Food for tbought:

Found this in the NYT's review of Madeline Levine's book TEACH YOUR  CHILDREN WELL and just had to post it. I will write more about this soon but put it here now as something to think about. How do we prevent schools from putting out children under undue and possibly damaging pressure and do we ever look at the pressure we as parents put on them as parents and evaluate this pressure? Something worth spending some time doing.


"she’s had it. She’s had it with schools that worship at the altar of high achievement but do everything they can to undermine children’s growth and well-being: eliminating recess; assigning mind-deadening amounts of homework; and ranking, measuring and valuing kids by narrowly focused test scores, while cutting out other areas of creative education in which large numbers of students who don’t necessarily test well might find success and thrive. And she’s had it with parents who profess to want nothing more than “happiness” for their children (“Kids laugh when I tell them that their parents don’t mention money as a measure of success; they think I’ve been snowed,” she divulges) while neglecting the aspects of family life that build enthusiasm and contentment, and overemphasizing values and activities that can actually do harm." NYT book reviewJuly 12. 2012

 WE CAN STOP THE KILLINGS- BUT IT WON'T BE EASY



I can't help but respond to the tragedy in  Connecticut last week. It's not that not enough has already  been said about this tragic even, The problem is that with all this talk no one is talking about what needs to be done to prevent  this from ever happening again. There has been a great deal of discussion about treating the symptoms of the problem with most of it focused on gun control but no discussion of a real solution. Gun control will make us all safer but it will not be enough to stop school shootings. I believe,  that a psychotic on a mission is going to find the weapons he needs regardless of how tightly we control guns. The real issue is not guns and it is only part of the solution.

The real issue is that as a culture and a community we have begun to produce, in numbers never seen before, young (people and sometimes even children), who have learned to hate themselves and the world so much that mass killing is the only way they believe they can ease their pain, compensate for their humiliations and be heard. The real problem, that too few people are talking about, is how do we prevent children from ever reaching this point. How can we provide every child with the experiences that he needs in order  for him to learn to  love and respect himself and others. Until we can figure out a way to do this these killings will continue whether we have better gun control or not.

A person must one go through a number of stages over many years before one becomes a psychopath   with the ability to kill. Killers are not born or made over night. The stages have well defined observable behaviors unique to each stage. If you would like to read about this in more detail there is an excellent book titled WHY THE KILL where Richard Rhodes writes about the research conducted by the sociologist Lonnie Athens  www.nytimes.com/books/first/r/rhodes-kill.html. It is an in depth study in which the author clearly identifies and explains these steps and the behaviors that accompany them.

Given that there are a number of stages if we were able to recognize one of the early stages in a student we could then take steps to provide the services the child needs in order to break the cycle.  By so doing we would also be preventing, later in life, the development of a very disturbed adult who would require services that the community then needs to provide. It seems the prudent way to go is to intervene as early as possible. An example of this is the shooter in Ct. who went through 12 years of public school talking to no one and apparently with out any attempt at out reach from the school. Had the school done so who knows how things might have turned out.

The big question is who in our communities will take on this responsibility?
Agencies are not exactly clamoring for the opportunity. Because our schools interact and evaluate our children every day they seem to be the most logical choice. However before this can be happen, we need to modify our schools by: adding required and qualified staff and training teachers and administration on what to look for in a child and by helping schools to embrace this new role, to make it part of their charter.  As it is now teachers believe they are responsible for transmitting a certain body of knowledge to their students and that their success of doing so is measured once a year by one standardized test. They don't consider the mental health of the child as being part of their job.  Now it is true that some teachers take it upon themselves to do this. They watch carefully for signs that a child may be in pain. However once she has done this there is no one to provide services to the child. This must change and schools will have to assume the responsibility for the mental health of the children the same way they now assume responsibility for their academic growth. It goes without saying that this will require additional dollars.



Once schools assume this responsibility we need to be sure that there are psychologists in adequate numbers available to provide the mental health services for those children in need. This can be done by the school or the state mental health agency, it makes no difference, as long as services are available. As part of the services to the child there will also need to be services provided to the family.  To assume that the problems teachers are seeing in children are of their own creation would be ill advised.  Usually when a child is experiencing difficulty there is something happening at home to support it. If, then, we work with the child and not the family it is unlikely that anything we do will have a permanent effect.

We will also need to improve the quality of teachers and teacher training. The job of teacher has become much more complicated and complex in the last two decades but teacher salaries have either declined or remained stagnant. If we do not seriously raise the salaries of teachers, and I mean double what they are making now, we will continue to attract teachers who although well intended are just not able to meet the needs of children. On average teachers come from the bottom 30% of their graduating class. ( I will deal with this in detail in a future blog)

The job requires people who are bright, talented, creative, flexible, infinitely patient, able to read even the subtle changes in a child's moods, is knowledgeable about child development and the latest research in the neurosciences that have implications for teaching.  They need to make 100s of decisions every day about how to handle  situations with different children that if wrong can ruin a child's day, if not his week. This is a lot to expect from any one person and there are not many who can do it really well. The average starting teacher makes 32k a year and this will not attract few people with the skills truly good teachers must have  

As an example it is not possible, on a teachers salary to buy a house, get married, have children save for retirement and then put your children through college while maintaining a decent standard of living. Many talented people, particularly men, who would make first rate teachers never even consider the job because the pay is so inadequate. Our brightest people should be teaching our children and this will not happen until salaries are made competitive.

