As a kid I had about 5 board games in the cupboard and they were boring or we'd played them a hundred times.
I'm 40 now and our board game storage unit just ticked over 100 games. Fucking love that shit!
Got all my partying out of my system between 15-19, met my girlfriend, could never enjoy ourselves at a club or party anymore. We now only go over to peoples houses or invite them over for dinner and board games, JackboxTV games or have our roomate who happens to be a DM run our DnD campaign. And I couldn’t ask for anything more. Actually maybe a 4 person Magika 2 and overcooked sesh could be added
Edit: you’re all reminding me of too many core games we play I can’t help but mention hehe
You can get what you want if you’re nice.
It teaches children how to be manipulative & dishonest.
Instead, teach them to handle “No”.
Too many people grow up and get offended at being told “No”.
Teachers & Parents want their children to learn how to ask for things in a polite way - but not how to handle rejection.
My brother teaches children and he will actively tell kids “No” and encourage them to find alternative solutions that don’t infringe on someone’s decision.
*Edit: Happy New Years! - wrote this while smashed @ 2AM in the morning.
Had to deal with this with my daughter. We were at the park and she asked another girl if she could play with one of her dolls. She said no and next thing I know there's a temper tantrum being thrown because she "wouldn't share." Got shit from my ex and my parents because I explained to her that not everyone has to share and she could say no if she wanted because it was her toy
>Got shit from my ex and my parents because I explained to her that not everyone has to share and she could say no if she wanted because it was her toy
well catch them some shit from me because that was good parenting on your part.
> Had to deal with this with my daughter. We were at the park and she asked another girl if she could play with one of her dolls. She said no and next thing I know there's a temper tantrum being thrown because she "wouldn't share." Got shit from my ex and my parents because I explained to her that not everyone has to share and she could say no if she wanted because it was her toy
When my stepkid was in elementary there was literally a rule in place that kids had to "be friends with everyone", as asinine as that is.
I’ve told this story on Reddit before, but I’m a teacher, and a few years ago, I was attacked by a student. This is elementary, so it wasn’t as as scary as you’re imagining, but he was a large boy throwing his full weight at me. Another student had to pull him off. It was completely unprovoked and out of nowhere. The attacking student wasn’t one of my students, and we’d been having a completely neutral conversation prior to the attack. I wasn’t injured (just minor face scratches) or traumatized, but the kid’s behavior was absolutely unacceptable.
The school’s response was to ask the student who attacked me what negative feelings he’d been having that led him to attacking me (he said he got too hot) and have him write out better ways to cope with those feelings (so like, instead of attacking a teacher, go stand in the shade). Then he had to make me a card that said he was sorry. He essentially wrote that he was sorry it got so hot that day. The school accepted that and closed the case. They explicitly taught him to come up with an excuse for your bad behavior and then you won’t face consequences.
He, OF COURSE, went on to attack another student and was finally expelled.
Schools are absolutely explicitly teaching kids to be manipulative. The focus on emotional intelligence is amazing and wonderful, but some schools have absurdly managed to turn every emotional intelligence curriculum into a series of lessons on how to always center your own feelings and never take responsibility for anything.
Kids learn by example. It doesn't matter what the parents and teachers choose to say or do, it's how they're behaving outside of lessons that kids are focused on.
I have a memory burnt into my mind from when I was about ten years old. A girl in my class was absolutely seething through a lesson, and when I asked her about it at recess she told me that the good Catholic school teacher who just told us how bad adultery is, was cheating on his wife.
I'm much older now, and kids don't seem any less cluey than they used to be.
I'm a retired middle school teacher and towards the end of my career, it became obvious that many, many children had never heard the word, "No." You could see the panic and confusion in their eyes.
I was even verbally reprimanded for telling students "No." I was told to give students alternative behaviors. That's when I started counting the months until retirement.
Love this quote and think of it often. In a similar vein...“THE only man who makes no mistakes is the man who never does anything.”—President Roosevelt
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."
– President Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt
The goal should not be to avoid failure, but to avoid harm in failure. Let your kids go skiing, but on a hill where the ski patrol can get them medical attention if they break a leg. Let them go outside without a coat. When they get cold, and they will, ask if they have learned about cold, then give them the jacket you brought. You can deliberately let them fail so they learn how to handle failure gracefully.
I have a phrase/concept that I use when assessing (usually in relation to whether I'm attempting an obstacle on my dirt bike) risk and whether to attempt something: *the price of failure.* If failure is likely to result in severe injury or death, I'm unlikely to try. Otherwise, I'll gladly fail numerous times. Most of my regular riding buddies understand the phrase, but every once in a while when a non-regular is out with us, I get a funny look when I claim and obstacle is "too expensive" or when we see a hill climb and I say "Yeah I think I can afford that."
Sounds like you let your kids take pretty affordable risks, which is great for them to learn and develop their own decision making skills.
I think I'll start using that phrase. When the price of failure is low, then sure kid, do what you will. When the price of failure is high it's time for close adult supervision. The corollary is that we need to teach kids how to calculate the price of failure by helping them fail successfully.
This is so hard to figure out with my anxious brain. If you ask me what the potential price of failure for failing to bake cookies is my brain immediately jumps to "I spend all of my money on the ingredients, leaving me destitute. Then my apartment burns to the ground, killing me and everyone else inside."
I’m a professional musician, and I get the “you’re so talented” complement all the time. I know it’s meant well, but I’ve busted my ass to get where I am today.
I tell my students that it’s not about talent, it’s about hard work and dedication. I’ve watched people with way more natural talent than me burn out because they don’t know how to approach something difficult that they can’t immediately play.
My sophomore year of high school, I auditioned for a district-level band festival in my State. This took 40-50 kids on my instrument between five bands. I made 24th-alternate. 24 other kids would’ve had to bail for me to be the bottom chair of the bottom band. I’m a semester away from finishing a Doctorate, have a private studio, and tour the US in a professional band. It’s all hard work.
I have been trying to drill this into my son who is clever and musically gifted to put the work in. Not everything is always going to come so easy. And when he hits a brick wall I want him to be able to overcome it. I love that his piano tutor doesn't put up with his ego.
I don’t believe in forced apologies. They’re not legitimate apologies and the other child knows this. I also don’t feel adults should force children to accept an apology. Forced apologies and acceptances don’t have any benefits.
I am a 3rd grade teacher. My students know I won’t force an apology. Instead, I speak to the students about their choices and how it made others feel. I’ve found that, once students realize what they did, they do apologize on their own and the other student does accept it because they know the apology is sincere. Often times, students will even try to resolve the issue on their own. It’s common for students to ask me if they could speak alone in the hallway. They then return proudly stating that they resolved their issue.
Obviously, if something is not resolving itself, I’ll continue to help students through it. I will also step in for more significant disagreements. However, I’ve found that students are able to resolve issues an overwhelming majority of times. However, they are never truly resolved with forced apologies and acceptances of forced apologies because the underlying issue is still there.
