America has a parenting problem

a reply to: Oleandra88

A few things I did with my kids that worked really well was:

1) We got them to read books early on, and every time they read successfully we'd clap and cheer and say 'yaayyy!' to condition them to believe that books = fun and excitement. Both of my kids are excellent readers and speakers now, and are the very top of their classes every year.

2) I let them go play outside and get dirty and take some risks. The outside world will expose them to germs and build their immune systems, the exercise will build healthy athletic bodies, and me allowing them to run off down the street allows them to build independence and responsibility for each other and allows me to learn how to accept that they are growing up and will be on their own one day.

So long as you teach them some basic rules, and show them you Trust them to make the right choices, they will behave and lead the other kids into making correct choices.

When my kids would come in from a hot day playing outside, their friends would come with them, and they'd actually want to read books together. I'm serious, read books. Their friends would say "Rosey read us another book!" (Rosemary is my daughter's name) and she'd run upstairs and go get one of my old college books like the astronomy or anatomy books. Kids love learning about stuff if you show them how much fun it is. They loved my educational books much more than cartoon books, surprisingly enough!

a reply to: Identified

I combine my answer for your other messages in this single one okay?

Finding golden middle is the tricky part. Not to much and less of everything. It sounds easy but it is not. I agree with government trying to play to much nanny.

But!!
We are all products of our surrounding environment and the people who run the countries (where elections are allowed, not dictators) are shaped by that. Sometime, somewhere many of us missed to chance to say clearly "this is "bs" or "enough is enough". I include me.

It is a slow speed, the speed this progresses all. Think generations. All influenced by so so many things that also make up the beauty of this world and life. That is if you can enjoy because you are somehow safe, have food water hygenie, basic human rights and a dry place to sleep.

Sadly that is not the case for many on this planet. I am guilty to, I am not a hypocrite. Do not read my message as a preaching but a logic try to understand life.

a reply to: muzzleflash

Hahahaha!!!
I paused, put my good headphones on and digged it. Yeah it explains a big part of German culture I guess!!
The end hahah, so true.

a reply to: JAGStorm

Steal away without remorse . And I just saw you posted this video original, again, very funny and accurate

a reply to: muzzleflash
Hey muzzleflash,
first, I was a bit confused with my last post, it thought you posted it but anyways

I agree with 1), I read her stories everyday and we snuggle and then I move my finger under the lines so she can see the words if she wants. She can look around the page how she wants but I want to give her the chance to see the words and hear them.

I read so many in my youth. It is like a movie in my head, often flash out of my inner movie and catch me reading lines.

2) agree. Rules like, if the church bell rings on x a clock you are expected to be home and ready for dinner. This included, if I got dirty, to wash and clean myself and that time I needed to plan, too. Politeness to other people, but very much towards old people. Help them if they want and need help.

Yes kids love learning new things. I had so many science books, I never got to build one of this radios and other things but I read them all so when the different classes like geology, history, physics, chemics began in school in 5th grade, I had a rough idea about the world already. I was not clueless trying to make up a picture of the world because I had the chance to know all this very early.

With science books I mean these thin hardcover books for kids that are about one topic only, like dinosaurs, electronic, building bottle rocket, the mars, plants of the djungle

a reply to: muzzleflash

I think you described the perfect relationship with love and endorsement, respect and deeply philosophic. It is sad that what you wrote here can not be seen from outside. I think many are looking for what you described so do not give up.

Read my signature, the long part:

As the sun does not wait for praise and requests to rise but is just lit and welcomed by the whole world you may not need flattery or applause to do good. By yourself you must do it: then you will be loved like the sun.

It is a translation of a old german saying that is written in old germanic letters in a picture in my house. I hope I translated it so it sounds good and make sense.

a reply to: Fools

I wonder how that happened? It can't be that mom is shacked up with a grown azz boy-toy who plasters affliction stickers on his pick up truck and spends every weekend partying with his MMA buddies?

A lot of step-anythings aren't worth the paper they are printed on. Teenage boys are especially good at seeing through the BS.

a reply to: JAGStorm


My parents became Pentecostals for a few years when I was around ten. A normal Sunday was filled with People speaking in tongues and falling out on the floor. Someone came to the church one time to present the evil hidden messages in albums by bands like Iron Maiden. That gives away my age I guess. Playing them backwards to unveil the hidden subliminal evil. I remember him playing an album backwards and saying, "Did you hear that?! He said, "SATAN is my master!?" Gasps and shock and hallelujahs. All I heard was, "Zerbesqugledoomfablammmo." Or something unspellable because it was crap. That place was terrifying.

a reply to: Identified


That helicopter crap makes me crazy. It makes kids less Independent/confident/able. I cannot find the video - a long time teacher in England was discussing the difference between the current and previous generations. Years back, on a school trip, one of the kids did not get off the train with everyone else. Shortly afterwards, the kid showed up on a train from the other direction. She got off and solved her problem. Same thing happened more recently, and the kid was lost for a while because he/she had no idea what to do without an adult dictating the steps.

a reply to: Oleandra88


It still happens. I live in Germany and my kids walk/ride the street train and city bus to school alone or to a friend's house all the time. Not even close to the freedom I had as a kid in Tennessee, but we try to give them a loose tether. My eight year old will take off to the grocery store a ten minute walk away alone if we need something while I am cooking.

a reply to: 3NL1GHT3N3D1
I so agree and I see the results of this way too often. Too many people think it is about "things" and they teach their children the same.

