Interesting read

[BigSqwert]

Saw this on CNN.com and found it interesting. I've included some excerpts. The full story is here --> LINK

 

Gone are the days when a kindergartner dropped a handful of party invites in the classroom cubbyholes of their closest buddies. Today, if anyone is excluded the invitations can't be handed out at school.

 

The idea that protecting kids from rejection is crucial to safeguarding their self-esteem has gained momentum in recent years.

 

Take Valentine's Day: At some schools, a second-grader can't offer paper valentines or heart-shaped candies to a short list of pals and secret crushes anymore. They give cards to everyone or no one at all.

 

Or sports: In many towns, scorekeeping no longer happens at soccer or softball games played by kids under 8 or 9. Win or lose, every player in the league gets a trophy at the season's end.

 

"Self-esteem comes from those feelings you have about yourself for a job well done, for when you have achieved something," says Dr. Georgette Constantinou, administrative director of pediatric psychiatry at Akron Children's Hospital in Ohio. "It's not something you pour into your children."

Edited August 9, 2006 by BigSqwert

[Texsox]

participation trophies are stupid and the kids know it.

[Rex Kickass]

At my school everyone had to get valentines when I was in second grade. If you gave em out, everyone had to get them. And that was like 1982.

[Texsox]

And the reasons cited are partial b.s.. In reality, the teachers do not want to, and shouldn't have to, deal with the crying kid who was excluded. Why allow a situation in the classroom where some kids are going to have their feelings hurt and disrupts instructional time?

[BigSqwert]

I didn't like the one mom's rationale in the article. She claims that her 1st grader plays with a different friend every other day so might as well invite everyone to the birthday party. It might just seem like that for her from afar.

 

I distinctly remember playing with only certian kids when I was that age. I probably would have been annoyed if my mom invited the entire class to my birthday.

Edited August 9, 2006 by BigSqwert

[mr_genius]

At my school everyone had to get valentines when I was in second grade. If you gave em out, everyone had to get them. And that was like 1982.

 

 

yea, same at my school. i think thats fairly standard.

[BigSqwert]

At my school everyone had to get valentines when I was in second grade. If you gave em out, everyone had to get them. And that was like 1982.

Ha. You just dated yourself. Now I know we're the same age. Unless you were held back several years in first grade.

[Rex Kickass]

Maybe not, I started 2nd grade when I was 5.

[BigSqwert]

yea, same at my school. i think thats fairly standard.

How lame though. I would remember going to school on valentines morning, hoping I'd get a valentines from the girl I had a crush on. Where's the fun if everyone gives one to you?

[Balta1701]

How lame though. I would remember going to school on valentines morning, hoping I'd get a valentines from the girl I had a crush on. Where's the fun if everyone gives one to you?

I Choo-Choo-Choose you.

[Texsox]

How lame though. I would remember going to school on valentines morning, hoping I'd get a valentines from the girl I had a crush on. Where's the fun if everyone gives one to you?

 

Most schools don't have a policy that they all have to be the same. My kids picked out extra special ones for their better friends and crushes.

 

Rex, 5 when you started 2nd grade? and 11 when you started 4th?

[BigSqwert]

I Choo-Choo-Choose you.

I knew I'd hear that sooner or later.

 

 

 

Here's another excellent article covering some similar themes. It's a bit longer to read but quite fascinating.

 

A Nation of Wimps

 

Behold the wholly sanitized childhood, without skinned knees or the occasional C in history. "Kids need to feel badly sometimes," says child psychologist David Elkind, professor at Tufts University. "We learn through experience and we learn through bad experiences. Through failure we learn how to cope."

 

Messing up, however, even in the playground, is wildly out of style. Although error and experimentation are the true mothers of success, parents are taking pains to remove failure from the equation.

In the hothouse that child raising has become, play is all but dead. Over 40,000 U.S. schools no longer have recess. And what play there is has been corrupted. The organized sports many kids participate in are managed by adults; difficulties that arise are not worked out by kids but adjudicated by adult referees.

 

"So many toys now are designed by and for adults," says Tufts' Elkind. When kids do engage in their own kind of play, parents become alarmed. Anderegg points to kids exercising time-honored curiosity by playing doctor. "It's normal for children to have curiosity about other children's genitals," he says. "But when they do, most parents I know are totally freaked out. They wonder what's wrong."

 

Kids are having a hard time even playing neighborhood pick-up games because they've never done it, observes Barbara Carlson, president and cofounder of Putting Families First. "They've been told by their coaches where on the field to stand, told by their parents what color socks to wear, told by the referees who's won and what's fair. Kids are losing leadership skills."

