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Spanking for Safety is a Risky Business
I'd like to urge all parents to further insure the safety of their children
by teaching them to recognize danger on their own, without a need for anyone to stand-by at close quarters on 24-hour-a-day watchdog duty. We've sold kids short by assuming that they are incapable of learning to avoid danger independently, and we've done so at their expense...a fact which is in evidence every time we see a toddler running onto a busy road. Instead of acting as a mere external control, parents would better serve their children by simply conveying to them their own fear and avoidance of all that is dangerous. This parental conveyance enables children to internalize an avoidance of the danger at hand...after all, this is how most living things quite effectively teach their young how to survive. Unfortunately, the commonly seen teaching method used by human parents to teach safety issues, which can be called, ‘The Yell and Hit Method of Teaching’, is a most inefficient and harsh way to teach anything, let alone safety issues. As a matter of fact, this yell and hit approach is such a poor method of teaching that it can even prove to be counter-productive on occasion. It should be apparent that the major flaw in using anger and violence as a method of teaching kids to avoid danger lies in the looming prospect of the anger and violence causing the child to fear the parent rather than the actual danger at hand. Let me explain a little about this `conveyed fear' learning that we've left neglected and unnoticed for far too long now. It's probably safe to say that most parents are aware of the fact that even infants react instantaneously to the startled behavior of a parent. This is because babies are born into this world fully equipped to automatically shift into a survival mode of acute awareness in response to an alarm reaction on the part of the parent. As soon as the baby is capable of identifying a source of the parents' alarm, the baby will immediately adopt the same fear of the perceived threat as is held by the parent. This ability of young children to immediately internalize the same fear displayed by a parent toward a source of danger is a built-in biological survival mechanism that we parents should be utilizing to a much greater extent than we do at present. This inborn learning ability in children is biologically designed to act as an aid in helping our young learn how to avoid danger.... and thereby enhance the probability of their survival. Most newborn animal species also share this inherent behaviorism. Except, unlike us, their parents take full advantage of its value in teaching survival- skills to their young. Additionally, we parents could save ourselves a great deal of worry and time by making use of this natural learning tool. It's a simple, yet proven technique that has over time shown itself to be much more effective, safe, and quick, than other traditional, typically punitive methods of teaching kids to avoid harm. This method utilizes the ability of children to internalize our conveyed fears and instantly adopt those fears as their own... and they do so in the form of a deeply ingrained learning process that can take mere minutes to stage and complete. To illustrate how this method works, let's imagine that you are the parent of a toddler who is ready to learn to use caution when in the vicinity of moving vehicles. You might want to start by taking your toddler out by the roadside for the lesson during a period of light traffic. Begin to laugh and play while at the same time keeping an eye-out for that first vehicle to come along. When one comes into view, jump in alarm with a scared ‘OH! OH!’, and point to the vehicle while making sure that your child is seeing the source of your alarm (rest assured that your child will be looking around for the cause of your distress). It only took one lesson to instill a sense of danger in my kids where moving vehicles are concerned, but if you see that your child is not wary of the road after the first teaching attempt, (perhaps through a failure to effectively convey your alarm) simply repeat the process until the message gets through. Few kids will remain immune to mom/dad jumping in startled alarm to a perceived threat. Needless to say, this teaching method is highly effective for teaching children any and all safety issues. The hot stove is another commonly heard excuse given by parents for exacting punitive measures upon their children. But, there's a better, faster, and safer way for new parents to address this safety issue. First, turn your stove on to a high setting and let it get good and hot. Then go on a `play crawl' with your (say 8-10 mo.) baby into the kitchen. Crawl close enough to the stove to feel the heat, then suddenly and abruptly stop dead with a vocalized alarm. You will have instantaneously gained the undivided attention of your baby. Slowly reach your hand out toward the hot stove until the level of heat becomes uncomfortable, then pull your hand back quickly with a wide-eyed start, while fearfully saying the word, ‘Hot!’ Baby might just might take-off beating a hasty retreat at that point, but might be just as likely to instead want to learn more about this danger by mimicking what you've just done by proceeding to slowly reach toward the stove themselves. Under a watchful eye, baby feels the same discomforting heat, and learns forever that a hot stove is best kept at a safe distance (of course, you will want to confirm this learning with follow- up observations under close supervision.) My daughter didn't actually have to reach-out to feel the heat because she crawled close enough to feel it and identify the stove as my source of alarm. On the other hand, my son cautiously reached-out to feel the discomforting heat just as I had done. Either way, both of my kids had internalized the desire to avoid getting too close to a hot stove from that point on. This process represents a safety lesson that can be permanently learned by a baby in as little as a minute's time. As a matter of fact, I've discovered that my method is so effective that it's better for parents’ to be under-dramatic and find that there's a need to repeat the exercise than it is to be over-dramatic and scare the heck out of poor baby. While fear is one of the least desirable or advisable emotions to instill in a child, there are nevertheless a few fears that they need to learn in order to survive. My method involves a simple matter of some thought and creativity. Of course, childproofing is desirable, but it doesn’t actually teach. For example, are all light sockets going to be covered in all places visited? Perhaps not. Crawl with baby to a light socket, stick a finger toward it, and then recoil in alarm. Crawl to the edge of steps with baby, and proceed to stop abruptly in alarm. It's certainly understandable that a parent seeing their child placed in harms way is going to react with fear and alarm. I'd like to suggest that parent’s refrain from allowing their feelings of fear to develop into feelings of anger; at least where the teaching of safety issues is concerned. Anger leaves much to be desired as a teaching method, and is just as likely to motivate the child to simply avoid getting caught the next time (with the child being prone to come away thinking something along the lines of, ‘I don't understand what was wrong with what I was doing, but for some mysterious reason it upsets mom, so I just won't do it when she's around’). Worse yet, young children have been known to begin running away from the alarmed, angry sounding shouts of a spanking parent through a fear of being hit. This reaction on the part of young children is especially risky near roads, parking lots, and swimming pools, where the danger lies ahead. Any parent knows that there are moments, no matter how high the usual level of their vigilance, when young children are going to disappear from sight. One of the major purposes of this teaching method is to help address these potentially tragic instances by creating a greater degree of insurance against childhood accidental deaths and injuries. It’s too often the case that children learn to avoid danger only in the presence of the punitive parent without an understanding of the actual risks associated with the behavior in question. Mine is a method of teaching that serves to effectively hasten the process of children internalizing an independent ability to avoid danger, while also representing a means of teaching children without subjecting them to demeaning, disrespectful, or violent treatments. Having said all that, I should also add that although this method of teaching safety issues is highly effective, it still doesn't replace the need for young children to be supervised at all times where the possibility of danger might exist. NOTE: This approach may not show itself to be immediately effective in the absence of a well-functioning bond of trust between the child and the parent/caretaker. In such cases where there exists a degree of distrust, current acrimony, or alienation between the parent and child, repeated restaging of the lesson in question might be required. James C. Talbot -- Message posted via http://www.familykb.com |
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