“Coach Accused of Punching Son”  The headline in the LA Times caught my eye.  A youth baseball coach is facing a simple assault charge for punching his 9 year old son in the face after the boy was ejected from a game.  Are they kidding? I read it again.  [Coach’s name] of suburban Harrisburg was charged after he allegedly struck his son twice with a closed fist…  I read it one more time to make sure I was reading it correctly. Yep, that’s what it said alright.

What could a 9 year old possibly do to cause an adult to punch his son—or anyone—with a closed fist—with a pinky finger? I just can’t make sense of this one.  Did he play poorly? Did he not try hard? Was he goofing around?  Did he not do as his father, the coach, asked? Was he being a smart alec? Did he stick his tongue out? What? Even if he yelled an unmentionable at the top of his lungs, I still can’t fathom a man  hitting a child, any child.

 There are so many directions one could go in reacting to this heinous behavior. I could address parents who are overly invested in their child’s performance at school, on the ice rink, on the ball field. I could discuss the parent who makes it his child’s job it is to meet his dream of achievement.  I could even go on and on about anger management.

 While I don’t know what really happened on the field that day, I do know one thing for sure: Lots of children  must have witnessed that scene, and for sure his own son did.  I can promise you, that boy got more than black eye from his father.

Parents are children’s primary teachers. Children learn more from watching their parents than by anything that that is said to them, even if it is accompanied by a wagging index finger and eyebrows knitted together.  “Do as I say, not as I do” is an expression of the past, and it just doesn’t work.  Parents model, day in and day out, how to be in the world. You can talk until you are blue in the face, but what you do is what your children will learn.  Not only will your behavior communicate your expectations for behavior, but it is also how your child develops his own system of values.

 Children spot hypocrisy more quickly than you can imagine. Yelling at your child not to yell at you because it is disrespectful is a message and a lesson. Jay walking because you are in terrible hurry erases your warnings of never to jay walk.  Speaking rudely to a waitress, to your own mother, to your own spouse negates your preaching the importance of treating people kindly and with respect.  It is your actions that model the lessons you want your children to learn.

 I wonder what lesson’s Mel Gibson’s 8 children learned from him last week.

 It’s hard not to love the movie Babies. That’s what I chose to do for my Mothers’ Day observance.  It was kind of like eating chocolate… all good! There were none of the not-so-fun parts of babies, like colic and diarrhea and sleepless nights. Just one oooo and ahhhhh after another.

 But the cute is not what stuck with me. Several days later, I am thinking about the stark contrast in the way the Japanese and the American babies were parented compared to the African and Mongolian babies.  The African baby was gnawing on a fat stick he plucked out of the dirt. Splinters, dirt, ants, fungus…yuck! Obviously teething, he chewed away. Flash to the sanitized environment of the American baby in his Parent and Me class, daddy swaying to the song about Mother Earth, as they sat on their acrylic carpet squares.

 Then there was the Mongolian baby who appeared to have more animals than adults in his life. Like self rising flour, he seemed to be raising himself amidst the raw life on the plain.  He crawls through the obstacle course provided by the legs of  a herd of calves, and the audience waits for him to be trampled.  Contrast that scene to the Japanese baby who is under the constant eye of her mommy or daddy or Gymboree teacher, getting her prescribed movement experience.

 In the past weeks as I have launched my new book, I have been speaking to parents all over the country. Among the many points I aim to make, is the need for parents to let go of their death grip.  How can young children ever cultivate independence and self reliance if parents are holding on so tightly? Children need to struggle and fall in order to learn how to pick themselves up and survive.  Dr. Spock said, “A child who has not been well bandaged has not been well parented.”

 I am not suggesting that you place your children’s dinner of mush down on the floor and let them all go for it in a giant feeding frenzy, including smushing the white goo on the youngest sibling’s head. Nor am I condoning a child sharing his bath water with the family goat. I am abundantly grateful for all that we, in our disease free, safety precaution filled America, are able to offer our children. But Babies sure made me think twice about the good parts of what children learn when they are sometimes left alone.

A Mother’s Day blog should be  meaningful, perhaps profound,  poignant, maybe a little sappy, and really chock full of platitudes about the importance of mothers.  It should be, but I am on a different journey.

