Christmas and children

Christmas is a time of year that baffles me. The objective seems to be acquiring huge amounts of stuff while consuming vast amounts of food, wasting huge amounts of paper and discarding huge amounts of plastic. Gluttony. Pure gluttony. The idea that we're teaching our children this is what Christmas is all about is tragic.

Then there are the poor folk, those who can't afford to give something to their children. How do we explain Santa to children when some children get noticeably huge amounts of presents while others get very little? As a child I never understood that. Why did some children at my school get lots and lots of gifts while I got very little? My only explanation was that I mustn't have been as good as them. What an awful thing for a child to think of themselves.

For those who can't afford much there is always those bargain shops that sell cheap goods. Cheap goods that break easy and don't amount to much aside from non bio degradable landfill at the end of the day.

Protecting your child from paedophiles: signs to look out for

My children don’t know that I’ve saved them from paedophiles. People who befriended us who turned out to be undesirable.

Situation #1

At 6pm there was a knock at the door on a school night. A boy from my child’s school and his mum were on my doorstep. She told me her son had asked to visit us, wanting to play with my child. Truth be told I was bothered by a visit at that time of night, after dinner, getting ready for the children’s bedtime. I let them in and the mum and I sat in the kitchen having a cuppa while her son, who was double my child’s age, went into the toy room to play.

ADHD? Really?

It's that time of year when the businesses we work for throw family Christmas events. This means presents and a visit from Santa, fun rides and other activities and lots of lollies, soft drink and junk food. There wouldn't be a lot of parents out there who give this much thought and simply go along to these events letting their children have a free for all eating fest. Then in the afternoon when the children's behavior gets atrocious they blame it on a big eventful day and the child being tired. People are naive and think the artificial colours, preservatives and additives don't play a part!

At one Christmas event I watched this mother with three children, all well behaved except for one little boy around 6. She did a fairly decent job trying to control him, yet she made idle threats like "If you don't behave I'll put you in the car" knowing the car was too far away for her to even bother. Don't ever make a threat you can't actually follow through with. She kept her cool, didn't lose her temper, didn't treat him badly, except that everything he was doing was bothering her because he wouldn't be still or quiet. I felt sorry for him because he didn't look like he understood what was expected of him, why, or even how to do what she wanted. I was pretty sure that he was having a major come down from all the treats and junk he'd eaten. Unlike his siblings the additives affected him in a different way.

There was an article about how in France ADHD doesn't exist (or if it does it is such low amounts it's not worth worrying about). The reason for this, the article stated, is that French people don't feed their children the CRAP we feed our children. The French still opt for home cooked meals and it's compulsory for all the family to eat what is given, or go without. What a novel idea! Not only that because ADHD is a behavioral issue and the French deal with bad behavior differently, ie. they don't run to the nearest doctor claiming they can't handle their child, that there is something wrong with their child because they cannot get that child to behave, less children are diagnosed with ADHD.

Teach children to respect others

They don't teach empathy in schools. If children know about this it's usually because they have parents who live by being empathetic. Respect is taught at schools yet it's only marginal and doesn't have the full weight of mum and dad behind it.

Put it this way, if school is teaching your child respect while you're not teaching your child respect or doing the opposite; raising someone who is hateful, bigoted, racists etc., any respect learned at school may be undone by the parents negative attitudes.

There is nothing more ugly than a person who puts others down for having a disability, looking different, being different, not dressing cool, being over weight. This is bullying and bullying stems from not being taught to respect all people because essentially we all deserve respect.

Get organised

Are you an organised person or is your life chaos? Is there stuff all over your house, many jobs that are yet to be done? Does this fall back onto your children who function in the same chaotic way?

Our lives are busy and we don't have a lot of spare time. It's normal to hear the phrase time pore. Add to our lack of time the issue of also filling ours and our children's lives with stuff. It makes for a messy living and mental environment. How hard is it to think straight and get things done when there is stuff around you house, every where you look?

If you're that type of person chances are you're raising children who are also that type of person. Too much stuff, not enough time to organise it all.

No TV before school

I have friends who struggle to get their children ready for school. They tell me their children are too busy watching TV in the morning and don't get ready.

Seems like the obvious solution would be to turn the TV off, right! I suggest that to them and they look at me like that is some foreign concept they couldn't possibly understand.

When my eldest child was in his first year of school I went in for one of those parent teacher interviews. I still remember how surprised and impressed his teacher was when I told her I don't allow my child to watch TV before school.

Unless your children are watching a game show where they have to guess answers and learn something there really isn't much point to sitting them down in front of the idiot box (as my dad calls it). It's referred to as the idiot box for a reason.

TV switches off your brain because you don't' need to think. It does the thinking for you. You sit and are automatically entertained. Having your child's brain switched off before school is a really bad idea because they need their brain to be active in order to learn.

Keep that TV off. Let your child's mind wake up on it's own and be ready for learning.

Teach children to like the opposite sex

We mimic what we learn from our parents. If mum talks about how bad dad is because he's a good for nothing man who watches sport and drinks all day, or if dad talks about how mum is lazy and just spends all his money, children pick up on that. They grow up with distorted views on men and women.

Quite often you'll hear men talking about females like 'I'd like to get into that' which is cringe worthy. It is no more better to raise your son that way than to raise a daughter with the view to 'Take him for all he's worth'. Not ok to raise your children to be sexist dicks who disrespect the opposite sex.