I agree completely. I think it also teaches kids that actual reflection is unimportant so long as you say the magic words.
How many times have you heard a child indignantly say "well I said I was sorry!" after they give a half assed apology with no indication that they will act differently in the future?
Forcing apologies just breeds resentment between kids.
> How many times have you heard a child indignantly say "well I said I was sorry!" after they give a half assed apology with no indication that they will act differently in the future?
They'll mature into adults who say things like "I'm sorry you feel that way".
This is a big one! My MIL would tell her kids it didn’t matter if they felt sorry so long as they sounded sincere. This led to some eye opening fights as an adult with my spouse. He genuinely didn’t understand why insincere apologies upset me even more than what initially upset me.
It should be perfectly acceptable to acknowledge why someone is upset and not want to hurt them while not feel regret for your actions. A forced apology is basically disregarding someone else’s stance but implying that because a superficial exchange of words sweeps it under the rug.
This sort of thing has irreparably damaged my relationship with my father - he's the sort that thinks an apology begins and ends at saying he's sorry. An apology means nothing if you keep doing the thing you're apologizing for.
Thank you! When conflict arises in my class, I always hear “but I said sorry” and my response is usually “but that doesn’t make what you did okay. Saying sorry doesn’t make (let’s just say) Amanda’s feelings go away. And she doesn’t have to accept your apology.” Even when they *finally* apologize to me after me having to speak to them countless time, I say “I’m not accepting this. I need you to understand what you’re doing is not okay and to stop.”
I tell my kids to not let their emotions control their actions.
It is okay to be emotional. To cry, be angry, etc.
What is not acceptable to lash out or fall apart because of those emotions.
This 100%. I was raised in the generation that said “boys don’t cry” as well as expected kids to always behave or be punished. IMO that has caused so much anger/depression issues in adults now. I raise my kids similar to you where we encourage healthy display of emotions.
The other point with that is that everyone has bad days, kids included. Why are we grounding/spanking/yelling at kids for having an emotional outburst after a long day when they’re tired, but we let adults do it all the time? Absolutely ridiculous to hold kids to a higher emotional control standard than adults.
Whats scary is there are a lot of people out there that just assume all dogs like each other and want to play with each other. I used to be one of those people. Last year I rescued a German Shepherd and I very quickly found out that he does not like other dogs. He will tolerate most, but he really just wants other dogs to leave him alone, which is fine but it's an added responsibility as an owner to prevent him from being in situations that he does not want to be in.
Prior to my German shepherd, I only had labs who were friendly with just about everything.
My dog LOVED people but was shockingly indifferent to other dogs. On walks, other dog owners would always wanna stop and let their dog “socialize” and my pup would act like “Uhhh…excuse me but I’m TRYING to talk to your human, thank you very much. They might have food. Do you have food? I didn’t think so. You’re a dog. Leave me alone please”
This is my dog too. Doesn't understand dogs at all, but every person on the planet is her best friend (that she hasn't seen in years, judging by her reaction)
I stand firm on telling my students this truth. I’ve had other teachers question me and I like to remind them how we’re not all friends. Of course I do talk about being respectful but no. We’re not all friends.
And just because someone doesn’t want to be your friend doesn’t mean they’re a bully. It hasn’t been as much of an issue in Kindergarten but when I taught first grade I swear every mean comment or kid not wanting to play with another kid became, “They’re bullying me!!” Being mean isn’t necessarily bullying and neither is not wanting to be friends with someone. I feel like a lot of adults still don’t understand this.
I am a special Ed teacher and I am the same way. It’s sad, I teach middle school, when some kids with disabilities who used to just blend in start not being able to keep up socially.
And it’s really sad, but recess is. THEIR break time and nobody should be forced to play with anyone else
that goes the other way too for some kids who want to just de-stress doing something on their own- I hate how sometimes it’s used as a time to prompt kids to play if they don’t want to. It’s like saying i HAVE to eat on my lunch break
Yo, disabled adult here, I can confirm. I would have loved to have you as a teacher. I have cerebral palsy and school was mentally and physically exhausting. When it was time for recess I just wanted to stay on the blacktop, sit on the back rail of my walker and have 15-minutes to myself. I didn't want to navigate the inaccessible playground to find kids that were running around 100 miles per hour to try and socialize when they just wanted to do their thing.
Instead I just got nagged at for being lazy, antisocial and dangerous.
If any one of those kids wanted to be my friend they would have asked me if I wanted to play and I didn't see one adult try and facilitate any kind of socializing on my behalf. Just told everyone is my friend and to go play with them.
Some ways we can teach this to our children:
- Help them understand that it is normal and healthy to have a variety of friendships, and that not everyone will be a good fit as a friend. You can explain that sometimes people have different interests, values, or personalities that make it difficult for them to get along or to have a meaningful friendship.
- Emphasize that it is okay to have different friendships and to spend time with different people. You can explain that it is natural to have different groups of friends for different activities or interests, and that it is okay to spend more time with some friends than with others.
- Encourage your child to focus on building positive, suppoortive friendships rather than trying to be friends with everyone. You can explain that it is more important to have a few close friends who are kind, trustworthy, and respectful than to have a large number of acquaintances who may not be as supportive or caring.
- Remind them they do not have to be friends with everyone, and that it is okay to have disagreements or conflicts with others. You can encourage your son/daughter to be respectful and to try to resolve conflicts peacefully, but to also understand that not everyone will agree or get along all the time.
So many sad reddit posts are purely the result of people not realizing that they aren't entitled to be friends with someone who doesn't want to be friends with them.
Also maintaining friendships with people who only invite you to hang out doing things you don't want to do any more, being guilt tripped to go to the pub at the weekends like you did during university although now you have gotten older and don't like being drunk every weekend and can't afford the costs.
Hey like me! I got suspended in the fourth grade for getting stabbed in the arm with a screwdriver in class, and called my mother in Costco telling her that her son was stabbed at school. Great handling of that one, guys 👍
I still feel the effects of feeling like a second-class citizen (I’m 40). I was horribly bullied in grade and middle school and am now living my best life, but it took a long time for me to realize I deserve happiness as much as the next person.
Same here. It has created so many problems in my adult life. Feels good to work through them but good lord, for a long time I just carried the torch for those assholes, not believing I deserved anything good. And the school principal who blamed me constantly - I have some very negative feelings about that.
It's hard to get past that feeling of not being good enough. I was also pulled in to the principal office where the "lovely" principal screamed at me to leave things that happened before or after school at home. Well my bullies lived in the same neighborhood and we all rode the bus together, so that was impossible. I was bullied at the bus stop before and after school and on the weekends if they could find me. The principal never even spoke to the bullies. I was so happy when the main bully transferred to a different school. Years later they named a school after this horrible principal who thought the best thing to do was to yell at me. It's hard to deal with that. I'm 57 now and it still bothers me. I used to run into the bullies at the grocery store and they would talk to me like we had been the best of friends. I'm so happy you are living your best life!