 I was sitting in Disney Hall, watching the dynamic Gustavo Dudamel and listening to the brilliant Los Angeles Philharmonic with my dear friend, Freida Mock. I sat there thinking how angry I am that music education has been cut from public schools and how important it is that children be exposed to music of all kinds at the earliest age.  Exposure to music not only enriches our lives and speak to our souls, but education and experience with music actually affects a child’s neural development. Music is good for you!

 Freida feels as strongly about music and all the arts as I do. But her life is the arts; she is a documentary film maker. We were first friends because our kids went to nursery school together, trick-or-treated together, celebrated  birthdays together, shared vacations at Red Fish Lake together.

 Freida is a wonderful mother, but film is her life. Her family has traveled the world (literally), shooting films of all kinds in the most remote places. Their holiday cards each year have told the tale, the whole family in the most unexpected places, making movies.

 It should come as no surprise that Freida and Terry’s kids are both artists. In particular, Jessica is a film maker.  Stop right now and give yourself a treat. Follow this link and watch the incredible short film clip Jessica made for Sony.  http://www.jessicasandersfilm.com/sony_trailer.html   It will knock your socks off.

 What does this have to do with Mother’s Day, you ask?  Every time I watch Jessica’s film, I cry. It hits me in the mother place. Jessica is on her way to stardom because Freida followed her own passion. Jessica grew up absorbing her mother’s passion for film making.

 We mothers are told that we need to help our children find their passion. We are supposed to expose them to much so a flame will be ignited somewhere within them. Sure Jessica took ballet and played soccer. But she lived with her mother whose life was film, and that passion was caught. And now her pilot light has burst into full flame.

 How important it is that while we are busy being mothers—driving carpools, making lunches, cheering at  Little League,  and kissing boo boos– we must not lose our own passion.  While your children may not become film makers, they are witness to your passions, to your devotion to your own interests. 

 Mothers wear many hats, each of which looks good on them. While on Mother’s Day your mommy bonnet looks best of all, how good it is for your children to know how much you enjoy wearing them all, as you are defined by all of them.  What better model could there be for your children?

 Happy Mothers’ Day!

While I cannot take credit for inventing the expression lousy local conditions, I use it all the time. It’s just so right-on-the-button.

Lousy local conditions refers to those times when a child’s less than perfect behaviors are magnified or even created by the conditions of his environment. The child who has missed a nap or a meal, who went to sleep late or woke up too early, who has been dragged on too many errands, who has attended one birthday party too many, who had a bad day at school, a fight with a friend, will reflect those lousy local conditions in his behavior, or shall we say, misbehavior. Your two-year-old, for example, isn’t so good at “Don’t touch!” when you visit your grandmother and her coffee-table china tea set. Your seven year old is not likely to treat his sibling with kindness when his best friend excluded him at recess.  The child’s environment sabotages his ability to behave in the way you expect.

When your child has an uncharacteristic tantrum or meltdown, when he is unusually uncooperative or just plain icky, it can easily be the result of lousy local conditions.  Often taking a guess, laced heavily with empathy, goes a long way with an older child. With the younger child, you may just need to get through it and plan better next time.

Anticipating your child’s thresholds and breaking points regardless of his age, will certainly help in avoiding meltdowns, tantrums, and icky behavior. Different children have different levels of tolerance for hunger and fatigue, for crowds and new situations, for stimulation of all kinds. Different children are affected different lousy local conditions.

Craft your reasonable expectations for your child around his age, development, and particular temperament. This, coupled with acknowledging the lousy local conditions, will make your days together a little brighter.

What  an amazing experience I had last weekend when I lunched with two women with whom I went to elementary school, one of whom I have not seen since I graduated from 6^th grade. Seriously! Keep in mind that I graduated from Seeds UES in Los Angeles, now called The Lab School (of UCLA), in 1960. That’s right, 50 years ago. 

 But this blog is not about all the catching up we did nor is it about the 50 year reunion we are organizing.

 In sharing our memories my two classmates and I discovered a common thread:  the profound impact, the indelible etching, that is made by a child’s relationship with each of his teachers.

