I love your thoughts on parenting. Have you heard of our mothering board? gracefulmothering.com...or maybe you already asked me this...if so I'm sorry for being dense.

Julie,
If you think it's bad now, wait till Emma is in school. Especially if she doesn't conform to whatever they consider appropriate, or normal. It's all about bribes and rewards. (And here I digress to say, that by being politically correct we now group all children together - BD, LD, ADD, Gifted, "normal"...just how is a teacher expected to get anything done unless she bribes the kids to exhibit quiet, robot like behavior?) Unfortunately, schools themselves are victims of this too via standardized testing. Good scores, more funding. Bad scores - your students can choose a better preforming school elsewhere. And so, we teach to the test. Bah. Don't get me started......

Makeesha - I'll check out the site...

Gerbmom ;) - its depressing the way the system works. Reading books like Punished by Rewards really scares me - makes me almost want to homeschool. But could you imagine a wild and crazy sociable girl like Emma being homeschooled! I know there are other options, its just frustrating.

Watch out for those bedbugs. We have been infested here in kenya, and well they are very anoying. Not dangerous just pesky, and itchy. We tried something a few days ago and so far so good no bites. We shall see if it works.

I think you're right on with your thoughts on the rewards. In my opinion it is just another clear example of lazy parenting - not truly teaching your child or allowing them to experience and learn for him/herself, but rather taking the easy route to get to the desired end result.

An example: I went on a picnic with my 2 girls (at the time I was pregnant w/ #3) and two moms with their kids. The oldest children were 4 at the time. We had each packed brown bag lunches for our kids and had set them up on a blanket to eat together. One of the older girls was trying to get her straw in the juice box and one of the other mothers said, "Oh honey, thats too hard for you, let me do that." I was apalled. I live in a world where we allow my kids to try, we allow them to crack eggs for pancakes when they're 2 years old so that they learn how to crack eggs, we allow our kids to try to do things even if they're hard (how revolutionary, I know) and if they need help, they are expected to ask for help.

How in the world are our children going to learn how to do things if we don't allow them to try? And what is the magic age that we allow them to open their own juicebox straw? And when are we going to start expecting our children to behave simply because they are expected to behave? And how in the world do we expect our kids to respect authority if the only way grown-ups exercise their authority is to bribe and/or reward?

Sometimes I wonder if we're setting our children up for some major, major pain and heartache in their lives by raising them to be kind, gentle, responsible, sympathetic, unselfish, caring etc. human beings, when it certainly seems that others are not raising their kids that way.

You are right on, Julie. And you got me going:) Sorry for the long comment, but really, this bothers me - A LOT;)

Hi - thanks for the comment-

You mentioned the thought that you wonder if we are preparing our kids for "major pain and heartache in their lives by raising them to be kind, gentle, responsible, sympathetic, unselfish, caring etc. human beings, when it certainly seems that others are not raising their kids that way."

This always gets me. Or the response that its a cold hard world and so our kids need to be ready for it or the whole they need to hit first in order to survive mentality. I want my child to be caring, unselfish and all that even if everyone else is not. I want her to enjoy books even if the school system try their hardest to prevent that. I want her to shun violence even if all the examples of authority she sees (other parents, our president) use violence as their first option. If it is a cold world that has bought into systems of rewards and punishments, I want her to know something different, be a better person than that, and be an instrument of change.

I think it is going to be difficult to be counter-cultural parents. I already notice a slight feeling of guilt that I don't have my 4 year old signed up for dance classes, soccer and art. I hate that. I want to provide experiences for her, but not at the expense of making her life so busy that she can't be a kid.

I have rarely happened upon someone who seems to have the same feelings as I do as a parent. I try to be intentional in the way I live my life and I try to be intentional in the way I parent my children and it sounds like you do, too. I want to, right now, be a source of encouragement for you to continue what you're doing regardless of what society is saying.

I, too, have thought that perhaps homeschooling would be a better option, but knowing myself well enough, I realize that it isn't the best option for my kids - I wouldn't enjoy it and neither would they. However, it does seem like the only way to make sure they are not subject to that kind of stuff... Somehow we need to help them navigate their way through life the correct way regardless of outside influences. Lots of prayer, I suppose - and intentionality.

I don't mean to hi-jack your blog or your post, I am just very passionate about this aspect of parenting. AND I am so glad there is someone else out there that feels the same way:)

That's so discouraging to hear about people not giving you a helping hand (literally.) My experience living in New England was similar. People even looked at you strangely if you smiled at a stranger. Here in New Jersey people are moderately nice. When people see me crashing a stroller into the door because the baby doesn't want to be in it, while I hoist the baby over my pregnant belly, people open the door. But when it comes to friendships, people seem mostly clickish and just totally into their own suburban lives.

RE Parenting: I struggle with that one. I am all for encouraging instrinsic enjoyment and innate expectation of success-cooperation, validating kids' feelings, not doing things for kids they can do for themselves, etc. However, my daughter is quite energetic and does not naturally follow directions when asked to do so, nor is she naturally into trying new things for the pure joy of it, and frequently validating her feelings just maks her wail louder, rather than resulting in the cookie cutter response of, "Oh I feel so much better now that I'm validated and understood, so I'll come up with my own solution." And there are times when I am not up for being ultra creative and playful, and I also do believe consistency, natural consequences and taking care of oneself as a parent are important. And I sure hope that an occasional reward is not going to damage a child for life, as long as the overall tenor is one of relationship, appreciation, authenticity, confidence-expectation and continuing to journey together as a family, doing what seems healthy and balanced at each stage of child and family development.

Nika attends a quaker preschool, and so far that has been a very good place for her. There seems to be a value on human beings over achievement standards and pushing kids to get "tracked" by age four.

No issues with the discussion - I think issues of parenting are often ignored. People go for whatever is easiest or what the people around tem are doing. To question that means to make people actually think about what they are doing... not a popular option.

I do hope I can find an affordable preschool that I actually want to send Emma to...

I really enjoyed the post about parenting, Julie. I'll have to read that book. I posted some of my own thoughts on my blog (rather than post multiple paragraphs here taking up a lot of space.)