Edited August 10, 2006 by BigSqwert

[YASNY]

Allowing kids to experience the little disappointments as they grow up prepares them to deal with the bigger disappointments life will surely throw in their paths. We wonder why kids go 'Columbine' on us. It's because they weren't taught how to deal with things as they were growing up.

[Texsox]

May I make a plug for Scouting? The program builds on learning moments and allows kids to fail along the way. But out of site of screaming parents (Little League).

[YASNY]

May I make a plug for Scouting? The program builds on learning moments and allows kids to fail along the way. But out of site of screaming parents (Little League).

 

No way. They are too homophobic.

[Texsox]

No way. They are too homophobic.

 

Like the military, don't ask, don't tell.

[YASNY]

Like the military, don't ask, don't tell.

 

Very Nice!

[Balta1701]

Allowing kids to experience the little disappointments as they grow up prepares them to deal with the bigger disappointments life will surely throw in their paths. We wonder why kids go 'Columbine' on us. It's because they weren't taught how to deal with things as they were growing up.

Pretending that there is a simple explantion for not just Columbine, but for any of those school disasters we've seen is just silly. You cannot just change one thing and prevent the psychopath who initiated that mess from showing up. It's almost as productive as blaming the whole thing on Marilyn Manson or the NRA.

[YASNY]

Pretending that there is a simple explantion for not just Columbine, but for any of those school disasters we've seen is just silly. You cannot just change one thing and prevent the psychopath who initiated that mess from showing up. It's almost as productive as blaming the whole thing on Marilyn Manson or the NRA.

 

Whatever.

[Balta1701]

Whatever.

I love the in-depth, highly detailed replies and point-by-point refutations I'm getting today.

 

Anyway, here's a summary of an FBI report on the actual psychological state of the 2 kids involved in Columbine. If we're going to bring that mess up, I think it's important.

[southsider2k5]

I love the in-depth, highly detailed replies and point-by-point refutations I'm getting today.

 

Anyway, here's a summary of an FBI report on the actual psychological state of the 2 kids involved in Columbine. If we're going to bring that mess up, I think it's important.

 

I think you are digging way to far into what YASNY was saying, and that is why he blew you off, I also think you really missed his point that the way your are brought up has a lot to do with the person you grow up to be.

[Balta1701]

I think you are digging way to far into what YASNY was saying, and that is why he blew you off, I also think you really missed his point that the way your are brought up has a lot to do with the person you grow up to be.

In general, yea I'd agree with that, but I think that goes beyond just allowing kids to experience failure. There are so many different aspects to a person's mind that are formed during youth that it's impossible to simply point at 1 reason and say "This is why that kid went wrong".

[Texsox]

I love the in-depth, highly detailed replies and point-by-point refutations I'm getting today.

 

Anyway, here's a summary of an FBI report on the actual psychological state of the 2 kids involved in Columbine. If we're going to bring that mess up, I think it's important.

 

With all due respect, any point-counterpoint on a subject this complex, in this type of forum, would be a mile wide and an inch deep. This is far to complex a subject to do anything beyond skimming.

 

America is a far more violent society than a generation or two ago. Our kids see way more real violence, with real actors, than before. They see violence "solving" problems daily on TV. When they can not solve a problem though other means, they go with what they learned. Possibly not specific to Columbine, but I believe YASNY is correct, but not allowing kids to suffer small defeats and make mistakes, they are unprepared for the bigger problems that will happen in life.

[YASNY]

With all due respect, any point-counterpoint on a subject this complex, in this type of forum, would be a mile wide and an inch deep. This is far to complex a subject to do anything beyond skimming.

 

America is a far more violent society than a generation or two ago. Our kids see way more real violence, with real actors, than before. They see violence "solving" problems daily on TV. When they can not solve a problem though other means, they go with what they learned. Possibly not specific to Columbine, but I believe YASNY is correct, but not allowing kids to suffer small defeats and make mistakes, they are unprepared for the bigger problems that will happen in life.

 

Exactly! Columbine was an easily identifiable reference to emphasize the point. But, the retort I blew off went directly away from the generality of the point and tried to direct it toward an apparent attempt by me to pinpoint the point. I made my point and didn't feel like getting into a discussion where I had to attempt to redirect the conversation back toward my intent. Therefore, I said f*** it and left the forum.

[Iwritecode]

I hate the "everyone has to be invited to a birthday party" rule. They even go so far as to not let the kids pass them out on school property at all. My daughter tried giving them out on the playground before school started and they made the kids give them back. So we had to go through the struggle of finding home addresses for all the kids she wanted to invite. It was a huge pain.

 

 

 

Maybe not, I started 2nd grade when I was 5.

 

 

I started 1st grade when I was 5. My b-day is in late October but my parents somehow got me into kindergarten when I was only 4. I think the cutoff now is they have to be 5 or older by September 1.

Edited August 11, 2006 by Iwritecode