13 Mar
Rant #1: Permissiveness
<rant>
I heard it a total of five times from five different parents over the course of two days of Parent/Teacher Conferences. “I just can’t get them to work at home.” The first time, I’m afraid I didn’t recover so well from the shock of hearing that.
Me: They won’t work for you?
Parent: Yes, I try to get them to do their work but they throw a fit.
M: They throw a fit?
P: Yes they yell and kick and scream and they won’t do their work.
M: So no homework is being done at home, he isn’t studying his multiplication facts?
P: Right.
M: Those are two of the biggest factors in your child’s poor grades. Are you OK with that?
P: Well he just won’t work for me.
I couldn’t believe my ears the first time. By the fifth time, I was more than a little fed up and was beginning to feel a little more bold in confronting parents with what I saw as a problem.
M: They throw a fit?
P: Yes they yell and kick and scream and they won’t do their work.
M: So what do you do about it?
P: There’s nothing I can do. He just throws a fit.
M: Hmmm… He doesn’t do that here at school.
P: I wonder why?
M: Probably because he knows if he tried to pull a stunt like that with me there would be swift consequences for his actions. Have you tried taking away privileges?
P: Oh I wouldn’t want to do that. He enjoys his TV shows so much.
M: So you don’t have any consequences for behavior like that?
P: No, not really.
M: That’s your problem.
P: *Awkward silence*
M: I wouldn’t let a child run a house like that, but if you need me to be the bad guy write a note to me in his agenda about his behavior at home and there will be consequences here at school.
P: Okay. That sounds good.
ARGGHHHHHHHH! I just wanted to scream at that point. Folks, permissiveness is not the key to child rearing! No I am not a parent, but I borrow 20 little darlings 5 days a week and I am having to do a lot of parenting that I really shouldn’t be doing and the main reason for this is permissive parenting. If this is the discipline model that you are taking in you house, believe me you are not doing your child any favors.
It is parents like these that make me thankful for parents who take an active interesting in their child’s development socially, morally, and academically. To those parents who are reading this who are, I thank you, your child’s teacher thanks you, and (even though they don’t now) your child thanks you.
</rant>
Class dismissed!
Posted by Timothy R. Butler on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
I can’t believe those parents. Sickening. “He enjoys his TV shows so much”!?!?!?
What in tarnation — sorry I couldn’t resist — is wrong with these people?
Posted by Michael on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
I think this
is the problem with the parents.
Posted by Christopher on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Michael, it should be noted that the minority of parents of students in my class said something like this. Not the majority.
Posted by ms. frizzle on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Right on!
A twist on this conversation which I’ve had any number of times is when parents take away ALL privileges for ANY offense. It’s November, but Andy knows he won’t be getting a single Christmas present, and can’t play video games until June. Sure it’s a punishment, but what on Earth is the child’s motivation to improve his behavior at this point? Why not just keep fooling around until June, and THEN try to shape up? I’ve had to suggest to several parents that they take away one privilege at a time, for short periods of time. I don’t know if any of them listened, though.
Posted by chett on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Might I suggest the Setting Limits books by Robert MacKenzie? Christopher and MS. Frizzle make complementary observations: The permissive parent who permits a child to go DefCon-4 with a slight response, and the punitive parent who responds to a slight infraction with DefCon-4.
MacKenzie has a great strategy for the middle ground: set firm limits, backed up by reasonable consequences, consistently enforces.
Posted by Christopher on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Thanks for the suggestion Chett. I’ll look into it. It might be a good recommendation in the future.
Posted by rick on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
former youth pastor here - same thing. and now that i’ve got kids, it’s ok to keep them from the tv shows they love so much.
Posted by Pressed on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Current Youth Pastor here. Parents want their kids to ‘grow’ and be a part of the youth group at church too, and yet they let their teen miss church constantly, let them skip all the events, don’t encourage them to be a part, and then wonder what the deal is when their kid isn’t growing in their faith and isn’t committed to anything.
Posted by Spare Change on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Rant #2: FAQ
No, 2 is not an arbitrary number, the first one is over here. This rant is provided to help better parent/teacher communication. <rant> Here are few common questions that parents ask that really gets my goat. So you don’t have…
Posted by irene on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
As one of the children who did NOT thank my parents at the time… I’m now thankful
Posted by Parablemania on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Permissive Parents
New to the Blogdom of God Alliance is What in Tarnation?!?!? (Note the symmetrial, palindromic punctuation.) He’s got a post about his observations from parent-teacher conferences (he’s the teacher) about parents who won’t get their kids to do homework…
Posted by jen on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
I would like to throttle some of the parents of the kids at my husband’s internship site. Their mom let them run wild and would scream at anyone who disciplined them. My parents would have killed my brother and I had we EVER behaved in public as these kids did and there were consequences if we misbehaved in school.
I’m thinking that we need to require parenting classes for people before they breed…
Posted by jen on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
pressed: i teach confirmation (what the infant-baptizing churches make kids go through to affirm their baptisms) and i have parents who want their kids to be confirmed but let their kids skip church, ditch class, and employ the “if my kid doesn’t want to do it, they shouldn’t have to” attitude with the requirements in general. i finally put my foot down on two of the kids and the family (who was pretty inactive anyway) threatened to leave the church. my husband (the pastor) and the church council all said “don’t let the door hit your butts on the way out.”
Posted by Tina on 13.03.04 at 1:52 pm
Former youth pastor… current senior pastor. Once had a parent that never told her poor child no… never set limits… after high school he did time dor rape and assault. Shoot! He had never been told no before. AAAAAAARGH!