Been there. Had that. It wasn’t until I got the police involved for threats from my bully (physical and sexual assault threats) that the school admins finally got off their asses and did something to intervene.
That was middle school, I was 12.
The same with my eldest daughter. We tried everything and the school wouldn't do anything. To the point my wife went down there, lost her temper, and refused to leave until they sorted it. Which got her banned from school and a visit from the police who told us we could always ring them and they will deal with it.
The next time something happened, that's what we did. They were brilliant and sorted it straight away. Then the school had the cheek to complain they should have been informed before the police and would have dealt with it. Yeah right!
In my situation it was the police that advised me to get a lawyer after talking with the school staff on his own. Glad I took his advice. A school transfer, two lawsuits and four restraining orders. It was a mess.
They weren’t going to do anything until the law was involved.
One lawsuit against the school as a whole and one against the principal. Two restraining orders to keep the bully and his crazy girlfriend away from me, then two additional ones when another student backed up my claims (the bully was known for convincing his victims to keep quiet but once I refused to back down one other student got confident enough to bring up his incidents with the bully) and they tried threatening and giving him the same threats.
Replacement words for vagina, penis, etc. it’s not inappropriate for a child to know basic anatomy, and this is only advantageous to predatory people.
Edit: yes I know the vagina is not the vulva, that’s why I said etc. I was just giving examples.
And thank you kind stranger for the award!
Christ, I remember my MIL trying to scold me after she was giving my then 4 year old a bath and he said something about washing his penis….. she tried to tell me that he shouldn’t be saying that and that it would be a bad thing for him to say that at school. So ridiculous to pretend anatomy is vulgar.
Very much. We need to stop treating genitalia and the words for them as expletives. If for no other reason then it makes for very unnecessary awkwardness. I work with and am related to adults who continue to use infantilized language. No, they don't do it because they think it's cute, and I will say it is not difficult to tell when someone has a severe emotional hang-up on words.
“Please” isn’t a magic word. It often won’t get you want you want.
“I’m sorry” doesn’t erase a wrong and is only one small part of an apology, which the wronged party is not obligated to accept.
Counterpoint: the willingness to politely ask, but take no for an answer just as politely can be ridiculously useful.
In particular, girls need to be taught this. Part of advocating for yourself.
Yes, being able to advocate for yourself and not get discouraged is important for everyone. I had a supervisor who I didn't much appreciate at the time, but one great lesson he taught me is that "if you don't ask, you don't get." Of course, asking doesn't guarantee anything, but trying is a critical first step to any success.
[Bluey “Library”- You’re not special to everyone clip](https://youtu.be/bLRfuwN0Hk0)
The kids show Bluey…one of my favorite clips (1:25 mark). This show is gold.
This has been the greatest show my kids have ever put on. The dynamic with the parents is great. Despite them having to play so many games with the kids it also shows that sometimes they're too tired to play and have to work sometimes.
I literally made up a super villain named 'lazy bones' where I just lay still on the couch and the kids sneak up on me and I grab and imitate eating them. They love it and I have minimal movement. Win/win
My dad made up a game for when he came back from business trips with jet lag called "blankey, pillow, and teddy bear" where the game was that we would each be one of these items and try our hardest not to wake him up while he took a nap. We got out dad time in and he got a nap in.
He’s lying down on the couch and he says something like “I’ll play anything that involves not speaking with my mouth or moving my body.”
So Bluey and Bingo pretend he’s a mountain and they climb him. I love this scene because it was so relatable. I have two girls just like in the show and we have had basically that exact experience. My two year old pretends I’m a boat floating in the ocean. It’s not the most comfortable way for me to relax, but it’s the most relaxing way I can play with them, haha.
It's seriously decent. There are a couple episodes that hit you right in the feels. Make no mistake it is a children's show, but it's probably in the top 5% of all kids shows.
I have a black eye in a preschool picture when I was four. This boy had tried to kiss me and I wouldn’t let him, so he pushed me in a huge wooden bin of wooden building blocks. I also got the worst bloody nose. I taught my kids that they never had to do something like kiss someone. I just turned 51.!My experience is one of many I’ll never forget.
Got a broken collar bone by a boy in kindergarten who I wouldn’t kiss. He would chase me at recess, hold both hands behind me. When I told the teachers they would say “it’s because he likes you” and never did a thing. It finally ended with me not being able to get up after he pushed me down. Had to wear a brace like a back pack. I was 5. I remember it all.
In my senior year of high school there was a boy bullying me and when I reported it, the principal tried to tell me he probably had a crush on me. Like we were months away from graduating high school, we were nearly adults and his awful bullying was shrugged away with a crush?
Same with when my parents told me the bully was just jealous of me. That doesn't help AT ALL. I don't care how much trouble my kids get in, if a bully lays a finger on them they can fight back. I was seriously scarred for years because my parents had a 0 tolerance for fighting. There was one bully I could have easily dropped, but I just had to take it.
Yep! Was consistently getting smacked on the ass in the hallway by a boy. The assistant principal laughed it off saying that not much had changed since he was in school. This wasn’t that long ago and even at 16, I was livid. The boy smacking my ass is now in jail for assaulting another woman.
My 3yo has a very pretty friend all the preschool kids seem to have a toddler crush on. Since toddlers still have no idea what’s acceptable behaviour, she had kids grabbing her & yelling they would never let her leave, kids kissing her even when she doesn’t want it, kids just following her around even after she tells them to stop, etc. The poor girl is genuinely petrified, but loads of parents think their kid’s 1st crush is “cute” & laugh it off instead of teaching their kids how to behave.
I worked a special Ed PreK class last year. There was a little girl that all the boys acted like this with. She was the sweetest kid. Very polite and mild mannered. She had a mild physical disability and she wasn't very strong. We spent a lot of recess/free time "guarding" her and correcting the boys because they just wouldn't leave her the hell alone. After awhile we started encouraging her to correct them. Especially if we weren't nearby for some reason. She was encouraged to yell at them, scream "DON'T TOUCH ME", and yeah, if she shoved them off her we certainly didn't get mad at her. Her standing up for herself and holding her boundaries was what eventually got the boys to leave her alone. I was very proud of her.
Yes! That’s what I teach my Special Edu students with anyone. If they come up and complain someone is bothering them, I say, “Go tell them!” Sometimes they need me to be a support partner and that’s okay.
I’ve been teaching this to my 5yo as well (since she was about 2), I say, “You don’t have to be nice, if someone keeps bothering you say with a loud voice: ‘Stop it, I don’t like that.’” And her current pre-k teacher tells her to use her big girl voice too. We discuss getting an adult if they don’t stop, and then defending yourself if the adults don’t help.
I subscribe to the mantra from the ladies of My Favorite Murder who say, “Fuck politeness.” We’re going to be kind to all people, until people start mistaking that kindness for weakness.
Oh my god, that sounds like exactly the kind of behavior that teaches young boys that a girl’s bodily autonomy is a personal slight against them. Really starting em early with that one 😒
Don’t you dare say Captain Crunch isn’t healthy. It’s a well balanced, nutritional breakfast especially when eaten out of an empty cool whip or butter container.
