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#21
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kids and their furniture?
On 2 Feb 2006 20:17:29 -0800, Banty wrote:
One thing to consider - one of the things that drives me crazy is when my son was younger, or friends with *visiting* children would behave roughly toward my son's stuff, and the parents have an 'oh well they're kids' attitude. I say "oh well they're kids that's why they need to *learn*." What they learn at home *will* be reflected in what they do elsewhere. And they don't unlearn it as quickly as you think. Like, not even by time they're sharing dorm rooms! When my ds was 3, he had a collection of blown easter eggs that we had decorated. He was extremely careful with them as they were very delicate. He kept them for around 2 years. Then one day, he had a friend come over (they were around 5 by then) and he showed his friend the collection. This friend threw them and stomped on them and destroyed them all. My son was very upset. The friend's parents didn't think much of it as after all they were just *easter eggs.* Ds never invited this boy home after that though they still played at school and were friends there. OTOH, my own dd had some destructive behavior at 3 when she went to play with her friend (the boy's sister, btw). The problem at this age though was a lack of supervision. The girl's dad had a broken leg and let the two 3 year olds play upstairs in the bedroom. He didn't hear them pillow fighting. One of the pillows broke and started shedding feathers all over and the girls thought it was such fun that they took the feathers out of a second pillow and were throwing them all over. I really didn't consider that dd's fault or her friend's fault though as they were 3, not 5 and both girls were involved in the playing. -- Dorothy There is no sound, no cry in all the world that can be heard unless someone listens .. The Outer Limits |
#22
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kids and their furniture?
In article ,
toto wrote: On 2 Feb 2006 20:17:29 -0800, Banty wrote: One thing to consider - one of the things that drives me crazy is when my son was younger, or friends with *visiting* children would behave roughly toward my son's stuff, and the parents have an 'oh well they're kids' attitude. I say "oh well they're kids that's why they need to *learn*." What they learn at home *will* be reflected in what they do elsewhere. And they don't unlearn it as quickly as you think. Like, not even by time they're sharing dorm rooms! When my ds was 3, he had a collection of blown easter eggs that we had decorated. He was extremely careful with them as they were very delicate. He kept them for around 2 years. Then one day, he had a friend come over (they were around 5 by then) and he showed his friend the collection. This friend threw them and stomped on them and destroyed them all. My son was very upset. The friend's parents didn't think much of it as after all they were just *easter eggs.* Ds never invited this boy home after that though they still played at school and were friends there. OTOH, my own dd had some destructive behavior at 3 when she went to play with her friend (the boy's sister, btw). The problem at this age though was a lack of supervision. The girl's dad had a broken leg and let the two 3 year olds play upstairs in the bedroom. He didn't hear them pillow fighting. One of the pillows broke and started shedding feathers all over and the girls thought it was such fun that they took the feathers out of a second pillow and were throwing them all over. I really didn't consider that dd's fault or her friend's fault though as they were 3, not 5 and both girls were involved in the playing. To say nothing of the fact that two 3 yo's left unsupervised is just not a very good idea! And what they broke didn't have sentimental value -- it's just a mess to clean up. -- Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care |
#23
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kids and their furniture?
In article t,
dkhedmo wrote: I am going to give the situation another chance, as the alternative would result in restraining the toddler every time ds1 wanted to work on something, which is often. Our space is very limited and to supervise both kids means ds1 at the kitchen table and a very exuberant toddler stuck in a high chair or gated off from 50% of the downstairs area. Does the exuberant toddler not like doing artwork? You could supervise them both together, at opposite ends of the table, with their own equipment. -- Chookie -- Sydney, Australia (Replace "foulspambegone" with "optushome" to reply) "In Melbourne there is plenty of vigour and eagerness, but there is nothing worth being eager or vigorous about." Francis Adams, The Australians, 1893. |
#24
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kids and their furniture?
In article ,
Chookie wrote: In article t, dkhedmo wrote: I am going to give the situation another chance, as the alternative would result in restraining the toddler every time ds1 wanted to work on something, which is often. Our space is very limited and to supervise both kids means ds1 at the kitchen table and a very exuberant toddler stuck in a high chair or gated off from 50% of the downstairs area. When I had a 5 yo who liked doing art, and two toddlers who got into her stuff, the playpen got a real workout: it's where the 5 yo did her art projects! I don't remember if it was my idea or hers the first time -- hers, probably -- but any time she wanted to do stuff that had to be kept out of reach of her siblings, she took it into the playpen and did it there. The babies didn't have to be restrained, she was still out where I could see her and converse with her, and it worked out really well. -- Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care |
#25
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kids and their furniture?
