I have known this for years already, but I figured others may need to be informed about it.
Have a read, its very interesting.
http://www.ahrq.gov/research/jan02/0102RA2.htm
The article is already from 2001, unfortunately nothing has changed so far :-(
Monday, 24 November 2008
Dessert first :-)
Recently someone told me that letting a child eat dessert first will promote obesity and unhealthy eating habits, but that highly depends on what dessert consists of doesn't it 
Our desserts are usually yoghurt or fruit or so. With that I really do not think there is any problem when fruit or yoghurt are eaten first, or even only the dessert.
Furthermore I do remember that as a child I had to first finish my main course before I could eat dessert, result I never ate dessert, because by then I was totally stuffed. I won't do that to my kids. They eat what is available and pick from it.
And as I do not make any fuzz over what they eat, they eat a bit of everything in general as there is no pressure at all on which food is eaten first or last or just. I do not expect them to eat anything they do not like either.
What I think the main thing is, is that dinner is fun, making it and eating it. There should be no stress at the dining table, because that doesn't make anyone feel any better or eat any better.
Our desserts are usually yoghurt or fruit or so. With that I really do not think there is any problem when fruit or yoghurt are eaten first, or even only the dessert.
Furthermore I do remember that as a child I had to first finish my main course before I could eat dessert, result I never ate dessert, because by then I was totally stuffed. I won't do that to my kids. They eat what is available and pick from it.
And as I do not make any fuzz over what they eat, they eat a bit of everything in general as there is no pressure at all on which food is eaten first or last or just. I do not expect them to eat anything they do not like either.
What I think the main thing is, is that dinner is fun, making it and eating it. There should be no stress at the dining table, because that doesn't make anyone feel any better or eat any better.
Thursday, 13 November 2008
Child abuse
The last few days I have read article after article about seriously bad child abuse.
The little baby boy of 17 months old that must have had a 17 month hell of torture, his back was broken, 8 ribs broken, fingertips cut off, nails missing. And nobody noticed anything? It could just go on?
The child had been in the hospital, with the doctor, everything.
The a 21 year old mother who has probably murdered her own baby and toddler. Details still have to come out.
Then in the US a child beaten to death because it wet its bed?
And then the Fritzl case.
It makes me think again. I have read enough books of Alice Miller to know that these people doing it to their own children were abused themselves. I am fairly sure that the mother of the 17 month old baby unconciously wanted help, because she did visit medical professionals, who in my mind were negligent.
They should have picked up on it and helped both mother and baby adequately. Mother needed psychological help to deal with her own childhood trauma, because the state she was in now was obviously lethal to her own child.
But obviously those professionals were too damaged themselves to be able to pick up on it.
Then the mother who killed her own children, same thing, she obviously was too traumatized to handle it all.
Beating a child to death for wetting its bed. I wonder how those parents were treated as children.
And then Mr. Fritzl, well in the meantime I have read enough about his childhood to know that he had a rotten one and turned out to be the tyrant he is because of that.
What makes me so immensely sick with this all is that in our western civilization we keep excusing people and locking people up who do stuff like that. Only a few people really want to make sure this stops with informing people on what the reasons are for people going down that horrible road, but those are often enough not heard, as the majority of people do NOT WANT to hear it. They do not want to know that their own parents screwed up badly or that they themselves are screwing up as well as parents and are breeding violence with their parenting styles.
Of course we all have to hide that behind the stupid theories of how children are second class citizens and have to be disciplined and all that other crap.
We can do to children that cannot be done to adults because its against human rights.
What makes a parent have the right to smack a child, when its assault when you smack another adult and you could be jailed for that? Why not when you smack a child?
How did we come so crazy that those things can happen to such sensitive young people, who are still learning from us and need to learn what is right, not what is wrong. We should sherish these little human beings as they are still so open to influences etc.
It makes me want to scream it out loud to everybody who does something like that. There are so many examples in history of what can happen with the normally accepted parenting style, but its soooo wrong.
But, no I don't, I only talk to people who do want to hear it, because its "not done" to tell other people that they are parenting their children in an abusive way.
I keep seeing it happen around me and it makes me really really sad.
The little baby boy of 17 months old that must have had a 17 month hell of torture, his back was broken, 8 ribs broken, fingertips cut off, nails missing. And nobody noticed anything? It could just go on?