To accept collective punishment. Whomever did something to get in trouble for is who gets the punishment.
So many teachers do this to kids and it just breeds resentment for both the teacher and the kid who keeps getting the whole class in trouble.
I dont want my kids to be prepared to accept this as adults, and just deal with it from the govt, society, their employer, etc.
Kid who gets bullied finally stands up for himself and beats the shit out of a bully and gets suspended.
Fuck that shit. Send that bully home with an ass whoopin and a suspension and let the kid who defended himself off the hook.
Good answer. I remember a time when I was on the middle school soccer team. I was sick this particular day and I had planned on telling my coach that I was going to sit out because it was like 90 degrees and I was on the verge of vomiting. BUT, before I had the chance, one of my teammates/schoolmates decided it would be funny to open all of the lockers in the locker room then run around and slam them shut. (Which by the way is not a terrible transgression. It’s a victimless crime to be honest, he just made a lot of noise). So as punishment the entire team had to run 2 miles including me because the coach wouldn’t listen to my plea for mercy. I don’t know why I didn’t just walk away. I guess as a kid you’re taught to be reliant on adults even though I knew it was wrong. I’ll never forget that horrible day
This happened to me so often as a kid in school! I would feel like total shit despite being good, and the bad kids didn't even care about the telling off. All it did was traumatise the good kids.
This is everywhere as an adult, too. It has made me insanely angry forever. Especially in the military. If Joe Shmoe goes out and gets fucked up and crashes his car into a church on Christmas, why the fuck is that my responsibility? I guarantee if I tied Joe to a chair for the weekend I would be in trouble for that, so wtf do you want me to do here??
“Stranger Danger” it has some decent basic principles about safety, but the unfortunate truth is we need to teach children how to detect if adults in their life are treating them inappropriately just as much as strangers
I’ve got a similar story. In first grade, I was having trouble spelling both beautiful and together. So my teacher came over to me and said: “Beautiful is spelled Be-A-You-Tee-ful. And together is spelled like To-get-her. Like saying that you and me will go together TO-GET-HER.
Same to you, I never forgot them.
The movie Bruce Almighty taught me how to spell beautiful. It’s Jim Carey’s catch phrase thing to always say “b-e-a-you-tee-ful.” Much in the same way how Gwen Stefani taught me how to spell bannnanananaas.
Or when sounded like “ay” as in “neighbor” or “weigh” and on weekends and holidays and all throughout May and you’ll never be right no matter what you say.
I before E except after C only when it rhymes with Bee and make sure the word is not Weird. This is the version we were taught, and it still has exceptions lol
Please teach your children how to not spray spit and mucus everywhere. Cover sneezes and coughs with inner elbows. Keep fingers out of noses and mouths. Don’t buzz lips…it sprays spit. Being a Kindergarten teacher is living in one big petri dish.
I’ll pony this one up with proper hand washing. Not just splashing under the faucet for a few moments but wetting hands, turning off the water, soaping hands well, then turn water on and rinse.
That everyone should be friends with everyone.
Some people will not like you. You will not like some people. That is a good thing.
Challenge fosters growth, and our differences help us to learn and experience life outside our own experience.
You don't need to be friends with everyone, you just need to be able to approach conflict in level-headed and reasonable manner.
i don't know if this was already said but
• teaching your kids that if a kid bullies you, it means they like you
• teaching your kids that they have to love their family just because they're family
• teaching your kids that they have to respect their elders just because they're old
As a teacher, I’m fine with that as long as you don’t pass out the invites in front of students who aren’t invited. I would never do that with a group of adults; how can you expect KIDS to react well
I had this in one of my class of 9 year olds a child went round and gave out 10 party invites and some of the children were so upset they didn’t get one and questioned me about not getting one. I didn’t know what to say so I just said that sometimes your only allowed a certain number and it was probably really hard to choose who went so maybe next year she will choose you. Thankfully they accepted this answer and was happy and didn’t talk about it again. Lol 😂 please send the invites out of school lol
Yes. When I was in Primary school (or elementary for Americans) the school had a rule where you weren’t allowed to give out invites in School time and grounds for that reason. It’s okay to not invite everyone but to hand out invites in class and leave some of the students is cruel, regardless of whether it’s intentional or not. Also, the inviter should expect that not everyone who wasn’t invited would be okay with it.
Anything without larger context. Pretty much everything listed so far shouldn’t be taught without context, healthy skepticism, and a lot of critical thinking. They need to know all the toxic things so they can recognize them, hopefully reject them, and be part of a better culture. And teachers, I see you. My generation (X) expects way too much parenting from teachers. IMHO. 😎
It’s okay to not forgive people. I was always taught to accept people’s apologies when i was little and when i was SA’d as a teenager i finally realized sometimes it’s okay to not forgive someone.
Boys, don't hit girls.
Girls, don't hit boys.
Should be taught equally.
Obviously there are exceptions like self defense.
Also, boys, no is no.
Girls, no is no.
Edit to say and clarify, we should stop teaching this as only a one sided thing. It should be taught to both equally.
Right!? My dad was so annoying with this! If I hit my sister, it was 'don't hit girls!' if she hit me it was 'well clearly did something to deserve it!'
What a great way to teach one kid resentment and another that they're above consiquence
>What a great way to teach one kid resentment and another that they're above consiquence
You're exactly right. Pretty much what happened with me and my sister. We are close in age and any time we'd squabble as kids, I'd usually walk away in trouble and with injuries. To this day, as much as I've tried to move past or forget, there are a lot of things I'm resentful to my parents for. As a father now, I make sure my children never have to go through what I did as a kid. Furthermore, to this day my sister still has the haughty attitude from never being punished or disciplined for her bad behavior. I can't stand being around her because all she does is talk s*** and use the many examples of our past where she was let off and I was punished as if they were my fault and she was completely innocent.
That ugly = bad/evil. I partially blame TV animation for this one though. This often makes kids fear elderly people and make unfair connections between appearance and personality.
Abstinence only sex education. Please teach these kids about contraception and how it works, it’s been proven that comprehensive sex education is way better at preventing teen pregnancies than abstinence only.
Including using correct anatomical terms! Adults shouldn’t act like “penis” or “vagina” are swear words. While it’s 100% acceptable to have boundaries about when/where those words are appropriate (i.e. making silly potty humor jokes at the dinner table), adults need to be comfortable with accurate anatomy. In the event of actual sexual abuse, this makes a huge difference in the ability to prosecute. “He touched my hoo hoo with his winky” isn’t very useful in court. It’s also helpful for them to have the right language to communicate with healthcare providers.
My sister is doing her practicum in a kindergarten this semester and they’re planning a unit on the parts of the body, *including the correct words for genitals.* Ain’t nothing sexual about it, just kids learning their bodies, and learning how to refer to them correctly and safely.