 Do teachers know how much they matter to their students?  I had a teacher in sixth grade who made what he probably thought was a harmless comment about me. It is not likely that Mr. Moss knew that his comment wounded me deeply. But it flavored all my memories of that year. And it actually still stings when I think about it. Each friend had a similar tale to tell; neither of them had forgotten the bad…or the good …they had gotten from a teacher.  I remember my fifth grade teacher, Mr. Covington, fondly. I felt like it mattered to him that I was in his class.  What a memorable year that was.

 This is the time of year when parents are flocking to school consultants. What is the best school for their child?  What is the best preschool that will get him into the best elementary school and then into the best high school and finally the very best college? And he’ll live happily ever after? May I admit how this turns my stomach?  What does “best” mean, anyway? It makes me think of the title of the book by Rabbi Sherre Hirsch, We Plan,God Laughs.

 Much as a parent wishes she could chart the best educational experience (or whole childhood, for that matter) for her child, that just can’t happen. The school experience is more than the 3 R’s.   Schools are filled all kinds of variables that cannot be predicted or measured, filled with teachers and friends and relationships. The school experience is about people as much as anything else.  And there are really 4 R’s:  Reading, (w)Riting, (a)Rithmetic, and Relationships. Relationships with peers and relationships with teachers.  These are the things that enable the foundations for learning, the learning environment, and form the lasting memories.

 Along each step of their pathway, children have relationships. And it is through these that they practice and discover who they are, how they are, and how they need to be in various situations. I wonder why it is that schools don’t actually add that last R to their curricula? 

 Even the very best school might not be the best for your child. And if he has an unfortunate experience with a teacher one year it is the worst school. But the next year it just might be the best.

 Our school memories are composites of so many things. Robin, Joyce, and I marveled at that over lunch. But there is just nothing that sticks as much as your relationship with your teachers, bad and good.

Regardless of the topic of the seminar I am teaching, I end up making the same point:  There are three peaks a child must climb in order to grow up and make his way through life fairly happily:  learning to tolerate frustration, learning to tolerate disappointment (These first two are kind of twin peaks.), and learning to delay gratification.  It is the last peak, the one that stands on its own, that parents find particularly daunting.

Being able to delay gratification is directly related to other positive and critical traits, like impulse control, self discipline, and persistence.  It’s a biggie, in other words.

Not being able to delay gratification looks different on children of different ages. It can be not being able to wait for his cookie to the toddler.  It can be pushing to be first in line or not being able to wait his turn to the preschooler. It can be giving up on a difficult homework problem when Mom doesn’t run right in to help the second grader.  It can be following right along with the bad ideas of the risky friend of the ten year old.  The older the child, the more far reaching the effect of not being able to delay gratification or control his impulses. In the longer term, the child who is challenged by delaying gratification has a hard time staying the course, following rules, and just following through.

In the 1960’s  a Stanford University researcher, Michael Mischel, conducted a now famous study, The Stanford Marshmallow Study. In it he offered four year olds a marshmallow. He told the child that if he could wait until  he, the experimenter, returned before eating the marshmallow, he could have not one but two marshmallows.  Each child was filmed to record who couldn’t wait at all, who waited a little, and who waited the whole time for the experimenter to return.  The results divided 1/3, 1/3, and 1/3.  The interesting part of the study was in Mischel’s follow up, years later. 

 Among the many findings was that children who were able to delay gratification at four years old, seemed to have an easier time growing up all around, subordinating impulses, achieving long term goals, etc.. (You can google this study to see for yourself!)

Seems like starting out early to help you child to delay gratification is a good idea, right? How do you do that?  Learning to delay gratification is just that, learning. It is accustoming your child, slowly, bit by bit, to learn to wait, to cultivate some patience.  It can happen, but it takes time, effort, and patience on your part.  You may have to tolerate a whole lot of screaming at first!

 When there are two doting parents, a nanny,  and 4 doting grandparents just waiting to meet the child’s every need, I can promise you, your child will not learn to delay gratification. So, for starters, call off the troops!

