Rules - good and bad

Ok - so I commented over at Daddy Geek Boy's about rules and have been thinking about it ever since. My internal metaphor generator is failing me, which is sad because I could really use a good metaphor, but anyway...

I am not against rules per se. Rules are really just tools. Using them, as most parents do, doesn't make one a good or bad parent. Having few or many rules (which usually results in the labels strict or permissive) isn't necessarily good or bad either, though any extreme seems unhealthy.

No, I think it's more about how a parent uses rules that I take issue with, and sometimes the content or rules, but less so.

Parents who have many rules risk falling into the trap or over relying on them. Suddenly everything is black and white. What kids do is viewed in terms of the rules - did they obey? Life becomes all about when the rules are broken and the consequences. Your kid broke a rule and must be punished. Having too many rules and fixating on them is, to my mind, bad parenting.

When a situation occurs, it's important that a parent not only addresses the problem, but finds out why it happened. Talking to and working with children is better for them, they learn that their input and feelings are valued and a situation can be a learning experience. If we go right to dealing with rule breaking, we lose an opportunity to teach and redirect behaviour, to understand why something happened and work to avoid it in future.

There's a lot of talk about rules and "bad" behaviour when we're visiting my nephew. The rules aren't particularly well defined, there's little or very disorganized responses to rule infractions, and no one seems to be actively trying to teach him about the fundamental values of respect or empathy.

Some particular rules seem overkill and counterproductive. I can understand banning some very nasty words, especially for small children who may not understand their meaning, but others? Banning mildly offensive words, or words like "hate" for example, seems limiting to a child's expression. Use of those words may provide insight into how a child is feeling or chances to talk to a child about language and respect. The more something is taboo, the more a child may rebel later as well.

I also dislike rote manners. Teaching a child to say "please" and "thank you" as a matter of course seems to demean their meanings. I am very pro manners, it's ingrained in the Canadian psyche, but I want to facilitate Geekling learning to say them for the right reasons.

Instead of "Tell Grandma thank you", maybe something more like "Was that a nice thing for Grandma to do? (insert hopeflly positive response) When someone does something nice, we can say thank you to let them know we liked it. Do you want to do that?"

Having too much emphasis on rules and being "bad" or "good" can encourage kids to want to please people. This is actually a bad thing, believe it or not. Perhaps this is something women are more familiar with than men, girls are often pushed more to be "good" than boys who are sometimes cut slack for being boys. The constant awareness of being "good", seeking approval or being right, is damaging. It skews ones sense of self and you become much more concerned about pleasing others, and what others think, than about your own particular happiness. It creates a lot of anxiety. Anxiety is also a problem when a child is focused on the rules instead of being less encumbered and more free to learn and fail without being labeled "bad". Trust me, I've been there.

Of course, being too lax is problematic as well. Parents need to provide stable guidance and not be totally wishy washy, otherwise children will be confused and find it difficult to trust a very unpredictable parent. I've experienced this too and it's very frustrating for a child. It's also very hard for a child to respect a parent who behaves this way.

Essentially, I feel that creating expectations and boundaries that can allow a child to feel safe, means creating a family environment where Geekling knows that I will always be willing to hear her side of the story and act fairly and respectfully towards her. That I'm willing to be flexible on many things, and explain as much as much as possible, but that I'm also her Mom and sometimes she'll have to do things she may not want to do or face a consequence because of something she chose to do. It means being firm about rules that are really important and letting her know why those particular things are non-negotiable.

It means letting her know that she's loved no matter what happens and leaving the labels "good" and "bad" out of it.

Right now Geekling is still very small. Most of my experience with kids comes from family and working with kids in other settings. A lot of this is theoretical as I haven't had a whole lot of need to implement it yet, but I do intend to try. It'll probably be a lot of work, especially all that explaining a communication, but I think it will be worth it. I'm sure I'll adjust my views and methods as things progress too.