Love is not defined by the amount of pre-stage landfill you drown your children with. I see children with so many things that the parents have to pay monthly for a storage unit to hold the things they don't even use any more and are not likely to use again.

When I was a young I would sit with my grandfather and listen to the radio. We were one of the first families in the area to have a TV, so watching TV was a community affair. Both radio and TV set the path for were we are now. We were slow walked to the gallows.

Radio, TV, phone lines, all started out as technology that involved family and community. With time the focus on family was stripped away and community was soon to follow. We went from compassion, sharing and tolerance to being all about self. Treat others the way you want to be treated, has changed to attack others for not thinking the way you think, and believing that your wants come first even at the expense of others.

When I was young, one of the first things I learned was life is not fair. My mother, and life itself, drilled that lesson home fairly early in my life. Today children talk about their "rights". I can't seem to get through to them that while they are banking on someone respecting their "rights", that someone believes they have the right to step on yours.

Children of the digital age communicate differently. They socialize differently, they have very little tolerance for anything that does not entertain them on some level, and that includes other people. They have been taught by their parents that their happiness and their desires are worth sacrificing time, home, community, and family for. Many children experience extreme anxiety from being touched, they have trouble showing or receiving affection. For many, demonstrations of affection translates into "things", and they find little satisfaction in human contact.

Too many parents fell into the advertising trap. They used TV, movies, and books, as the Dummies Guide or the Cliff Notes as to how to parent and what their lives were supposed to look like. So here we are.

a reply to: crunchypeople
your example is a good one. It teaches the 8 year ol
3-4 years in the future I will get to know the todays "normal" parenting doctrine, soon enough.

a reply to: stosh64
My fear is that too many people will look at this and say, "That is just Hollywood".

They will be unable to accept how real it is. The problem is that Hollywood makes it look fun, titillating, exciting and cool. Take away the breakaway scenes, the music, the glitz, and I end up with a child that has been severely traumatized a parent that is clueless, and both not willing to accept that responsibility starts with self, and hiding that fact in what you think your "rights" are, gets no one anywhere and just makes you a victim.

a reply to: crunchypeople

Is it this story?

The Day I Lost a Child On the Tube

I completely agree. It amazes just how much things have changed in 20 years. I was a 12 year old on a school trip to a foreign country and we had no adult chaperones for most of the days. We were told to meet back here it a certain time and we were off.

I think the way children are treated now is abuse because they are not allowed to grow, learn, problem solve, etc... Then they get to adulthood and are totally unprepared.

I just found out yesterday from one of my friends that some summer camps now have parents attend with them!
Crazy! Go to a Family camp if that is what you want. Camp was supposed to be about people your own age.

a reply to: muzzleflash

Reading is so important!

We early on established a nightly ritual with ours. His father has a book he's reading to him, and I have a book I'm reading to him. We each read a chapter (or partial chapter, the books are getting more complex as time goes on) at night.

Now that he's reading on his own, he's taken off. This past year as a 2nd grader he was the second best reader in his entire grade school and only missed being the top by a few minutes. He's reading easily a couple full grade levels beyond his own grade level, and can often be caught reading a book on his own in the back seat of the car on trips.

a reply to: Identified

That's sad.

Our kid would have a fit!

He loves summer camps. He was upset this year because I didn't find him a week long sleepaway. He got the 3 day, 2 night tae kwon do camp that he did last year. I went poking around for a sleepaway for him in upcoming years and told him the really cool sleepaway programs for him wouldn't start until he was at least 12 or 13, so he'd do best to wait a few years, but he's all primed to go now.

I can't believe parents won't stay away. That's the point of camps -- to let your kids build independence.

a reply to: ketsuko

It's very sad. Take a family vacation if that's what you want.

Summer camps most likely had to figure out a way to bring in kids in the era of helicopter parents and this was offered.

I hope your kid had fun and I hope he enjoys and grows from his future sleepover camps.

a reply to: crunchypeople

I'll bet you discovered a ton of great music that way though.

a reply to: Identified

Oh yeah, he's been back for two days, and he's still a couch potato which is not his usual state. So he's still recovering. They run them ragged out there. It's a traditional camp - fishing, swimming, kayaking, campfire stuff, etc., but they do get to throw ninja stars. It's just run through the group of tae kwon do schools he takes lessons from which means he's familiar with kids and the adults (instructors) in charge.

Our philosophy on summer activities and school activities are that those are how a kid starts to discover what they're good at and what they enjoy doing. If you don't let your kids spread their wings and explore, then they won't ever know those strengths and weaknesses, likes and dislikes. The only thing we ask of him is that if he starts an activity, he see it through to the end. So a season of basketball is a season of basketball; if he auditions for the play, he does the play. There's no obligation to go back for another round, but he does finish the one he starts.

And that's something that upsets me is when I see parents bring in their kids and then let them bail as soon as they either lose interest or it gets tough.