 When your child asks for juice, don’t be so quick to run and get it for him. Say, “Sure. In just a moment I will get your juice. I need to finish this page and then I will.” When your child screams for you to come to his room, explain that you will be there in a few moments. When he insists that you go to the store to find the Lego piece he cannot live without, postpone your trip until the weekend.  In other words, start by forcing yourself to wait, and always build in some delay to your response time.  And certainly remember to praise the child’s ability to wait and be patient as you see he is beginning to get it.

 Now that it is on your mind, I have the feeling you will catch yourself supporting or undermining your child’s ability to climb that most important peak, learning to delay gratification. The time is now.

“What are we going to do today?” pleads the child as he climbs into the car after a full day of school.  What is that about?  Is it that the child has come to expect that every day brings a new form of parent-organized, post school entertainment – music lessons, sports lessons, art classes, dance classes, “enrichment” classes, and playdates?  And I wonder if maybe, in our mission to make sure our children don’t miss one minute of mind and body improvement, we are forgetting the  importance of doing nothing.

“Doing nothing” is not that at all. Experts tell us that unstructured time is vital for children’s development cognitively, emotionally, physically, and even socially. Peter Sheras, PhD, a clinical psychologist at the University of Virginia, says “Children need [unstructured time] to recuperate from the more structured part of their day and to just veg out.”  The chance to recharge their batteries that unstructured time allows is a crucial part of child development.  “When children amuse themselves, they’re actually exercising a different part of their brain than when they’re engaged in an organized activity, “ says Dan Rees, PhD at Western Maryland College. “They grow emotionally and intellectually; kids who have ample opportunity to make up their own rules and fantasies are cognitively way ahead of those whose time is always structured.”

Children need time to process and practice what they learn during the structured times, formal activities, even the socializing of their day.  They need time to use creatively the new skills they learn from teachers, coaches, and friends.  They need space and time to try out that which they simply observe others doing. It’s kind of like microwave cooking.  After something cooks in the microwave, it has a “standing time.”  The learning goes on and on, long after the direct instruction time.  When we have our children’s days completely programmed, either with extracurricular classes or with parent-generated activities, when is the standing time?

Children’s days need “unplanning.” Our children have become so reliant on others for stimulation, they don’t know how to entertain themselves.  Doing nothing encourages children to be resourceful. Some parents fear that children, left to their own devices, will become bored. Some parents feel that any activity that doesn’t seem to lead in some measurable way to advancement or direct results is not a good use of time. So, in their zeal to give their child every opportunity to learn, they are robbing them of something much more valuable, the growth that comes from doing nothing.

Maybe it’s time to get busy doing nothing.

While I cannot take credit for inventing the expression, “lousy local conditions,” I use it all the time. It’s just so right-on-the-button.

Lousy Local Conditions refers to those times when a child’s less than perfect behaviors are magnified or even created by the conditions of his environment. Children who went to sleep late or work up too early, who have missed a nap or a meal, who have been dragged on too many errands, who have attended one birthday party too many, will reflect those lousy local conditions in their behavior, or shall we say, misbehavior. Your two year old, for example, isn’t so good at “Don’t touch!” when you visit your grandmother and her precious china tea set that sits on the coffee table. The environment sabotages his ability to behave. Your three-year-old will not be too willing to clean up the play room after a wild, napless afternoon with three playmates too many. Your five-year-old isn’t likley to “ask nicely” or speak respectfully after staying up until midnight watching the ball game.

Sometimes a child has tantrums, lots of them, because that’s the stage he’s in. He’s learning to assert himself and is intoxicated by his own power. When he is frustrated in his quest, look out for a tantrum. But when your child has an uncharacteristic tantrum or melt down, when he is unusually uncooperative, or he’s just plain icky, it is often the result of lousy local conditions.

Anticipating your child’s thresholds and breaking points will go a long way in avoiding tantrums and mishbehaviors. Different children have different levels of tolerance for hunger and fatigue, for crowds and new situations, for stimulation of all kinds. Different children react to different lousy local conditions. (By the way, some grown ups do too!)

Craft your reasonable expectations for your child around his age, development, and particular temperament. Then keep in mind the environment that could morph into lousy local conditions, and you will head down the pathway towards taming the tantrums, melt downs, and icky behaviors.