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ailbheEmer's asleep so I can switch my other brain on.
Non-judgmental play supervision: How do you go about allowing your children to choose their forms of independent play when you know that they are acting out violent, gender-stereotyped, or other undesirable roles? I don't have time to go into much detail now but am thinking of stuff like Barbie, guns, etc. Some toys give me the screaming abdabs but I also feel I ought to allow them to play with them, so I try to keep out of it and let it go on around me without voicing a judgment, but there again, I'm fairly sure they're not dim enough not to realise when I'm judging my little heart out.
Property: My kids have SO MUCH STUFF and one of the ways Linnea expresses naughtiness is to destroy her own stuff. In general I either confiscate it and mend it or confiscate it and bin it. I do not replace destroyed stuff. There's too much already. What Would LJ Do?
Consequences: Linnea ate the icing off the defrosted cake in a box on the counter this morning. The cake itself is fine, though probably not fit to be given to guests, but I think she has forfeited her right to eat any of it now. Am I a tyrant or is that a reasonable, connected to the event, direct, comprehensible consequence?
Laundry: Do you think small spatters of orange turmeric staining on the front fly area of a pair of brand new beige trousers would be better or worse than small spatters of white marks where I failed to bleach it properly? I need to make this decision soon. I suppose I can always dye them brown...
Non-judgmental play supervision: How do you go about allowing your children to choose their forms of independent play when you know that they are acting out violent, gender-stereotyped, or other undesirable roles? I don't have time to go into much detail now but am thinking of stuff like Barbie, guns, etc. Some toys give me the screaming abdabs but I also feel I ought to allow them to play with them, so I try to keep out of it and let it go on around me without voicing a judgment, but there again, I'm fairly sure they're not dim enough not to realise when I'm judging my little heart out.
Property: My kids have SO MUCH STUFF and one of the ways Linnea expresses naughtiness is to destroy her own stuff. In general I either confiscate it and mend it or confiscate it and bin it. I do not replace destroyed stuff. There's too much already. What Would LJ Do?
Consequences: Linnea ate the icing off the defrosted cake in a box on the counter this morning. The cake itself is fine, though probably not fit to be given to guests, but I think she has forfeited her right to eat any of it now. Am I a tyrant or is that a reasonable, connected to the event, direct, comprehensible consequence?
Laundry: Do you think small spatters of orange turmeric staining on the front fly area of a pair of brand new beige trousers would be better or worse than small spatters of white marks where I failed to bleach it properly? I need to make this decision soon. I suppose I can always dye them brown...
(no subject)
Date: 2008-05-29 04:00 pm (UTC)(2) Sounds good; I think I do this already but feel guilty about it, which isn't all that useful. I'm always uncertain about which of my beliefs are beliefs and which are prejudices. I must go and look up that link you gave me about a book about overthinking, actually.
(3) The books and stories and stuff we talk about is pretty clear; I think a lot of the "play I don't like" is Linnea exploring things she sees and hears about outside our house.
I put toys and people in time out, but we don't call it time out, we call it going somewhere to calm down. "People" includes me. Putting myself in time out is a remarkably effective tool.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-05-29 08:35 pm (UTC)I'm always uncertain about which of my beliefs are beliefs and which are prejudices.
I think that as long as you're not expressing them in a shaming way, and you are willing to engage with counterarguments from other people present including your children, your beliefs don't have to be 100% prejudice-free in order for it to be okay to communicate them.