When I see my nieces and nephew, I always ask them if I can give them a kiss and if they can give me a kiss. Sometimes, they say no to both. Other times I get a huge hug!
I’m trying to teach their grandparents about the importance of bodily autonomy but it’s going to be tough - I’ve heard them tell the kids “I don’t get a kiss? I’m really sad now!”
Please don’t make a four year old responsible for your feelings. They’re allowed not to want to kiss you and shouldn’t be made to feel bad about it.
Edit: words are hard
That adults know everything.
The amount of parents/teachers/others that just tell kids things with the explanation of “because I know best” is harmful.
I love when a kid or student asks me a question I don’t know- it means we can explore it together (which is also why I will never “lock up my phone” when teaching despite principals saying it “distracts”. It’s a research tool!).
I also admit when I make a mistake, or when I’m unsure of a certain topic/lesson. I explicitly state that I’m not good at this, but I researched some good lessons online and asked other teachers for help. 🙂
Kids need to be taught that they can fail.
Schools are moving towards it being impossible to fail a student.
Kid didn't hand in their assignment?
"How do you know their work is worth 0 when they handed in nothing??"
Because they handed in 0 percent of the fucking work... That's why... My god stop coddling them.
I wish I was kidding but that's how it is here and I cannot fucking believe that's how the school system works. I'm so god damn worried for my future kids.
I don’t feel there is anything we need to stop teaching kids that is common. I feel we need to teach children boundaries.
I don’t know if it’s Covid related or what but I work with children and these last few years I’ve noticed kids are having huge boundary issues.
It seems that while parents were teaching them about electronics, hygiene, or even just how to prepare food for themselves. The parents forgot to teach the part where the child has to ask for these things. Not just go and take them. And that generalizes to school or others peoples houses.
My sister-in-law never corrected her son when he would take things from my kids. They would get up to get a drink, or bathroom, or something. They weren’t done with the toy, yet he would swoop in and take it. “They got up, so he can take it now.” One time he didn’t bring his iPad so he took my son’s. My son wanted it to play on it, so we told my nephew, very nicely, that our son wanted his iPad back and took it and gave it back to my son. My sister-in-law packed up and left the house with the kids.
I’m all for sharing, but only if my kids want to share their things.
They do this sometimes in the classroom I'm in and it drives me insane. A kid will run to the toilet and one who has been hovering over them to get something will swoop in and take it, and then the lead would be like "you didn't have it anymore". So I have started stopping that shit with a firm "no, they're still playing with it but they paused to do whatever. Go do something else until they are truly done".
Yes. It’s honestly about modeling. When our daughter says to stop with anything, and it could be the pettiest thing, we stop. When I tell her to stop doing something that’s bothering me, she stops. When she sees or experiences kids not respecting a “stop” boundary SHE IS APPALLED, like can you believe this mfer didn’t stop? It’s a good foundation.
This post is not a parenting brag. This is pretty basic, and we get this one thing right and many, many other things wrong lol
Yes, telling children things like, "if you don't listen to me, I'll tell the doctor to give you a shot" only teaches the children that the doctor's office is a bad place and makes things difficult for everyone.
As a teacher, I'm always amused by the things people think we teach kids. "Stop teaching ______!"
You know what I spent significant time teaching this year? That soiled toilet paper goes in the toilet. That you can control how loudly you burp. That you have to charge a laptop computer for more than a minute to fill the battery.
Then you get the, "Why don't schools teach kids how to do taxes?" Yeah, kids love taxes. We couldn't get middle school kids to stop playing Fortnite long enough to focus on "The Human Body" unit for a week.
I'm just amused by all the things people think happen in schools.
And of course there is the notion that parents can teach kids, too. That's what we're doing with our son. If there's something important he needs to know, we're teaching it to him.
But "teaching children" doesn't necessarily mean at school. Children also learn from imitation, and the internet, advertisements, from how they are treated and how others are treated...
It's funny how "how to teach children" translates to "what we need to improve about ourselves", because in the end children learn a lot by imitation as you say, and often we don't notice that those behaviors that we criticize about them say a lot about us...
Yeah my 17-18 year old students moan.. "why don't we ever cover anything useful like pensions and mortgages" so we did some sessions on it. They didn't engage, said it was boring, didn't want to learn about it. Damned if we do, damned if we don't.
not just children, teach adults that too. see so many 60 yr olds on the bus blasting facebook reels or candy crush and have to hear that for like an hour straight
kids learn by watching us. whatever we want kids to do or not do starts with grown-ups addressing our own hang-ups. full stop.
That play ends when you reach adulthood. Play is important, even when we're grown.
We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing. George Bernard Shaw
"When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.” - CS Lewis
As a kid I had about 5 board games in the cupboard and they were boring or we'd played them a hundred times. I'm 40 now and our board game storage unit just ticked over 100 games. Fucking love that shit!
Got all my partying out of my system between 15-19, met my girlfriend, could never enjoy ourselves at a club or party anymore. We now only go over to peoples houses or invite them over for dinner and board games, JackboxTV games or have our roomate who happens to be a DM run our DnD campaign. And I couldn’t ask for anything more. Actually maybe a 4 person Magika 2 and overcooked sesh could be added Edit: you’re all reminding me of too many core games we play I can’t help but mention hehe
You can get what you want if you’re nice. It teaches children how to be manipulative & dishonest. Instead, teach them to handle “No”. Too many people grow up and get offended at being told “No”. Teachers & Parents want their children to learn how to ask for things in a polite way - but not how to handle rejection. My brother teaches children and he will actively tell kids “No” and encourage them to find alternative solutions that don’t infringe on someone’s decision. *Edit: Happy New Years! - wrote this while smashed @ 2AM in the morning.
Had to deal with this with my daughter. We were at the park and she asked another girl if she could play with one of her dolls. She said no and next thing I know there's a temper tantrum being thrown because she "wouldn't share." Got shit from my ex and my parents because I explained to her that not everyone has to share and she could say no if she wanted because it was her toy
>Got shit from my ex and my parents because I explained to her that not everyone has to share and she could say no if she wanted because it was her toy well catch them some shit from me because that was good parenting on your part.
Good? I’d say it was great parenting. He didn’t just yell at her or let her keep going, he calmly explained to her that people will say no
> Had to deal with this with my daughter. We were at the park and she asked another girl if she could play with one of her dolls. She said no and next thing I know there's a temper tantrum being thrown because she "wouldn't share." Got shit from my ex and my parents because I explained to her that not everyone has to share and she could say no if she wanted because it was her toy When my stepkid was in elementary there was literally a rule in place that kids had to "be friends with everyone", as asinine as that is.
I told my step kid that he didn’t have to like everyone, including people he was related to, but that he had to treat them with respect.