"dragonlady" wrote in message
When I had a 5 yo who liked doing art, and two toddlers who got into her stuff, the playpen got a real workout: Yes, I second the playpen. When I had multiple children of different ages is when I used the playpen the most. The older kids loved the playpen because they could play with their little pieces and/or the little ones could play and the older ones could do their thing. Saved my sanity a lot. -- Sue (mom to three girls) |
#26
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kids and their furniture?
I think it's nice for kids to have SOME things that they're free to treat pretty much as they like, and SOME things that they have to treat with care. The first category gives them freedom and opportunity to develop creativity, as well as possibly a way to learn on their own from their own mistakes. The second category teaches them appropriate behaviour. It might be nice to give a child one piece of furniture that they're allowed to colour and paint and draw on as much as they like. Probably not to be allowed to cut up or destroy, though. (Though see the Project Lab pages about letting kids take things apart as a sort-of creative activity http://borntoexplore.org/plab/plab.html After the child is finished with it, it could be repainted. However, I don't think it's necessary for every child to have a piece of furniture like that. They could have other outlets for creativity or other ways to take control of a territory: some kids might have the freedom to arrange the furniture in their room how they want, for example. Or decide which shelves are for toys. I think it's up to the parents to decide which items of furniture, if any, need to be treated with care and which can be coloured or destroyed by the child. (If allowing a child to actually take the furniture apart, there could also be safety issues.) I think it's usually nice to keep things in a condition where they can eventually be given away or sold and used by another family. Another issue: if a child writes on something or partially destroys it, the same child when older might not like the destruction or even remember doing it, and might even blame the parents for letting them do that. With some justification, perhaps. This may apply more to 2-year-olds destroying things than 5-year-olds. |
#27
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kids and their furniture?
I don't see why a 5-year-old needs permanent markers.
Washable markers should be fine. If you take things away, you can do it in a way that doesn't seem too punitive: just a necessity. |
#28
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kids and their furniture?
In article , toto says...
On 2 Feb 2006 20:17:29 -0800, Banty wrote: One thing to consider - one of the things that drives me crazy is when my son was younger, or friends with *visiting* children would behave roughly toward my son's stuff, and the parents have an 'oh well they're kids' attitude. I say "oh well they're kids that's why they need to *learn*." What they learn at home *will* be reflected in what they do elsewhere. And they don't unlearn it as quickly as you think. Like, not even by time they're sharing dorm rooms! When my ds was 3, he had a collection of blown easter eggs that we had decorated. He was extremely careful with them as they were very delicate. He kept them for around 2 years. Then one day, he had a friend come over (they were around 5 by then) and he showed his friend the collection. This friend threw them and stomped on them and destroyed them all. My son was very upset. The friend's parents didn't think much of it as after all they were just *easter eggs.* Ds never invited this boy home after that though they still played at school and were friends there. It isn't just the kids. When my son was younger (in fact, until recently and he's 13) he was really into die-cast little cars (like Matchbox). We'd always put them carefully away into boxes with slots for them or my son would park them in rows to put them away. One evening, I had friends over, and he was playing cars with their daughter, and they had pretty much taken them *all* out. When it was time to go home, he and the girl started cleaning up (he had to initiate). My friend, her father, seeing this, thought he'd speed the process up and 'make it fun' by having the kids pitch the cars across the room into a toy box! She and her Dad were throwing them, with them smashing agaisnt each other, chipping paint, with my son crying and objecting, the puzzled Dad saying to my son "What's WRONG??". I intervened and said "oh, we'll take care of that" and later had to explain to my son that *this* time it didn't work out to have his friend help him clean up as usual but he should still have his friends help him clean up before they go home. ARrgggh. You could always tell which ones got thrown into the toy box before I went to his room to see what the commotion was about. Banty |
#29
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kids and their furniture?
