Parenting

What comes to mind when you think of the purpose of parenting? If we're being straightforward, it is the process of promoting and supporting the physical, emotional, social, and intellectual development of a child from infancy to adulthood. Another, more concise, way of putting it is "to protect and prepare children to survive and thrive in the world in which they will live" (Popkin). I am not a parent myself, but from my experience of looking after my younger siblings and many babysitting occasions, I have an idea of what it's like. It is no walk in the park. Added to the responsibility of making sure a child's basic needs are being met is the pressure of raising them to be a good person, someone who benefits society.

Parenting is a big deal, and some of the parenting topics that I found interesting during my studies this week that I'd like to focus on today are the 5 qualities Michael Popkin suggests are most important for kids to develop, the problem-handling model, and Vitamin N.

Michael Popkin is the founder and president of Active Parenting Publishers. The 5 qualities that he claims are crucial for parents to help their kids develop are courage, self-esteem, responsibility, cooperation, and respect. I could go more into depth on each of these qualities and why they're beneficial to learn at a young age but I think that's pretty self explanatory. The one thing I will say, though, is that we could look at responsibility not just as accepting the outcomes of your decisions but as a person's ability to respond to certain situations in a positive and helpful manner (response-ability). These qualities and their importance will also come up later as I discuss problem-handling and Vitamin N.

Have you heard of helicopter parenting before? It's when a parent overprotects and overshadows their child to the extent that they leave no space for the young mind to explore and experience things in their own way. One of the many issues that helicopter parenting might present is the parent solving all of their child's problems for them. Parents can teach their children problem-solving skills that will be useful to them as they become adults if they practice the problem-handling model.

The problem-handling model basically just looks like the parent(s) doing what they can to offer support and give direction as their child goes about dealing with a problem. First, we must recognize who owns the problem, is it the the kid or the parent or both? Determining who owns a problem is as simple as recognizing who is directly affected by the situation and its consequences. The second aspect of the problem-handling model is letting the child learn from the natural consequences, except if those consequences are too dangerous, too far in the future, or if they harm others. Third, if the parent owns/partly owns the problem they should handle it by making polite requests, using "I feel" statements, being firm, and establishing a logical consequence. Establishing logical consequences is an area in this process where the child can have the opportunity to practice responsibility. When they are included in the discussion about their own consequences the parents are showing them respect, which will help the child learn to treat their parents with respect in return.

Lastly, this video I watched about Vitamin N is not only interesting by itself, but I believe it connects well to some of the parenting topics that I've already discussed. John Rosemond, author and family psychologist for Prager University, suggests that what kids need more of these days is being told "no", or as he puts it, Vitamin N. Parents who want their kids to be happy are often rewarding bad behavior with too many material items.

"Our children are becoming accustomed to a material standard that's out of kilter with what they can ever hope to achieve as adults."

This cycle of the child doing basically nothing except for whining and always getting what they want is actually linked to depression in children and teens. Additionally, since the kid didn't work for the new toy or phone or whatever it may be, they aren't going to take care of it very well. Overdosing children with material items inhibits their abilities to develop

those key qualities that I talked about earlier, such as responsibility, respect, and cooperation. Rosemond presented the principle of benign deprivation which I think is a good parenting tip. He suggests making sure that the child's needs are met 100% of the time and that their wants are met 25% of the time.

Anytime I've considered what my parenting style will be like I've thought about things that my parents did with me and my siblings that I want to incorporate in my future family. And I'm sure that my mom and dad's parenting styles also had bits and pieces of my grandparents' parenting styles. That's how we learn to be parents! Wow, I've said the word "parent" a lot. So something to keep in mind is that we have the power to control what we pass on to our own kids. If there are things you notice in yourself, your kids, or your parents that you'd like to change based on what I've talked about, then do it! Establish good habits before it's too late so that your kids can be as successful as possible.