The child had been in the hospital, with the doctor, everything.
The a 21 year old mother who has probably murdered her own baby and toddler. Details still have to come out.
Then in the US a child beaten to death because it wet its bed?
And then the Fritzl case.
It makes me think again. I have read enough books of Alice Miller to know that these people doing it to their own children were abused themselves. I am fairly sure that the mother of the 17 month old baby unconciously wanted help, because she did visit medical professionals, who in my mind were negligent.
They should have picked up on it and helped both mother and baby adequately. Mother needed psychological help to deal with her own childhood trauma, because the state she was in now was obviously lethal to her own child.
But obviously those professionals were too damaged themselves to be able to pick up on it.
Then the mother who killed her own children, same thing, she obviously was too traumatized to handle it all.
Beating a child to death for wetting its bed. I wonder how those parents were treated as children.
And then Mr. Fritzl, well in the meantime I have read enough about his childhood to know that he had a rotten one and turned out to be the tyrant he is because of that.
What makes me so immensely sick with this all is that in our western civilization we keep excusing people and locking people up who do stuff like that. Only a few people really want to make sure this stops with informing people on what the reasons are for people going down that horrible road, but those are often enough not heard, as the majority of people do NOT WANT to hear it. They do not want to know that their own parents screwed up badly or that they themselves are screwing up as well as parents and are breeding violence with their parenting styles.
Of course we all have to hide that behind the stupid theories of how children are second class citizens and have to be disciplined and all that other crap.
We can do to children that cannot be done to adults because its against human rights.
What makes a parent have the right to smack a child, when its assault when you smack another adult and you could be jailed for that? Why not when you smack a child?
How did we come so crazy that those things can happen to such sensitive young people, who are still learning from us and need to learn what is right, not what is wrong. We should sherish these little human beings as they are still so open to influences etc.
It makes me want to scream it out loud to everybody who does something like that. There are so many examples in history of what can happen with the normally accepted parenting style, but its soooo wrong.
But, no I don't, I only talk to people who do want to hear it, because its "not done" to tell other people that they are parenting their children in an abusive way.
I keep seeing it happen around me and it makes me really really sad.
Monday, 10 November 2008
Positive reinforcement
What is the use? Or is there a use?
As studies have shown positive reinforcement is, like praise, rewards and other stuff like that an external motivator and with that not giving the child much intrinsic motivation, which is in general the best motivator a person can have. Intrinsic motivation will keep a person doing what they do (learning) and trying to become better at it. When there is praise, grades or whatever used, the child will work for the praise, grade or whatever, but not for the fun of it learning. What you can see is when a child is interested in something they will keep at it and learn more and just dig into it.
When a child is getting praise, they will not go for the topic, but for the praise and with that the topic becomes uninteresting.
Children love please their parents and teachers, therefore they will do what is necessary to please them, i.e. get a good grade, but do they remember anything from what they learned afterwards?
I do remember getting great grades for things, but don't remember much of what I learned in school in order to get those grades. I do remember being totally fascinated about a topic, which was not taught in school, so I went to the library and dug and dug, I was 12 and still remember the photographs.
Okay, I know.... this sounds like only unschooling is good. I wont say that, coz some kids love it in school so there is no need to meddle with that. But make sure that the children know that its not about the grades, that you as a parent are not interested in the grades, but in what they learned. You can do that by ignoring good and bad grades, but asking about what they learned and what they liked about it and all that stuff. Just by showing interest.
And this goes for other parts of parenting as well. Why would it be a good job if yr child makes a drawing, its not necessarily a good job. It can also be a crappy scribble job, but there is no need to say good or bad. Just say that you see scribbles in red and blue. Ask about the feelings or motivation that made your child make that drawing.
When I go to the playground I heard a load of "Well done" 's all the time for nothing.
When a child goes into a playground, what is the use in saying "Well done" when they go on the swing and swing. Isn't that normal for a child to want to do and have fun?
Or climb into a climbing rack? Isn't that just fun and stuff?
