Leave no child inside
The article on children and developments in Alternet made me realise how lucky I was, and how lucky my kids are. My sons are free to roam outside as much as they want to, go and play on the local village football field, build treehouses in a nearby forest, play by streams and on firelds behind the houses. As a child I did the same, albeit with the city of Stuttgart, as we had a large park nearby. Both them and I were lucky in that we had an ample supply of other children to play with.
But it will not remain so forever. Our village is becoming urbanised, the football field will soon become a housing and commercial development, and the new football field is inaccessible without transport and gated. The woods and fields they roam in will soon become the site of a new double lane bypass. And more and more people are reluctant to let their children play outside for fear of abduction and child molesters.
But surely the right point to start at, would be by educating the adults? How can we teach our children about nature, if most of us adults are ignorant? After all, most others changes have to be made by convincing the adults, who then convert their children. Just look at the multitude of "Nanny 922", "Brat Camp" and other programms designed to show adults how to make their children behave, eat well and become healthy adults. I might have played in nature, but I only truly learnt about plants once I had my own garden. Without the addition to my life of the garden I still might not know what a flowering larch looks like.
So maybe its the parents who should be shown what nature is, not the children. And maybe the way to go for cities is not only planning better housing developments, but also by encouraging Schrebergärten or garden colonies.
But it will not remain so forever. Our village is becoming urbanised, the football field will soon become a housing and commercial development, and the new football field is inaccessible without transport and gated. The woods and fields they roam in will soon become the site of a new double lane bypass. And more and more people are reluctant to let their children play outside for fear of abduction and child molesters.
But surely the right point to start at, would be by educating the adults? How can we teach our children about nature, if most of us adults are ignorant? After all, most others changes have to be made by convincing the adults, who then convert their children. Just look at the multitude of "Nanny 922", "Brat Camp" and other programms designed to show adults how to make their children behave, eat well and become healthy adults. I might have played in nature, but I only truly learnt about plants once I had my own garden. Without the addition to my life of the garden I still might not know what a flowering larch looks like.
So maybe its the parents who should be shown what nature is, not the children. And maybe the way to go for cities is not only planning better housing developments, but also by encouraging Schrebergärten or garden colonies.
Posted at 3/02/2007 12:34:00 PM UTC
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13 Comment(s):
Olgalux,
I agree with all that you wrote. And I feel sad that our generation was in fact more free as children than our own kids can be in that we could wander extensively for entire days without parents where our own children are much more confined. The best we can do to make up for it is to wander aimlessly with them in places like the nearby woods or the alleys behind houses.
I also loved what you wrote about gardens. I would only add that it wasn't just the plants in the garden taht made the childhood complete, it was the fantasies and imagined scenarios that were cooked up while sitting around, digging, or watching birds.
I also read Alternet, but here's something delightful on the current malaise with children from the Onion:
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/kindergartner_being_groomed_for
Our children have a screwed up future anyway.
They are supposed to be image concious (makeup for toddlers!), easy to care for, healthy, fit, slim, loving nature. The next generation is supposed to reverse the woes which betide us with our current teenagers :rising crime, anti-social behaviour, overweight, early sex ( I mean 14 and below) and just a general feeling of being lost and without much to hope for. And all the goals are supposed to be achieved without any input from the parents, after all its society's responsibilty.....
The fact that as more parents need to work, and as more kids get pushed into state education at an earlier age (witness the debate in Germany where they want all preschool kids to be handed over asap to the state system, preferably right after birth), there will actually be less and less close interaction with adults to teach them the necessary social skills or about nature or how to deal with emotions, the children will be more dependent on their peer group for setting standards, and in order to control these groups less will be undertaken with them, so that the general malaise will only accelerate.
I just don't get it how people do not see that our current teenagers are the result of us setting high image goals for them, but actually abandoning their emotional and social education to anyone else who happens to be around. Some parents care more about their kids looks than whether they are nice and well-adjusted. Cleanliness above godliness, instead of the other way around.
You have to make adults MORE responsible for their offspring in order to bring back the "good old days" , where adults are respected not assaulted, commodities are purchased from money earned not stolen, and anti social behaviour is dealt with at home starting at an early age.
Sorry just had to rant.
And another thing... the boy in the article was very lucky with his teacher.
I have a child like that at home. He is nearly 13 now. He could throw the most amazing paddies when he did not get his way, started rebellions in preschool by refusing to work, generally always contradicting everyone and wanting his way. I could have occassionally cheerfully strangled him and was grateful when he was in bed every night.
Like the teacher I kept at him forcing him to complete projects, "breaking" him a little, and forcing him to accept responibility. The main difference is I did it at home with my own child, after all as a mother its my responsibilty to make him socially acceptable.
