Re: [UUPoly-L] Adult Decisions vs. Child Decisions?

["Earth Father" <earthfather@cfnc.us>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: CWLee

> Your statement " ... the child has the freedom to learn that
> lesson." is troublesome to me.  (I'm off the poly topic, and
> onto parenting here.)  While "age of consent" is debatable,
> depending on whether one is talking about crossing the
> street alone, sex, alcohol, driving, military, contracts,
> etc., I think it is a valid concept that parents have a duty
> to overrule their children in many cases.  

In my experience, overruling happens far more than it should.  The fear of not
being protective enough has done far more damage than being overpermissive--
particularly among folks concerned enough to ask the question.  There are, of
course, parents who are wildly irresponsible and neglect their children
horribly-- but they don't spend their time discussing parenting online.  

(FYI, my background includes running a teen crisis program for 13 years, having
over 100 court-referred teen foster children living with me at various times,
raising three children of my own, and writing and giving workshops on child
development and related issues, particularly as they relate to highly and
exceptionally gifted children.)

> I think a child
> prodigy (music, math, sports) should be encouraged, and
> supported in the area of his displayed gift, but not at the
> expense of some basic tools of life, such as reading,
> writing, adding/subtracting, etc.

This is a common perspective that has seriously damaged more exceptionally
gifted children than I could count.  As it turns out, exceptionally gifted
children are nearly all "asynchronous" in their development; the 8 year old
child who does math like a grad student, shares his toys like a two year old,
reads like a 16 year old, has gross motor control like a four year old, is
physically the size of a six year old, and can play violin at concert level is
more the norm than the exception.  

In study after study, it has been shown that gifted children thrive when the
focus is on their strengths, rather than on remediating their weaknesses.  One
study in Connecticut showed that when divided into two comparable groups of
gifted/LD children, the LD's improved significantly more for the children who
were *not* given remedial help, but instead spent time doing whatever they had
the most aptitude for.

There are a number of reasons for this, but one factor is that the asynchronous
development means that their nervous systems may not be ready for certain
skills at the same time as their agemates.  One young man I was working with,
for instance, couldn't control a pen well enough to write legibly when he
turned 15 one June, nor could he produce coherent written paragraphs-- even
though he spoke like a college professor.

He spent the summer doing Outward Bound and other non-academic activities.
When he started school the next September, he had gone from four years *behind*
his age group in writing to four yeas *ahead*!  The neuropsychiatrist we were
working with said that it was a familiar pattern to him-- some wire in his
brain got soldered in place finally, and a part of his brain that didn't work
before finally came on line.  

(An important fact to know in order to make sense of the above is that some
skills are learned, but many more are a matter of neurological readiness.
Studies with identical twins have shown that children don't *learn* to walk,
for instance; they walk the first day that their neurological development will
allow it, and no amount of training will hurry that up or improve it in any
way.  So for skills that are primarily neurologically based, which includes
walking, reading, writing, and many others that we have been told need to be
"taught", are best left to be learned when the child's capability reaches the
point that you'd have to actively *oppose* them in order to *prevent* them from
learning that skill.)

There are vast amounts of information available on these and related issues; an
excellent place to start is www.hoagiesgifted.org .


> Comments welcome, but I'm not trying to start a war.

No need to fight about any of this.  Each parent has their own insights and
path to follow in raising their kids.  They can educate themselves, but
parenting is not a piecemeal process-- it is a wholistic reality that has to
make sense to each parent on a gut level.

My instincts led me to give my children enormous freedom-- far more than most
parents would even dream of.  Parenting them was extremely challenging, because
I couldn't fall back on most of the classic support structures that most
parents rely on.  We had to re-evaluate their schooling frequently, often in
the middle of the year.  Sometimes we homeschooled; sometimes we "unschooled";
sometimes we used apprenticeships; sometimes we didn't know *what* to do.  I
also made sure that they could earn at least $50 an hour at *something* by the
time they were 18-- so college, if they chose to go, would be for their
*education* rather than because they needed a mealticket.

At this point, I have three highly resourceful young adults, who are noted for
their self-confidence, for their leadership, and for their strength of
character.  All three have chosen a path of social action, social justice,
environmental activism & stewardship, etc.  So while it was hell raising them,
I couldn't be more pleased with the outcome.

But each kid is different-- your mileage *will* vary!

:-)

Michael Rios

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