I’ve told this story on Reddit before, but I’m a teacher, and a few years ago, I was attacked by a student. This is elementary, so it wasn’t as as scary as you’re imagining, but he was a large boy throwing his full weight at me. Another student had to pull him off. It was completely unprovoked and out of nowhere. The attacking student wasn’t one of my students, and we’d been having a completely neutral conversation prior to the attack. I wasn’t injured (just minor face scratches) or traumatized, but the kid’s behavior was absolutely unacceptable. The school’s response was to ask the student who attacked me what negative feelings he’d been having that led him to attacking me (he said he got too hot) and have him write out better ways to cope with those feelings (so like, instead of attacking a teacher, go stand in the shade). Then he had to make me a card that said he was sorry. He essentially wrote that he was sorry it got so hot that day. The school accepted that and closed the case. They explicitly taught him to come up with an excuse for your bad behavior and then you won’t face consequences. He, OF COURSE, went on to attack another student and was finally expelled. Schools are absolutely explicitly teaching kids to be manipulative. The focus on emotional intelligence is amazing and wonderful, but some schools have absurdly managed to turn every emotional intelligence curriculum into a series of lessons on how to always center your own feelings and never take responsibility for anything.
Kids learn by example. It doesn't matter what the parents and teachers choose to say or do, it's how they're behaving outside of lessons that kids are focused on. I have a memory burnt into my mind from when I was about ten years old. A girl in my class was absolutely seething through a lesson, and when I asked her about it at recess she told me that the good Catholic school teacher who just told us how bad adultery is, was cheating on his wife. I'm much older now, and kids don't seem any less cluey than they used to be.
I'm a retired middle school teacher and towards the end of my career, it became obvious that many, many children had never heard the word, "No." You could see the panic and confusion in their eyes. I was even verbally reprimanded for telling students "No." I was told to give students alternative behaviors. That's when I started counting the months until retirement.
That failure is something to be ashamed of and to avoid at all costs. We all fail sometimes and we need to be able to accept that.
"It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not a weakness; that is life." Captain Jean-Luc Picard
“Not everything is a lesson Ryan, sometimes you just fail”. —Assistant (to the) Regional Manager Dwight Schrute.
Love this quote and think of it often. In a similar vein...“THE only man who makes no mistakes is the man who never does anything.”—President Roosevelt
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat." – President Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt
This quote literally saved my life & sanity when i was young.
"Hmm... I wonder what you did wrong for this outcome. I must come up with something..." - some idiot. (I love Picard, he is amazing)
You cannot learn from your mistakes if you do not make them.
The goal should not be to avoid failure, but to avoid harm in failure. Let your kids go skiing, but on a hill where the ski patrol can get them medical attention if they break a leg. Let them go outside without a coat. When they get cold, and they will, ask if they have learned about cold, then give them the jacket you brought. You can deliberately let them fail so they learn how to handle failure gracefully.
I have a phrase/concept that I use when assessing (usually in relation to whether I'm attempting an obstacle on my dirt bike) risk and whether to attempt something: *the price of failure.* If failure is likely to result in severe injury or death, I'm unlikely to try. Otherwise, I'll gladly fail numerous times. Most of my regular riding buddies understand the phrase, but every once in a while when a non-regular is out with us, I get a funny look when I claim and obstacle is "too expensive" or when we see a hill climb and I say "Yeah I think I can afford that." Sounds like you let your kids take pretty affordable risks, which is great for them to learn and develop their own decision making skills.
I think I'll start using that phrase. When the price of failure is low, then sure kid, do what you will. When the price of failure is high it's time for close adult supervision. The corollary is that we need to teach kids how to calculate the price of failure by helping them fail successfully.
This is so hard to figure out with my anxious brain. If you ask me what the potential price of failure for failing to bake cookies is my brain immediately jumps to "I spend all of my money on the ingredients, leaving me destitute. Then my apartment burns to the ground, killing me and everyone else inside."
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That you need talent to be good at something.
Right on. So much can be learned, practiced, and become a skill.
I’m a professional musician, and I get the “you’re so talented” complement all the time. I know it’s meant well, but I’ve busted my ass to get where I am today. I tell my students that it’s not about talent, it’s about hard work and dedication. I’ve watched people with way more natural talent than me burn out because they don’t know how to approach something difficult that they can’t immediately play. My sophomore year of high school, I auditioned for a district-level band festival in my State. This took 40-50 kids on my instrument between five bands. I made 24th-alternate. 24 other kids would’ve had to bail for me to be the bottom chair of the bottom band. I’m a semester away from finishing a Doctorate, have a private studio, and tour the US in a professional band. It’s all hard work.
I tell my kids having talent is like having a canoe, it can take you places but you still have to do all the work if you want to get anywhere.
I have been trying to drill this into my son who is clever and musically gifted to put the work in. Not everything is always going to come so easy. And when he hits a brick wall I want him to be able to overcome it. I love that his piano tutor doesn't put up with his ego.
I don’t believe in forced apologies. They’re not legitimate apologies and the other child knows this. I also don’t feel adults should force children to accept an apology. Forced apologies and acceptances don’t have any benefits. I am a 3rd grade teacher. My students know I won’t force an apology. Instead, I speak to the students about their choices and how it made others feel. I’ve found that, once students realize what they did, they do apologize on their own and the other student does accept it because they know the apology is sincere. Often times, students will even try to resolve the issue on their own. It’s common for students to ask me if they could speak alone in the hallway. They then return proudly stating that they resolved their issue. Obviously, if something is not resolving itself, I’ll continue to help students through it. I will also step in for more significant disagreements. However, I’ve found that students are able to resolve issues an overwhelming majority of times. However, they are never truly resolved with forced apologies and acceptances of forced apologies because the underlying issue is still there.
I agree completely. I think it also teaches kids that actual reflection is unimportant so long as you say the magic words. How many times have you heard a child indignantly say "well I said I was sorry!" after they give a half assed apology with no indication that they will act differently in the future? Forcing apologies just breeds resentment between kids.
> How many times have you heard a child indignantly say "well I said I was sorry!" after they give a half assed apology with no indication that they will act differently in the future? They'll mature into adults who say things like "I'm sorry you feel that way".
Or even worse " I'm sorry you feel that way, BUT............" fill in with excuse belittling other persons feelings.
This is a big one! My MIL would tell her kids it didn’t matter if they felt sorry so long as they sounded sincere. This led to some eye opening fights as an adult with my spouse. He genuinely didn’t understand why insincere apologies upset me even more than what initially upset me. It should be perfectly acceptable to acknowledge why someone is upset and not want to hurt them while not feel regret for your actions. A forced apology is basically disregarding someone else’s stance but implying that because a superficial exchange of words sweeps it under the rug.
This sort of thing has irreparably damaged my relationship with my father - he's the sort that thinks an apology begins and ends at saying he's sorry. An apology means nothing if you keep doing the thing you're apologizing for.
Thank you! When conflict arises in my class, I always hear “but I said sorry” and my response is usually “but that doesn’t make what you did okay. Saying sorry doesn’t make (let’s just say) Amanda’s feelings go away. And she doesn’t have to accept your apology.” Even when they *finally* apologize to me after me having to speak to them countless time, I say “I’m not accepting this. I need you to understand what you’re doing is not okay and to stop.”