He now has his own clique who wait for him on weekends to tell them what they will be doing. He organizes the main outdoor events of the neighbourhood, has a good business of re-selling drinks at school for a profit, and is generally always full of ideas and on the go. He is helpful, friendly, stands up for others, and looks out for his younger brothers diet. Plus he studies hard and has good grades.
Maybe he'll become class president one day...
Hope this goes through. Plain Jen is accessing this via a different route than last night (yippeee!!! I finally get to be Blue, Blue for all to see!)
I want to say, first, that I am a religious 'Onion' reader and also got a kick out of the Kindergartner-being-groomed-for-line-leader piece.
Olgalux, I wouldn't know a flowering larch if it landed in my esophagus. I suppose I should be ashamed of that, but I don't have a garden or any desire for one; I think it's because I grew up in such incredibly urban environments from ten-years-old on that I'm indifferent to the idea. Plus, every nice Saturday/Sunday/early evening, just about every neighbor I have is outside dutifully weeding, planting, tilling, whatever it is Constant Gardeners do, and I don't like to be Like The Rest. I'm usually reading at the time, or hauling kids around - in a van -from this activity to that.
Schrebegaerten will never come to the Midwest. I thought they were 'adorable' in Germany, but it just won't happen here. Ever. We have too much of our own personal garden-worthy property to warrant such a need or desire.
Since I've moved around a lot (like most of you,I think), my environments were varied and unpredictable while growing up. The one constant variable was that all settings were urban; my parents were simply not rural people (though one was by birth.) But I do remember, fondly, forming an environmental club in my Jersey-shore neighborhood ; a group of friends and I would don E.P.A. pins and march through the neighborhood, picking up litter on weekends, unsolicited by 'big people' to do so. It made us feel really important.
And I do remember bits and pieces of frolicking outside with no particular aim, playing hide-and-seek,pretending to be princesses, getting our feet dirty...and the small of grass. Mostly, though, I remember the world of the inside, probably because we lived so close to New York City, a pioneer in creating child molester paranoia of epic proportions among parents. It was in the most polluted city I've ever lived in (Taipei), I believe, where I reached a pinnacle of childhood freedom: at ten, I'd get in a taxi every Saturday morning (and most Sundays), travel 45 minutes down a mountain into the city, and just explore ALL DAY. So I was not a naturalist, but rather a budding anthropologist/ linguist. The fact of being outdoors was not what empowered me; it was that I could do whatever I wanted, all alone.
When I had my own kids, I promised myself and them that they would grow up in the same place, and that promise has been kept. My oldest is leaving for college in September, and has been here since he was two months old. The other has two years to go. They have wonderful childhood memories...or so they claim.
We carefully chose and built a house that was within the city but had a huge backyard (complete with man-made retention pond where they could 'pretend-fish'), was located on a cul-de-sac, and backed up to dense woods in which they loved to play. The developer assured us verbally that these would never be torn down, as they were situated within 'protected wetlands.' That promise lasted about five years, when all the trees were razed to squeeze in yet another development. At least the kids got a few years of 'real' outside time, and I know they remember that era fondly. But once soccer, swimming, and basketball entered our lives (at their insistence, not ours), nearly all physical activity became centered around a rigid schedule, swallowed up our evenings and weekends, and engulfed family time. Homework was done in cars, and, oh, the number of fast-food meals consumed on the way back from games, tournaments and practices..it makes me want to gag.
Yes, these sports were good for them physically. Neither has ever even come close to being overweight. But I mourn the fact that, because of some of the nefarious forces you and this article mention, American children have been forced to replace spontaneous/imaginative play with structured play (which is, by its very essence, rules-based and competitive.)
Most of what my kids know about nature (and one is an armchair nature FREAK) have come from reading, vacations, The Discovery Channel, and trips to organized theme-parks (e.g., Butterfly World, Sea World-they're all in Florida !) Ask my son what his favorite trip, ever, was, and he'll tell you that it was his ten days in the Galapagos Islands. He came back more excited than I think I've ever seen him,armed with ten pounds of photographs...and he's a pretty jaded traveller. It takes a lot to truly impress him.
This is far too long, but I must add that I share your disdain of those 'Super-Dee-Dooper Nanny 911' shows. As you know, they're all over the globe now. I never looked to anyone (especially not a stelevision personality!) for parental guidance, and I became a mother at barely 22. I just DID IT. And I had rarely babysat growing up. Aren't we technically hard-wired for parenting? You just learn from your mistakes, like in any other context, not from some childless English nanny with fashionable glasses.
One last note: our city has pumped gazillions into beautiful public parks, walking/bike trails, etc., to promote nature literacy and fitness. But as long as the News at 11's headline continues to be 'MOLESTER ON THE LOOSE!', parents will either stay away from such spaces -or keep such a close eye on their kids while there that a crushing sense of hyper-vigilance will spoil the experience for the children.