As studies have shown positive reinforcement is, like praise, rewards and other stuff like that an external motivator and with that not giving the child much intrinsic motivation, which is in general the best motivator a person can have. Intrinsic motivation will keep a person doing what they do (learning) and trying to become better at it. When there is praise, grades or whatever used, the child will work for the praise, grade or whatever, but not for the fun of it learning. What you can see is when a child is interested in something they will keep at it and learn more and just dig into it.
When a child is getting praise, they will not go for the topic, but for the praise and with that the topic becomes uninteresting.
Children love please their parents and teachers, therefore they will do what is necessary to please them, i.e. get a good grade, but do they remember anything from what they learned afterwards?
I do remember getting great grades for things, but don't remember much of what I learned in school in order to get those grades. I do remember being totally fascinated about a topic, which was not taught in school, so I went to the library and dug and dug, I was 12 and still remember the photographs.
Okay, I know.... this sounds like only unschooling is good. I wont say that, coz some kids love it in school so there is no need to meddle with that. But make sure that the children know that its not about the grades, that you as a parent are not interested in the grades, but in what they learned. You can do that by ignoring good and bad grades, but asking about what they learned and what they liked about it and all that stuff. Just by showing interest.
And this goes for other parts of parenting as well. Why would it be a good job if yr child makes a drawing, its not necessarily a good job. It can also be a crappy scribble job, but there is no need to say good or bad. Just say that you see scribbles in red and blue. Ask about the feelings or motivation that made your child make that drawing.
When I go to the playground I heard a load of "Well done" 's all the time for nothing.
When a child goes into a playground, what is the use in saying "Well done" when they go on the swing and swing. Isn't that normal for a child to want to do and have fun?
Or climb into a climbing rack? Isn't that just fun and stuff?
Hitting
Recently there was a thread on one of the forums I participate in. There were questions on how to handle hitting of a child that was not even 1 year old yet.
This was my reply:
Infants and young children basically have no clue what the consequences are from their actions. They have no clue when they hurt you or not.
So its the parents job to let the child know when things hurt, whether they hurt the parent or another child or a pet. But as humans have much more complex brains as animals its obviously not as simple as to train a dog into certain behaviour. Even though with my dog I am sensitive and look at her cues whether she even gets the point - but that is an entirely different topic
So how can we do this with little humans with complicated brains. First of all think of how you would want to be treated in case you ended up in a culture where you had no clue what they were saying and they had totally different idea's on what's normal and what not.
Young children / infants don't fully understand every word we say, but they are on a level of understanding emotions and sounds. Therefore show them it hurts and use the right words and sounds with it. Also explain how it can be done differently and what you would like her to do. Just keep talking, showing and redirecting. Its not going to happen overnight, but it will happen.
Simply keep respecting your child as a fellow human being and not put them on a secondary place, which is unfortunately quite common in the western world.
Example: My 9 mos old has no clue when she hurts the dog by pulling the dogs hair. So I stay with her when she is within reach of the dog, often she goes there. Both the dog (10y) and I are very patient with her. The dog usually keeps laying there - when I am not around she disappears - and when she grabs a hand full of hair I gently loosen her hand and tell her that that will hurt the dog and show her that the dog loves being stroked.
Slowly but carefully her grip has become less hard on the dogs hair.
She also head butts us, pretty normal for young children. My partner sometimes has a hard time handling it because it can really really hurt, so he hands her to me, while he regroups himself, but we keep being gentle with her.I have also handed her to him at times. And then we simply explain to her that it really really hurts.
Another thing to realize with things like pulling hair is that the hair grabbing is a rudimentary left-over from our evolution (no offence meant to the creationists here). In those times our babies had to hold on to us on our furs, like with the apes. Therefore they still keep grabbing our hair, but as we don't have a lot of body hair left its usually our heads and some kids also hold on to the ears or nose, not to hurt, simply to feel safe.
So, back to the topic hitting. It is al right to not feel happy about it. The trick is to handle it gently and keep repeating and redirecting.
You may have to repeat it a LOT of times, she is still a baby you know.
Basically in my whole parenting thoughts I start with how I would like to be treated if I didn't get that and with that I realize that a lot of parenting ideas out there, are in my view mistreatment as its not very respectful to the child.
Other than that, I think, that basically you don't really have to do anything more than say OUCH or what ever, coz sooner or later they will get the point that OUCH means that you really don't like it and somewhat older children hate doing things that are not right, they really want to be part of the group / family they live in and really do not want to be odd. So just simply by not hitting your partner and letting her know you don't like it it will stop, but it could last a bit.
