Keeping Your Fears to Yourself
Monday, February 18, 2008
Babies are born with a highly developed startle reflex which is natures way of alerting them to danger. Infants can be startled by loud or strange noises and sudden unexpected movements. As the infant grows into babyhood unfamiliar sights such as a Halloween mask can startle and even frighten them. Toddlers may experience anxiety when a loved one leaves the room, but this is different than fears or phobias. It is anxiety about the uncertainty of being left behind. Beyond that babies just don't develop fears and phobias.
Children develop fears and phobias via the example of their neurotic or phobic family members; especially if they are young and still strongly identifying with the parent. We live in a turbulent and sometimes frightening world, but the issues that frighten society at large are adult issues that should never be imposed on the child's psyche. In fact, children should be protected from all adult fears and phobias lest they take them on as their own crippling mindset. And that includes common fears such as fear of water, insects and heights.
Overly anxious, over protective parents create phobic children who are too afraid of life to experience life. When children watch a parent having mini-panic-attacks whenever they fall down, when they get close to water or when they approach a dog they get a strong message that the world is a dangerous and frightening place.
Do parks have pedophiles? Sure they do. But that is no reason to avoid them. It is a reason to learn how to be aware of your surroundings. Does the ocean have sharks? Sure it does but that is no reason to avoid it. It is a reason to learn how to be safe around water. If you live your life giving in to irrational fears that is your choice but don't psychologically cripple your children by imposing those fears onto them.
Children need to be taught that the world is full of opportunities, that it is a wonderful place to experience life and to express themselves. Sure there will be some tumbles along the way but it is far better to live life to the fullest knowing that you will scrape your knee once in a while than to lock yourself away in fear of falling.
Parents who keep their children from enjoying life are teaching them to fear life. And a fear-based life was never a fulfilling one.
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Sex Offender Wins $10 Million Lottery
Monday, February 11, 2008
For the second time in a few months, a convicted felon has won the lottery in Massachusetts. Daniel Snay (photo above), of Uxbridge, Massachusetts, a level 3 sex offender has just won 10 million dollars in a state lottery. Just a few months ago a convicted bank robber in Massachusetts won a 1 million dollar state lottery. Surprisingly, the people of Massachusetts are not too concerned, even though the first lottery winner violated his probation by buying the lottery ticket.
We often comfort ourselves by believing that most sex offenders are locked up somewhere or that they live in mobile home parks designated for felons. Neither is true. The vast majority of sex offenders live next door to you. they have jobs and even have families. And those are just those who have been convicted. Authorities believe that the actual number of sex offenders (both registered and those not yet caught)is about triple the number who are registered.
Megan's Law is now upheld by every state in the US. The law requires that the public must have access to sex offender records for their area. And now you can go online to sites such as http://www.city-data.com and find state and city wide records for virtually anywhere in the US. Most sites include photos of the registered sex offender as well as their living and work address. State records even list the number of sex offenders per capita per state. This site shows the states in order of fewest sex offenders per capita to most sex offenders per capita.
If you have children you need to stay on top of who is living in your neighborhood. Allowing fear to keep you in the dark is not an option when you are a parent. It is your responsibility to protect your children and with the national average of sex offenders being about 0ne in 700, keeping your head in the sand is a very dangerous stance to take.
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Labels: lottery, Megan's Law, per capita, sex offender, state
Disciplining Infants and Toddlers
Saturday, February 02, 2008
Parenting is an exercise in evolution. As your child grows you, the parent, need to continually reassess your discipline techniques to fit your child's age and level of development.
From birth to about 10 months of age there is very little discipline that is needed. Infants aren't capable of misbehaving yet as they don't yet have the ability to understand the concept of right and wrong. By the time the child is 12 months old they have developed the cognitive ability to understand that some behaviors are acceptable and others are not. However, they haven't developed enough to determine which behaviors are right and which aren't. Consequently a child under one year of age cannot misbehave.
This is not to say that babies cannot try a parent's patience, but at this young age it is the parent that needs to learn how to teach the child by example and with positive reinforcement. No other form of discipline will have a positive effect.
From 18 months to 3 years of age the child has begun to understand that they are capable of getting the parent's attention via certain behaviors. They begin to understand that some behaviors have negative consequences and others have positive consequences. The more positive experiences a child has the more they will engage in behaviors that have positive consequences. A child who is craving attention will often resort to behaviors with negative consequences. A child's need for parental interaction is greater than their fear of punishment.
That's not to say that even a well loved child won't act out. They will. Between the age of 15 months and 3 years the child wants to understand what the rules are. Rules make them feel safe and secure. So they will continually choose to engage in behaviors that they have previously been scolded for. They do it to reinforce the rule in their mind, not to upset the parent or to assert dominance in the home. They do it to see if the parent really meant it when they introduced a new rule. Little children need the rules to be enforced over and over again in order to trust that it is not negotiable.
Some forms of discipline are effective with children this young and others are very ineffective. The following is a list of discipline styles both effective and ineffective for children age 18 months to 3 years.
Effective:
Positive Reinforcement
Redirecting
Verbal Instruction/Explanation
Time-outs (no longer than one minute of time-out per year of life)
Ineffective:
Establishment of Rules
Grounding
Withholding Privileges
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Labels: discipline, infants, parenting, punishment, toddlers