Chapter Excerpts

Myths of Child Rearing

Myth: You should let the baby know right away who is boss.

Fact: This dictum reflects a recurrent theme in the annals of child-rearing mythology: the fear that if we do not control our children, they will control us. Who will control whom should not be an issue in raising children. Rather, our concern should be: How can we best meet the needs of our children in order to help them develop into the finest human beings possible?

Myths from Birth to One Year

Myth: Prospective parents will innately know how to meet their babies' physical and psychological needs, therefore formal courses in infant care are unnecessary.

Fact: This is not true. These courses should teach adults to allow themselves to naturally meet the baby's needs of feeding, holding, and care. The baby is not fragile and will not fall apart or break if held or fondled. The need for the mother to rest and for the father to help should be emphasized.

Myths from One to Three

Myth: Parents should force their children to eat a balanced diet.

Fact: Research has shown that if you make nutritious food available to children, they will choose what they need to have a nutritionally balanced diet. In general parents should not involve themselves too much in what food their children eat or the amount of food portions. We do have to limit them with regard to sweets, do not keep them in the home. Children do go through food extremes at different ages and they do use food in different ways. The trick is not to make too much of an issue over children's eating habits, to the point that food becomes a battleground rather than a learning experience.

Myths from Three to Five

Myth: The period prior to a child's entry into Kindergarten is generally a quiet time for children.

Fact: There really is no such thing as a quiet time for children. However, it is a time when a child is getting ready to go on to the next stage, of going outside the home, when he begins going to school. By this time children are identifying more with adult values and will report other chilren's infractions. They are more willing to be involved with adults.

Myths from Five to Seven

Myth: Boys tend to behave more maturely than girls.

Fact: There probably are many differences between boys and girls during this age period. The basic difference is the ability of girls to have more frustration tolerance than boys. Girls are essentially able to tolerate frustation better, and because of this they are able to take directions better, to wait longer, and to handle themselves in a more mature manner than boys. This is not to imply that every girl can do better than every boy. Naturally there are going to be boys with better frustation tolerance than certain girls. Also, a boy may be specifically suited for a certain task and because of his strength, he can perform the bask better than a girl with more frustation tolerance. Then the level of frustation tolerance does not matter as much.

Myths from Seven to Nine

Myth: It is not important for a child to know the difference between fairness and unfairness within himself. The group will teach him to be fair.

Fact: When a question of fairness is involved, you teach the child to ignore the group when it is unfair. If you do not do this, then you are teaching him to give in to primitive group unfairness and teaching him personal irresponsibility. Groups are often carried away by the moment. The exception might be groups who feel that they themselves are unfairly treated so they try to teach their children to treat others faily. But even minority groups fall into the habit of attacking as a majority when attacked. This is based on hostility, not fairness. Fairness can be taught to children by reversing roles and asking the child what he would want to happen to him if he were in the other person's position. Ordinarily, he will see his own advantage for himself but he does not see it for the other person. Children at this age do not see the other person's position as their own because as far as others are concerned, they are still under the influence of the instinctual brain that goes mostly on emotion. But when it comes to themselves, they will usually be under the control of the ego structure of the intellectual brain that will show them what is fair.

Myths from Nine to Eleven

Myth: Children should always be kept back in school if they are unable to keep up with their academic work.

Fact: When a decision is made to retain a child in school, it has to be understood from every aspect of that child's life. It would depend on whether or not you can solve his intellectual problem by retaining him. What his social and emotional condition is and how he feels about himself about being retained at the time of retention must be considered. Will being left back leave the child socially isolated and frustrated to the point of losing his interest in school? For this reason, retention should be considered in Kindergarten rather than in the fifth or sixth grade. Whatever the grade, it should be done with parental support and acceptance and with remedial help.

Myths from Eleven to Twelve

Myth: You cannot prepare a child for adolescence.

Fact: In general, you let the child take on more and more responsibilities as he shows himself appropriately able to handle them. This means that if an eleven-year-old boy is extremely immature, you do not push him toward girls and if he is extremely mature, you do not completely stop him from being with girls. But you do set up appropriate limits all the time. This is the gradual development of a child's identity in line with his ability to carry out certain tasks. This should have been going on from the time the child was a baby and will continue now into the difficult time leading toward adolescence.

Back