Until we stop creating people capable of committing acts as atrocious as the shootings in Ct. we will have to accept these shootings as just another part of life because they will not stop. And solving the problem will require a rock solid commitment of both the government and the people and it will take the willingness to spend the money that s needed to make it effective.  The sad thing is that until we make this commitment to keep children from growing up to be psychpaths then innocent children and teachers will die and families will be torn apart and the only reason they will die is that "we" failed to act.

There are of course other ways to attack this problem.  I have outlined only one. It doesn't matter how we attack the problem only that we do attack and with a plan that stands a good chance of succeeding.
Don't let people tell you we don't have the money. If we can fight two wars and give tax breaks to the richest of the rich then we can fund this. Our children deserve it. They have a basic right to attend school without having to be afraid that they won't be home for diner as was the case for the children in CT.

Today is a day to celebrate Christmas with your chilrden and your family.  I hope it is a very Merry Christmas. Try to take a few moments to pause and condsider how lucky you are to have your children safe and happy and also take moment to think of those who will not be able to share this experience with you.

If children are truly our most precious asset and we truly believe this then it is time to start acting like it. 

IT IS TIME TO STOP THE MADNESS.

G

COMMUNICATING WITH YOUR CHILD

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THE IMPORTANCE OF COMMUNICATING WITH YOUR CHILD 

Once the necessities of food, shelter, clothing and water are provided, building a positive and productive relationship developed through strong communication with your child is the most important thing you will do for him. What makes the job of parenting so challenging is that as the child matures your relationship and communication must adjust accordingly. Your relationship, with your child, needs to be influenced by the developmental stage of your child. This means that you need to be constantly attuned to the subtle shifts in his development so that you can adjust your relationship accordingly. Like all skills this one will have to be consciously developed and practiced until it becomes part of your intuitive response.

In order to know and respond to the ever evolving needs of the child you will need to spend time with the child and carefully listen to the child. This has gotten harder and harder for parents to do, with both parents working and so many tempting distractions. This means that parents have to work harder than ever to make this happen and to spend enough time with their children to make sure it does.

It is also important to be aware of the quality of the attention you are giving your child. He needs to know that you are not only listening but hearing. This means that listening is the only thing you are doing. If you are distracted or doing other things at the same time you are listening to your child then the quality of the communication is diminished and your child may be getting the message that what he has to say is not important. Make the time to give your child your undivided attention and it will pay dividends long into the future.

If this investment of time is made and you develop the skills, needed to build a strong relationship, this will make the remaining years of child rearing much more managable and give you enjoyment beyond words. 

If you cannot communicate effectively with your child it is not possible to influence his development in a positive way as he grows older.  A strong parent child relationship built at this time will  have influences far into the future.  In his book They F**** You Up the psychologist Oliver James talks about how his relationship with his father continued to influence him in his early adulthood:

“Many parents have tried to cajole, bribe. And otherwise persuade their sons to work harder, but without success.  My father succeeded because he had real purchase with me, having been unstintingly enthusiastic and encouraging throughout. He was a very tactile person who offered hugs and affection liberally. Although he occasionally lost his temper completely, for the most part he was not a frightening presence. I believed that I complied with his aspirations for me not out of fear but out of a sense of obligation and love for a kind man.” (Oliver)

What is of significance here is Mr. James’ decision to comply with his fathers wishes, even after childhood, were motivated by the kind of relationship he had with his dad as a child. It was a relationship clearly built over time and based on a mutual respect that does not happen by coincidence. Mr. James' impression of his father as a "kind man" was developed over many years.

Establishing this kind of relationship with your child is also the only way you can influence a child once his peers have become the driving force in his life. The time you spend weaving a relationship in his early years will determine how much influence you have in later years.

Mr. James was able to influence his son’s decision, long after he had left home, simply by asking.  This worked only because his father had, through strong communication, over the years, built a relationship that gave his words credibility, long after his son had moved from home. Parents who do not take the time to establish a mutually trusting and respectful means of communications with their children find themselves pained by the decisions their children make and by their inability to communicate with them in a way that the child can hear them.

One of the more frequent concerns that I hear from parents, of middle school and high school children, is there feeling of helplessness when it comes to connecting their child ; “No matter what I say he just doesn’t listen. I don’t know how to get him to see that he is ruining his chances in life.”  This is a difficult situation to deal with since the fabric of that parent child relationship, woven years in the past, apparently did not have much mutual trust or respect built into the weave. Now that the child’s life has moved into a new orbit far from the family, where peers rule, it becomes very difficult to weave new qualities into the relationship. In fact beyond the age of thirteen or so if you haven’t developed the relationship you want your child you may have missed your opportunity to do so.

I say this not to discourage the parents of older children from trying because with considerable effort it can be done but it requires outside support and an amazing will to effect this change. The best time to do it is when the child is developing his attitudes, self image, values and trust. Mr. James described so very accurately what a parent needs to do in order to develop this relationship  "My father succeeded because he had real purchase with me, having been unstintingly enthusiastic and encouraging throughout."

If you want to have "purchase" or influence with your child as he grows older your support of him needs to be "unstintingly enthusiastic and encouraging throughout." The key word is throughout. You have to provide your support from the very beginning right through to adult hood. 

Do this and you will have the kind of purchase you need to influence your child to make the right decisions right through his adulthood.