Saying “I hate kids” is discrimination, plain and simple. It is an -ism: Ageism, to be precise. Similar to any other form of prejudice like racism, sexism. It is no different from saying “I hate women / gays / blacks / old people / <insert any other group with similar characteristics>.” Underneath all those...
Respect is rarely a discussion point considered valid in a conversation about children. While respect can mean somewhat different things to different people, when it comes to children, there is often, hardly any debate. “Ha! What do kids even know?!“ If you ask people whether they love their children, without a second thought, they...
When my son was about four and a half, we often took city buses and walked a LOT (we lived in downtown at the time). So he was familiar with the idea of looking at bus numbers and enjoyed reading them. While driving to somewhere once, I noticed a bus in the next lane...
Human beings are born hard-wired for connection. Increasingly, research has shown that social connection is as essential as food and sleep. It is a biological imperative resulting from thousands of years of evolution, during which we started to organize ourselves into social groups with increasingly complex relationships. A lack of connection can be perceived...
Time and again, research has shown, that rewards, punishments and excessive praise slowly erode away a person’s intrinsic motivation over time. This is why adults who use these strategies with children often find, that for the same “offense”, they need to raise the severity of the punishment over time in order to keep it...
Picture this scenario: You had a really bad day at work. On your way home, all the happenings of the day seem to be swirling up into a giant tornado. You seek the comfort of your partner to vent or cry and get through this tough time – non judgmental support while you weather...
I’ve been reading a book by clinical child psychologist Ross W. Greene titled Raising Human Beings. It is a brilliant and practical guide to building healthy and respectful relationships with children. This book is primarily focussed on resolving conflicts and disagreements through what he calls Collaborative Problem Solving. There are many real life examples...
Most of us have grown up with the traditional idea that emotions can be classified into “good” and “bad” categories. Good emotions are allowed to be freely experienced. Bad emotions must be “controlled” (or ignored), most often, with distraction or manipulation. Much of this, we pick up subconsciously when we are children, from our...
The most mainstream view of children with respect to comprehension is that they need to be taught. This is rather absurd especially considering that children have an innate desire to understand the world around them – to try and comprehend pretty much everyone and everything around them – to understand themselves and their relationship...
To me, learning is not something that happens at a specific place and a specific time with a specific person. School is not the only place children learn – we cannot turn learning on and off depending on place, time or person. Learning is life itself. Living is learning, every minute. We’ve only been...