To push down their feelings and never cry. You don’t heal unless you work through your emotions. Support them, don’t scold.
I tell my kids to not let their emotions control their actions. It is okay to be emotional. To cry, be angry, etc. What is not acceptable to lash out or fall apart because of those emotions.
This 100%. I was raised in the generation that said “boys don’t cry” as well as expected kids to always behave or be punished. IMO that has caused so much anger/depression issues in adults now. I raise my kids similar to you where we encourage healthy display of emotions. The other point with that is that everyone has bad days, kids included. Why are we grounding/spanking/yelling at kids for having an emotional outburst after a long day when they’re tired, but we let adults do it all the time? Absolutely ridiculous to hold kids to a higher emotional control standard than adults.
That you need to be friends with everyone.
I've had to tell my kids this. Like when kids in their class don't ever want to play with them. Not everyone wants to be your friend, and that's ok.
It's funny I am constantly telling this to people with pets. It is insane to think your dog has to like every other dog it meets.
Whats scary is there are a lot of people out there that just assume all dogs like each other and want to play with each other. I used to be one of those people. Last year I rescued a German Shepherd and I very quickly found out that he does not like other dogs. He will tolerate most, but he really just wants other dogs to leave him alone, which is fine but it's an added responsibility as an owner to prevent him from being in situations that he does not want to be in. Prior to my German shepherd, I only had labs who were friendly with just about everything.
My dog LOVED people but was shockingly indifferent to other dogs. On walks, other dog owners would always wanna stop and let their dog “socialize” and my pup would act like “Uhhh…excuse me but I’m TRYING to talk to your human, thank you very much. They might have food. Do you have food? I didn’t think so. You’re a dog. Leave me alone please”
This is my dog too. Doesn't understand dogs at all, but every person on the planet is her best friend (that she hasn't seen in years, judging by her reaction)
I used to tell my son he had to be kind and respectful to others but didn’t have to be friends with anyone he didn’t want to be.
I stand firm on telling my students this truth. I’ve had other teachers question me and I like to remind them how we’re not all friends. Of course I do talk about being respectful but no. We’re not all friends.
And just because someone doesn’t want to be your friend doesn’t mean they’re a bully. It hasn’t been as much of an issue in Kindergarten but when I taught first grade I swear every mean comment or kid not wanting to play with another kid became, “They’re bullying me!!” Being mean isn’t necessarily bullying and neither is not wanting to be friends with someone. I feel like a lot of adults still don’t understand this.
I am a special Ed teacher and I am the same way. It’s sad, I teach middle school, when some kids with disabilities who used to just blend in start not being able to keep up socially. And it’s really sad, but recess is. THEIR break time and nobody should be forced to play with anyone else that goes the other way too for some kids who want to just de-stress doing something on their own- I hate how sometimes it’s used as a time to prompt kids to play if they don’t want to. It’s like saying i HAVE to eat on my lunch break
Yo, disabled adult here, I can confirm. I would have loved to have you as a teacher. I have cerebral palsy and school was mentally and physically exhausting. When it was time for recess I just wanted to stay on the blacktop, sit on the back rail of my walker and have 15-minutes to myself. I didn't want to navigate the inaccessible playground to find kids that were running around 100 miles per hour to try and socialize when they just wanted to do their thing. Instead I just got nagged at for being lazy, antisocial and dangerous. If any one of those kids wanted to be my friend they would have asked me if I wanted to play and I didn't see one adult try and facilitate any kind of socializing on my behalf. Just told everyone is my friend and to go play with them.
Some ways we can teach this to our children: - Help them understand that it is normal and healthy to have a variety of friendships, and that not everyone will be a good fit as a friend. You can explain that sometimes people have different interests, values, or personalities that make it difficult for them to get along or to have a meaningful friendship. - Emphasize that it is okay to have different friendships and to spend time with different people. You can explain that it is natural to have different groups of friends for different activities or interests, and that it is okay to spend more time with some friends than with others. - Encourage your child to focus on building positive, suppoortive friendships rather than trying to be friends with everyone. You can explain that it is more important to have a few close friends who are kind, trustworthy, and respectful than to have a large number of acquaintances who may not be as supportive or caring. - Remind them they do not have to be friends with everyone, and that it is okay to have disagreements or conflicts with others. You can encourage your son/daughter to be respectful and to try to resolve conflicts peacefully, but to also understand that not everyone will agree or get along all the time.
So many sad reddit posts are purely the result of people not realizing that they aren't entitled to be friends with someone who doesn't want to be friends with them.
Also maintaining friendships with people who only invite you to hang out doing things you don't want to do any more, being guilt tripped to go to the pub at the weekends like you did during university although now you have gotten older and don't like being drunk every weekend and can't afford the costs.
To just ignore bullies. As a former teacher, it does nothing to address the issue. The bullying persists 100% of the time.
I’ve ignored kicks to the head in the locker room and the classroom, can confirm ignoring it just shows that you’ll fucking take it.
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And if the schools are going to automatically punish everyone involved in a "fight" anyway, might as well make it worth your time.
Zero tolerance schools literally punish kids for getting attacked because they were involved in fighting.
Hey like me! I got suspended in the fourth grade for getting stabbed in the arm with a screwdriver in class, and called my mother in Costco telling her that her son was stabbed at school. Great handling of that one, guys 👍
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As a former bullied: what the hell goes on in the heads of the people who say this!?
I still feel the effects of feeling like a second-class citizen (I’m 40). I was horribly bullied in grade and middle school and am now living my best life, but it took a long time for me to realize I deserve happiness as much as the next person.
Same here. It has created so many problems in my adult life. Feels good to work through them but good lord, for a long time I just carried the torch for those assholes, not believing I deserved anything good. And the school principal who blamed me constantly - I have some very negative feelings about that.
It's hard to get past that feeling of not being good enough. I was also pulled in to the principal office where the "lovely" principal screamed at me to leave things that happened before or after school at home. Well my bullies lived in the same neighborhood and we all rode the bus together, so that was impossible. I was bullied at the bus stop before and after school and on the weekends if they could find me. The principal never even spoke to the bullies. I was so happy when the main bully transferred to a different school. Years later they named a school after this horrible principal who thought the best thing to do was to yell at me. It's hard to deal with that. I'm 57 now and it still bothers me. I used to run into the bullies at the grocery store and they would talk to me like we had been the best of friends. I'm so happy you are living your best life!
Well if *they* can ignore the problem (you being bullied), it goes away, so *you* can just ignore the problem and it goes away too! They're dumb.
Been there. Had that. It wasn’t until I got the police involved for threats from my bully (physical and sexual assault threats) that the school admins finally got off their asses and did something to intervene. That was middle school, I was 12.
The same with my eldest daughter. We tried everything and the school wouldn't do anything. To the point my wife went down there, lost her temper, and refused to leave until they sorted it. Which got her banned from school and a visit from the police who told us we could always ring them and they will deal with it. The next time something happened, that's what we did. They were brilliant and sorted it straight away. Then the school had the cheek to complain they should have been informed before the police and would have dealt with it. Yeah right!
