenges, which is why there is a specific topic for SN on MN.

So I don't think that you should be getting upset about what I have written since it was not about SN situations.

PMSL at motherinferior's rhetorical question .

Just revisiting this thread, interesting direction it has taken. DS (4.5) would think the dog bit hilarious, would get the giggles then wouldn't be able to clean his teeth for laughing. It would raise a giggle from most of his friends as well.

I do hope very much that my children's teacher are as calm and patient as Fivecandles, increases my admiration for teachers. I suspect my DS & DD would love her to be around at bedtime, she sounds more fun than I am at that time of night!

My dp is an assistant headteacher at a school for students with severe emotional and behavioural difficulties. He would agree with everything you said pagwatch. But what he also says is that dealing with his students is very much like dealing with toddlers and he does use similar techniques in both situations. Lots of positive reinforcement, clear goals, very defined boundaries etc etc.

I think this thread is interesting. Obviously there is a huge clash of parenting style.

I find it interesting that I am called "liberal". My parents think my partner and I are super-strict - in fact, my mother has little digs at me about it (and we were at their house last weekend, so it's fresh in my mind). So if my parents are so much more liberal than I am, how come I went through school without so much as one detention? According to some on this thread I should have been a trouble-maker...

Good grief -
can you not understand the simplest point?

The point is your language.
The point is that all parents face different children and different challenges and to demonise anyone for not parentingthe way you do is arrogant and foolish.
The SN is not the point,it is merely an example.

And I am not upset by what you have written as I have no respect for your point of view. I am just mildly irritated at your preachy and inaccurate tone.
Irritated and upset are very different.

And besides I have a few minutes to spare as I have locked the kids in the shed...

Pardon me, but you don't sound liberal. You sound very controlling .

That was to Anna, btw.

Also..children don't all come in the same mould. Some need firm boundaries set because their judgement is a bit askew. Others are born fairly sensible and understanding of rules.

You must spend a helluva lot of time negotiating Anna... fast forward 10 years with your DD and you will be laying down the law just like everyone else.

Because, Anna, you are you, and what clearly worked in parenting you would have worked differently (possibly nearly-invisibly differently, possibly so as to not work at all) with another child.

As Anne Bradstreet (who had 10 children I think) said, some 300 years ago, about child-raising: some children need to be treated with honey, some with salt, some with vinegar ... your daughter, I would submit, does fine being treated with honey. As does mine. But my son needs salt. For instance.

fivecandles.
yep
My DS2 just needs life to be very straightforward and 'certain'. He gets loads of praise and cuddles and we use things like start charts to reinforce the good things and lots of thumbs up and 'good boy'.

It is just very simple, very reassuring parenting really. A bit like some one younger.

The irony is that with DS1 I was a lot more 'faffy' but what I have learnt from DS2 is to be more in control as kids respond better to feeling safe than almost anything else. DD is my youngest and last and guess who has all the confidence

Well said Bink

I don't think of myself as a liberal parent at all .

But controlling - well, for me, that is those parents who don't involve their children in decision-making. Who decide for them.

Firm boundaries are great and necessary, but the concept of firm boundaries shouldn't be misconstrued as an opportunity to make decisions on children's behalfs.

And, to take another subject that is very topical in the newspapers, how about all those university admissions tutors and recruiters who complain that young people today have no personal autonomy and cannot decide anything for themselves and negotiate in their own interests?

I would love to be a fly on the wall in Anna's house.

Anna.... I have Uni and college aged children. I made decisions on their behalf when they were little.. sometimes with no negotiation. DD1 is perfectly capable of arguing the toss with anyone and negotiating the best for herself... far too capable actually!

It's also, Bink, I think about what works for everyone.

Here in the Inferiority Complex, fallible exhausted humanity means that there are times when it's me bellowing BEDTIME NOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW. And, er, sorry kids, but that's it.

Teeth are somewhat non-negotiable too.

helliebean - you know what? I doubt it. We all spend a lot of time negotiating in this household - we really like it

'Firm boundaries are great and necessary, but the concept of firm boundaries shouldn't be misconstrued as an opportunity to make decisions on children's behalfs.'

I'm sorry if I sound in any way impatient anna. Actually I'm still very calm. But this is bonkers.

Who exactly is making the decision to take your child to see Atonement and to the Lebanese restaurant and who has chosen which school she will go to and got her there?

Adults make the decisions on behalf of children anna because they have to. Because however sophisticated you might think childen are (and I actually feel sorry for your dd because she is no where near as sophisticated as you think she is not because she's not clever and charming which I'm sure she is in spaces but because she's THREE) they are CHILDREN and are not able to make responsible decisions for themselves.

When adults stop making decisions on behalf of children and to protect and guide them then this is not a good world anymore.

Just because you think your decisions are better than everyone else's and right for your children (and God knows nobody else here thinks that Atonement is an appopriate choice of film for a child) they are still decisions that you are making on behalf of your child.

'we spend a lot of time negotiating in this household we really like it'

Actually the fact that you love going on and on and on is probably the most perceptive thing you have posted here.

My father took me to see Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet when I was six. I was, I should explain, a precociously literate child who had read - and enjoyed - Jane Eyre.

I fucking hated it.

Bloody loved Chitty Chitty Bang Bang the next year, though.

My Brother used to call it 'Shitty, shitty Bangbang'

I was traumatized