In article ,
Banty wrote: In article , toto says... On 2 Feb 2006 20:17:29 -0800, Banty wrote: One thing to consider - one of the things that drives me crazy is when my son was younger, or friends with *visiting* children would behave roughly toward my son's stuff, and the parents have an 'oh well they're kids' attitude. I say "oh well they're kids that's why they need to *learn*." What they learn at home *will* be reflected in what they do elsewhere. And they don't unlearn it as quickly as you think. Like, not even by time they're sharing dorm rooms! When my ds was 3, he had a collection of blown easter eggs that we had decorated. He was extremely careful with them as they were very delicate. He kept them for around 2 years. Then one day, he had a friend come over (they were around 5 by then) and he showed his friend the collection. This friend threw them and stomped on them and destroyed them all. My son was very upset. The friend's parents didn't think much of it as after all they were just *easter eggs.* Ds never invited this boy home after that though they still played at school and were friends there. It isn't just the kids. When my son was younger (in fact, until recently and he's 13) he was really into die-cast little cars (like Matchbox). We'd always put them carefully away into boxes with slots for them or my son would park them in rows to put them away. One evening, I had friends over, and he was playing cars with their daughter, and they had pretty much taken them *all* out. When it was time to go home, he and the girl started cleaning up (he had to initiate). My friend, her father, seeing this, thought he'd speed the process up and 'make it fun' by having the kids pitch the cars across the room into a toy box! She and her Dad were throwing them, with them smashing agaisnt each other, chipping paint, with my son crying and objecting, the puzzled Dad saying to my son "What's WRONG??". I intervened and said "oh, we'll take care of that" and later had to explain to my son that *this* time it didn't work out to have his friend help him clean up as usual but he should still have his friends help him clean up before they go home. Did you explain to the father that your son was careful to not chip his matchbox cars? Frankly, it's a mistake I could see ME making -- my kids' toy cars were not something they were that careful about, and throwing them into the toybox is how we would have taken care of them. I'd have appreciated a parent explaining to me that what I was doing was violating their kids' sense of the right way to care for their items; it would have given me a chance to, first, apologize, and, second demonstrate to my own kids a different approach to caring for toys. We did have one friend with a daughter who took extraordinary care of her toys. There were some things that she just put up and didn't get out when we visited -- my kids weren't particularly distructive, but, for example, the "filler" pieces in those foam puzzles were things they'd just throw away, while she liked to have even those tiny filler pieces put back in place. (Her kid sister, by nature, was closer to my kids -- and the two of them had to do some serious work to learn to share space when they got older!) ARrgggh. You could always tell which ones got thrown into the toy box before I went to his room to see what the commotion was about. Banty -- Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care |
#30
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kids and their furniture?
In article ,
dragonlady says... In article , Banty wrote: When my son was younger (in fact, until recently and he's 13) he was really into die-cast little cars (like Matchbox). We'd always put them carefully away into boxes with slots for them or my son would park them in rows to put them away. One evening, I had friends over, and he was playing cars with their daughter, and they had pretty much taken them *all* out. When it was time to go home, he and the girl started cleaning up (he had to initiate). My friend, her father, seeing this, thought he'd speed the process up and 'make it fun' by having the kids pitch the cars across the room into a toy box! She and her Dad were throwing them, with them smashing agaisnt each other, chipping paint, with my son crying and objecting, the puzzled Dad saying to my son "What's WRONG??". I intervened and said "oh, we'll take care of that" and later had to explain to my son that *this* time it didn't work out to have his friend help him clean up as usual but he should still have his friends help him clean up before they go home. Did you explain to the father that your son was careful to not chip his matchbox cars? Frankly, it's a mistake I could see ME making -- my kids' toy cars were not something they were that careful about, and throwing them into the toybox is how we would have taken care of them. I'd have appreciated a parent explaining to me that what I was doing was violating their kids' sense of the right way to care for their items; it would have given me a chance to, first, apologize, and, second demonstrate to my own kids a different approach to caring for toys. Well, this was something where all my friend should have needed to do was to let his daughter follow my son's lead. Or at least have known that his change of plan wasn't working when my son started objecting and crying! (He was 4 or 5.) I mean, as the adult I can be more polite and articulate than "nooooo NO NO don't DOOO that! Waaaaahhhhh!", but I do think my son *was* conveying the essential message! And as the adult I don't necessarily need to instruct or reform anyone; just get everyone out of an awkward situation and save the toys. It wouldn't be necessary or even my place to explain things to him. If we shared housing, then it would make sense. (The Dad is a very good and reasonable human being, BTW, just a tad dense on some stuff.) This is really my *point*. That a really casual attitude towards furniture (and toys) *will* come out in how one treats others' things. Banty |
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