Despite all his chest-beating grandiloquence, Michael Moore is right when he claims that we live in a culture of constant fear...but Canadians really DO lock their doors !
Wow, I think that was a bit grandiloquent itself. I'll stop now...
PJ
Sorry for all the typos...wrote this too fast.
'in the most polluted city I've ever lived in'?
'the small of grass'??
'STELEVISION'???
Plain Jen will read entries more carefully in the future before submitting...
Oh, and Olgalux? I was elected president of my fourth grade class.'Tis a memory I shall cherish forevermore.
(And just look at me now !)
Let's keep reminding those little critters of ours the importance of striving for personal excellence - while maintaining modesty, compassion, and having FUN.
Wow, I can't tell you how thrilling it is to access this without having to tick 'Other'. Almost as thrilling as that moment when my name was announced as Very Bestest...
Naaw, that's enough bragging for one day.
PJ
BTW, there are communities in NYC that have small parks within the city filled with rented gardening plots. Also, in a park near here, there appears to be a parcel of land that is also segmented into plots that are tilled by people from the area. So the US East Coast does have something close to Schrebergaerten.
However, Jennifer is right in pointing out that most Americans do their gardening in their own yards. This because most of the US has more plentiful space, cheaper land, and lower population density than does most of northern continental Europe.
Regrading Coni's earlier post, I think our kids are being pressured to be self-centered, vain, and almost psychotically self-serving. I think that makes it even more important for the parents to try to help them understand how to combine critical thinking regarding the messages that they are being bombarded with with a good dose of civic mindedness (i.e. conducting oneself in a way that is considerate of the community) AND how to keep a light heart and an inner sense of peace and self....oh Jesus it starts to look like a tall order doesn't it! Anyway, we have to try to promote those things among our young'uns to keep them from becoming mere vehicles for over-consumption and dependency.
There is a greater institutionalization of children going on here in the States too only it's being done without government directives regarding the standards and conduct of publicly funded pre-school programs. It is in the form of private programs that working parents have no choice but to utilize in order to be able to have two careers and two incomes in order to be able to live in a decent neighborhood......and ironically in order to be able to pay for these kids' programs! But it's true that is is over-institutionalizing the kids. Here's an example, last year Melissa and I were on a cabin trip in West Virginia with some neighbors. We put some music on and our little girls started to dance, Marilyn bounding around joyfully and the other girl doing various ballet moves. After a while the other girl stopped in frustration and said that Marilyn was doing moves that she hadn't learned yet and that it wasn't fair. This was supremely embarassing for that girl's parents becuase it was obvious that Marilyn was jumping about aimlessly and that their own daughter was not capable of even understanding that such a thing was possible, so "programmed" had she become.
So inded I agree with Coni, there needs to be a renewed commitment by parents to reclaim the shaping of their children, and this is partly to re-insert carefree joy and idleness into their lives!
This comment has been removed by the author.
On this same subject, here's a shameless plug of my own blog with the kick-off posting:
http://blogsterama.blogspot.com/2007/01/intro-blog-from-me.html
Ian,
Will check out your blog posthaste. Wow, two you have OTHER blogs, plus the alum forum? Kudos on your stamina !
I agree wholeheartedly with the idea of striving to help our children achieve a sense of concurrent civic duty AND individualism - yes, a tall order, but one worth placing. That's what I've always tried to do.
Ian, the mental image of the looks on those parents' faces takes me back to the 'evangelizing dancer'kid in 'Jesus Camp'(please tell me you've seen it?) She was the perfect embodiment of all we eschew in this thread...a ten-year-old who had already been brainwashed into spreadin' the word of the lord on the streets, and one who had memorized all the 'right' dance moves to accompany her favorite music (which, I recall, was not Britneeeee Spears, but some equally-bad-in-another-way Christian Rock band). The girl was robotic, programmed, pathetic.
One last comment I cannot resist making...as a follow-up to the Blue/Red debate, I just want to point out that it is FAR easier to be a stay-at-home parent while maintaining a high standard of living if one is In the Red than in large, coastal (urban) Blue areas...but I know you're well aware of that already ! I alternately stayed home FT/ worked PT when the boys were growing up, and I don't regret it for one nanosecond. That's certainly not an indictment of working parents...just a reminder that THAT particular choice is easier to make, from a pragmatic standpoint, in places like this. I believe mine would be very different kids (not better, not worse, just different) had they spent their days in someone else's care while young. And I must say that I'm happy with the way they turned out...
Er, that's 'you two, ' not 'two you.'
Will I ever master keyboarding?
Maybe not, but no need to apologize for it. We know what you mean, despite what you might say.
Here are some clips that show how some American kids keep themselves entertained:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3G8_jzmta90
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeUz5ZihaqA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDqprYJcbOo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JECP9qzjmFO&NR
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CgvgjfwPs
Hope they go through...
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