This was my reply:
Infants and young children basically have no clue what the consequences are from their actions. They have no clue when they hurt you or not.
So its the parents job to let the child know when things hurt, whether they hurt the parent or another child or a pet. But as humans have much more complex brains as animals its obviously not as simple as to train a dog into certain behaviour. Even though with my dog I am sensitive and look at her cues whether she even gets the point - but that is an entirely different topic
So how can we do this with little humans with complicated brains. First of all think of how you would want to be treated in case you ended up in a culture where you had no clue what they were saying and they had totally different idea's on what's normal and what not.
Young children / infants don't fully understand every word we say, but they are on a level of understanding emotions and sounds. Therefore show them it hurts and use the right words and sounds with it. Also explain how it can be done differently and what you would like her to do. Just keep talking, showing and redirecting. Its not going to happen overnight, but it will happen.
Simply keep respecting your child as a fellow human being and not put them on a secondary place, which is unfortunately quite common in the western world.
Example: My 9 mos old has no clue when she hurts the dog by pulling the dogs hair. So I stay with her when she is within reach of the dog, often she goes there. Both the dog (10y) and I are very patient with her. The dog usually keeps laying there - when I am not around she disappears - and when she grabs a hand full of hair I gently loosen her hand and tell her that that will hurt the dog and show her that the dog loves being stroked.
Slowly but carefully her grip has become less hard on the dogs hair.
She also head butts us, pretty normal for young children. My partner sometimes has a hard time handling it because it can really really hurt, so he hands her to me, while he regroups himself, but we keep being gentle with her.I have also handed her to him at times. And then we simply explain to her that it really really hurts.
Another thing to realize with things like pulling hair is that the hair grabbing is a rudimentary left-over from our evolution (no offence meant to the creationists here). In those times our babies had to hold on to us on our furs, like with the apes. Therefore they still keep grabbing our hair, but as we don't have a lot of body hair left its usually our heads and some kids also hold on to the ears or nose, not to hurt, simply to feel safe.
So, back to the topic hitting. It is al right to not feel happy about it. The trick is to handle it gently and keep repeating and redirecting.
You may have to repeat it a LOT of times, she is still a baby you know.
Basically in my whole parenting thoughts I start with how I would like to be treated if I didn't get that and with that I realize that a lot of parenting ideas out there, are in my view mistreatment as its not very respectful to the child.
Other than that, I think, that basically you don't really have to do anything more than say OUCH or what ever, coz sooner or later they will get the point that OUCH means that you really don't like it and somewhat older children hate doing things that are not right, they really want to be part of the group / family they live in and really do not want to be odd. So just simply by not hitting your partner and letting her know you don't like it it will stop, but it could last a bit.
Wednesday, 5 November 2008
My grandson...
.... is one year old now and needs to go to a daycare centre now because he needs to be socialized, he is old enough now.
Ugh..... has he been living alone then since birth? No social contacts at all?
Those type of comments always make me wonder how people think. Why would a child have to be put in an environment they are not used to in order to socialize? Don't they have parents to socialize with, no siblings, cousins, grandparents, etc.?
How about the people in the neighbourhood?
Why put a child into an artificial environment like day care or school with children of the same age group when real life doesn't do that. You don't learn socializing with older people or younger people that way, or just dealing with normal life situations.
I keep being surprised about those odd comments.
Ugh..... has he been living alone then since birth? No social contacts at all?
Those type of comments always make me wonder how people think. Why would a child have to be put in an environment they are not used to in order to socialize? Don't they have parents to socialize with, no siblings, cousins, grandparents, etc.?
How about the people in the neighbourhood?
Why put a child into an artificial environment like day care or school with children of the same age group when real life doesn't do that. You don't learn socializing with older people or younger people that way, or just dealing with normal life situations.
I keep being surprised about those odd comments.
Saturday, 1 November 2008
Quick soup recipes
Today I read about a tomato soup recipe that was quick and healthy. So I followed the link and indeed a great healthy recipe.
Here it is : Quick creamy tomato soup
Have fun making it.
Here it is : Quick creamy tomato soup
Have fun making it.
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