Respect children's autonomy, why is it arrogant?

Minxiao said

In education, have you ever been torn between giving your children freedom and restraining them? Many parents regard their children as special "people on people", but in exchange for their children's arrogance. What should be respected for children? What should I discipline my child? How to grasp the sense of balance in education? Let's take a look at this article -

Recently two videos "went viral". During the "May Day" period, on the high-speed train, parents ignored the "bear child" constantly kicking the back of the passenger seat in the front seat, and when the front seat passenger seriously criticized the child, the parents thought that the child was not wrong at all, and tried to protect and ask the front seat passenger to apologize to the child, which caused a fierce dispute between the two sides, and even took action. In another video, when the mother proposed that she could not buy an expensive Apple phone for her child, the 15-year-old beat up her mother on the street...

When we discussed these two videos with colleagues in the education community, we were shocked and gave many similar examples. In many families, even if parents know that their children's requests are unreasonable, they will not refuse, such parents are not a few, and the children they raise are often willful, selfish and domineering. As a result, everyone came to the conclusion that families are now spoiling their children more than ever. But in hindsight, this conclusion is not of universal significance, there are such doting parents, there are also many very domineering parents, their approach is the opposite, will require children to do things exactly according to their own wishes and ideas, do not give children space for independent growth, their behavior is often also extreme, will occupy all the child's time, never give children the opportunity to express their opinions, children are just their puppets and projections of thoughts, will, such parents often lack independence , no creativity, not even ego, not knowing what you want.

In fact, at any stage of social development, parents' two parenting tendencies will exist. It's just that in our current era, both parenting tendencies seem to be going to extremes: due to the great improvement of life than before, and the more open and pluralistic ideas and concepts in society, many parents will spoil their children more and let their children go, thinking that letting children develop independently is to let children release their nature; At the same time, in other parents, due to the fierce competition in education, parents are very anxious, and many parents will feel that their children cannot face this situation independently, and they will make too many decisions for their children and do not give their children the opportunity to develop independently.

Behind the two different upbringing tendencies are two different perceptions of society, one too tense and the other too relaxed. We advocate respecting children's independent growth, but it is still very necessary for us to clarify a boundary: what is arrogance and what is respect; What is to meet the needs of children's independent development, and what is to let children go unprincipledly.

Children aged 0~3 are not completely independent in daily life, so parents should try their best to help them learn basic skills such as dressing, eating, and excretion, and give children full care and support to enhance the trust between parents and children. After the age of 3 to adulthood, parents must set rules for their children, help children establish a correct view of right and wrong, let children know what to do and what not to do, to cultivate children's good learning habits as soon as possible, and at the same time to cultivate children's imagination, creativity, encourage children to try to solve problems independently, cultivate their autonomy and independence. That is to say, after the child is 3 years old, parents must learn the dialectic of education, figure out which aspects should respect the child, which aspects should restrain the child, blindly and unprincipled respect for the child and completely do not give the child the opportunity to develop independently and independently.

What should respect the child and what should be disciplined?

As parents and teachers, we all know that every child has his or her own nature, and nature includes two aspects: on the one hand, it is a positive energy nature that can make people maximize their potential and kinetic energy, including the desire to explore, create, protect, kindness, etc. On the other hand, there is the negative energy nature that makes people degenerate, including destructive desire, jealousy, laziness, etc., and each child is a mixture of two energies. Parents should respect their children's positive energy nature, restrain their children's negative energy nature, and not let their children have the final say in everything.

Many parents understand this truth, but for those parents who are too arrogant to their children, some parents are always unable to act according to the principles in the face of weak children; And some parents can't tell what is positive energy nature and what is negative energy nature, indeed in many ways, the positive and negative energy in children's nature is difficult to cut across the board.

For those parents who cannot be ruthless, there is always a wrong understanding behind them, thinking that children are "people on people" in the family, and they must be given special treatment everywhere. It is true that children have certain particularities, and they do need special care in infancy, but as they grow older, they also have to take corresponding responsibilities and learn to give. In the process of learning to take responsibility, parents must be fierce in making demands, talking about rules, and strictly expressing what is the bottom line that must not be touched. In this process, parents should constantly adjust their attitude towards their children, and as the children get older, the requirements and rules must also keep up. If the view of children always stays at the infant stage, then it is really only possible to cultivate "giant babies".

Moreover, family relationships are also part of education, respect and understanding are mutual, some parents in the process of cultivating children, only focus on the child, respect the child's needs, on the contrary, do not emphasize the child's respect for themselves, always ignore their own needs, this blind accommodation is a huge mistake. A few years ago, I came into contact with a family with very poor economic conditions, the parents were migrant workers in the city, the income was not high, and the children were borrowing from primary schools in the city. Seeing that other families around them bought balance bikes for their children, they also ruthlessly spent a lot of money to buy one, and they themselves did not even have a decent dress. This disrespect for one's own normal desires is a particularly bad education, which makes the child self-centered and does not have the concept of thinking about others. Behind this, the child is still regarded as a special "person on people", always trying his best to let the child get everything he wants. In fact, when a child is born into the family, parents must of course strive to create conditions for the child's normal growth, but we must also treat the child as a normal family member, in addition to providing the necessary growth conditions, parents and children are equal, and mutual respect and understanding are required. In many cases, parents ask their children to say something like this: "We are a family, please share happiness and suffering with us within the limits of your ability and tolerance." "In fact, families with average living conditions are more likely than those with good financial conditions to raise children who are self-motivated and understanding.

Compared with those parents who regard their children as "people on people" and cannot bear to discipline their children, distinguishing children's positive and negative energy is a high-tech, high-intelligence job, and many parents and teachers do not have a clear concept. For example, the relationship between play and learning: if we don't give children time to play, are we constantly strengthening the positive energy in children? On the contrary, we let the child play, let the child play more, is it pampering the negative energy in the child? Another example is the relationship between creativity and destruction, which teachers and parents can explain this clearly, in terms of specific behavior, it is likely that creativity and destructive power will coexist in a child, if we suppress all the destructive power of the child, it is likely to greatly reduce the child's creativity. In the process of education, this situation is very numerous.

Parents and teachers should learn as much as possible about pedagogy and psychology, and also integrate it specifically with the reality of their children. For example, the relationship between creativity and destructive power, we can do more guidance work, lead children to more constructive activities, destructive power can be transformed into creativity; Another example is the relationship between play and learning, we must learn psychological knowledge and truly understand the value of play to children. In the allocation of time for play and learning, it is necessary to follow the age characteristics of the child, and each child is different, and it is necessary to observe and adjust.

In addition, we believe that education should emphasize a sense of balance, which is the wisdom that intuition brings us. Just like adults who walk into society, they must be in a balanced and equal state of interacting with others and participating in work: in work, we must pay attention to the balance of responsibilities, obligations and benefits; In dealing with people, we should pay attention to mutual equality in status and mutual respect. Education is the same, we must be tolerant of children's behavior, but also have requirements; Give them the opportunity to play freely, but also give them the necessary guidance; Let them have a sense of responsibility, know how to be grateful, and let them experience the beauty and happiness of life; Respect them, and let them respect us; Let their lives have certain challenges, but also let them have the necessary enjoyment... Let the educational intuition constantly revise our direction.

(The author, Sun Xuefeng, is the Education and Sports Bureau of Hanting District, Weifang City, Shandong Province; Wang Yunhua's unit is Hanting District Experimental Middle School, Weifang City, Shandong Province)

Source|People's Education, Issue 11, 2023

Article author|Sun Xuefeng, Wang Yunhua

Responsible Editor|Cheng Lu

WeChat Editor|Tao Yuxiang