From the book Seen and Heard: Children’s Rights in Early Childhood Education: "Adults might try, when possible, to offer wisdom gained from experience rather than use life experience to justify control. When we offer instead of command, children maintain the power to refuse."
The book's authors, Ellen Lynn Hall and Jennifer Kofkin Rudkin, explain, "Adults disallow children's opportunities to make decisions by either forbidding behaviors or turning probabilities into certainties. 'If you don’t get down from there you're going to fall.' If the child should fall, adults might further assert their power (at the price of empathy) with the hard-to-resist, 'I told you so.'"
Hall and Rudkin offer a way for adults to hold themselves accountable for their use of control:
"Respecting children's rights requires that adults assert control in measured ways and provide reasons for assertions of control... Sometimes adults do not have compelling reasons for their directives. A pause to consider 'why' gives a chance to clarify their reasons to themselves as well as children. This opens the possibility for adults to realize that their constraints on children's decision making were not warranted. I have had to concede, for example, that pancakes for breakfast offer no nutritional advantage over chips and salsa."
Seen & Heard |
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Comments (2)
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Dallas, TX, United States
I eat chips and salsa for breakfast all the time. Crush chips, pour salsa and stir. Eat with a spoon.
Texas cereal.
Harvest Christian Academy
Kingsland, GA, United States
While I understand the sentiment of the article, that last example wasn't the best one to use. Also, I think making decisions for them is a good lesson that they don't get to make some choices, because that's just the reality for children. Yes, choose your battles, but some things aren't up for discussion.
On a lighter note, I try to explain to the teachers that the best time to tell the children why we don't run in the classroom or climb on shelves is before it happens. After it happens, it's time for empathy. Love them and soothe them. A gentle reminder is okay after they're calm and relaxed again.
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