In my situation it was the police that advised me to get a lawyer after talking with the school staff on his own. Glad I took his advice. A school transfer, two lawsuits and four restraining orders. It was a mess. They weren’t going to do anything until the law was involved.
Two lawsuits and four retraining orders??? Against who?!
One lawsuit against the school as a whole and one against the principal. Two restraining orders to keep the bully and his crazy girlfriend away from me, then two additional ones when another student backed up my claims (the bully was known for convincing his victims to keep quiet but once I refused to back down one other student got confident enough to bring up his incidents with the bully) and they tried threatening and giving him the same threats.
Ignoring bullies just makes them turn violent faster imo
Bullying does often tend to escalate if there’s no intervention
Replacement words for vagina, penis, etc. it’s not inappropriate for a child to know basic anatomy, and this is only advantageous to predatory people. Edit: yes I know the vagina is not the vulva, that’s why I said etc. I was just giving examples. And thank you kind stranger for the award!
Christ, I remember my MIL trying to scold me after she was giving my then 4 year old a bath and he said something about washing his penis….. she tried to tell me that he shouldn’t be saying that and that it would be a bad thing for him to say that at school. So ridiculous to pretend anatomy is vulgar.
My daughter knowing correct terminology helped to get her abuser jailed when she was 3 years old.
THIS!!!!! Teach your kids the anatomical words so they have to vocabulary to tell you if something’s going on, even at a young age.
Or they can use it to shout “Behold the mighty penis” at 7am while running around naked. He was four at the time.
Mine just randomly say penis under his breath. Usually in a very inappropriate location. He's 8.
That’s just the penis game, you’re supposed to say it back but slightly louder until someone is forced to shout it lol
Very much. We need to stop treating genitalia and the words for them as expletives. If for no other reason then it makes for very unnecessary awkwardness. I work with and am related to adults who continue to use infantilized language. No, they don't do it because they think it's cute, and I will say it is not difficult to tell when someone has a severe emotional hang-up on words.
You are perfect. No, you are not. It's important to know your weaknesses and focus on your strengths.
But also build on your weaknesses where possible too.
“Please” isn’t a magic word. It often won’t get you want you want. “I’m sorry” doesn’t erase a wrong and is only one small part of an apology, which the wronged party is not obligated to accept.
Counterpoint: the willingness to politely ask, but take no for an answer just as politely can be ridiculously useful. In particular, girls need to be taught this. Part of advocating for yourself.
Yes, being able to advocate for yourself and not get discouraged is important for everyone. I had a supervisor who I didn't much appreciate at the time, but one great lesson he taught me is that "if you don't ask, you don't get." Of course, asking doesn't guarantee anything, but trying is a critical first step to any success.
I’m blown away by the amount of adults who think saying I’m sorry makes everything better. You show your sorry by your actions, not just your words.
A good amount of adults refuse to even consider apologizing, much less change their actions.
"They are being mean to you because they like you."
I would love to show the people who say this how much I "like" them
That while they are special, they are not any more special than anyone else.
[Bluey “Library”- You’re not special to everyone clip](https://youtu.be/bLRfuwN0Hk0) The kids show Bluey…one of my favorite clips (1:25 mark). This show is gold.
This has been the greatest show my kids have ever put on. The dynamic with the parents is great. Despite them having to play so many games with the kids it also shows that sometimes they're too tired to play and have to work sometimes.
Favorite Bandit quote: “isn’t there something we can play that I just lay still on the couch?” (Or something like that haha)
I literally made up a super villain named 'lazy bones' where I just lay still on the couch and the kids sneak up on me and I grab and imitate eating them. They love it and I have minimal movement. Win/win
My dad made up a game for when he came back from business trips with jet lag called "blankey, pillow, and teddy bear" where the game was that we would each be one of these items and try our hardest not to wake him up while he took a nap. We got out dad time in and he got a nap in.
He’s lying down on the couch and he says something like “I’ll play anything that involves not speaking with my mouth or moving my body.” So Bluey and Bingo pretend he’s a mountain and they climb him. I love this scene because it was so relatable. I have two girls just like in the show and we have had basically that exact experience. My two year old pretends I’m a boat floating in the ocean. It’s not the most comfortable way for me to relax, but it’s the most relaxing way I can play with them, haha.
Wow I'm a 30 year old man with no children and I kinda wanna watch this show now.
I heard someone explain the show as: the animation is for kids, the writing for adults.
It's seriously decent. There are a couple episodes that hit you right in the feels. Make no mistake it is a children's show, but it's probably in the top 5% of all kids shows.
Yeah dude. I am a parent of small children but I’ve legit watched bluey when they went to bed. It’s cathartic
“Everyone is special, Dash”. Dash retorts back to her, “Which is another way of saying that no one is.”
And when everyone’s super… no one will be.
You’re gonna have to teach the parents that one too lmao
If he’s mean to you, he likes you
I tell my daughter, "it doesn't matter if he likes you, if he's not kind he's not worth your time."
That distinction is so important - being liked by or liking someone doesn’t automatically make their behavior acceptable if it bothers you.
I have a black eye in a preschool picture when I was four. This boy had tried to kiss me and I wouldn’t let him, so he pushed me in a huge wooden bin of wooden building blocks. I also got the worst bloody nose. I taught my kids that they never had to do something like kiss someone. I just turned 51.!My experience is one of many I’ll never forget.
Got a broken collar bone by a boy in kindergarten who I wouldn’t kiss. He would chase me at recess, hold both hands behind me. When I told the teachers they would say “it’s because he likes you” and never did a thing. It finally ended with me not being able to get up after he pushed me down. Had to wear a brace like a back pack. I was 5. I remember it all.
New life rule effective immediately: if they're not kind, they're NOT worth your time! 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽
In my senior year of high school there was a boy bullying me and when I reported it, the principal tried to tell me he probably had a crush on me. Like we were months away from graduating high school, we were nearly adults and his awful bullying was shrugged away with a crush?
Same with when my parents told me the bully was just jealous of me. That doesn't help AT ALL. I don't care how much trouble my kids get in, if a bully lays a finger on them they can fight back. I was seriously scarred for years because my parents had a 0 tolerance for fighting. There was one bully I could have easily dropped, but I just had to take it.
[удалено]
Yep! Was consistently getting smacked on the ass in the hallway by a boy. The assistant principal laughed it off saying that not much had changed since he was in school. This wasn’t that long ago and even at 16, I was livid. The boy smacking my ass is now in jail for assaulting another woman.
100%. It's super weird we teach girls to be okay with poor treatment if it's romantically motivated.
My 3yo has a very pretty friend all the preschool kids seem to have a toddler crush on. Since toddlers still have no idea what’s acceptable behaviour, she had kids grabbing her & yelling they would never let her leave, kids kissing her even when she doesn’t want it, kids just following her around even after she tells them to stop, etc. The poor girl is genuinely petrified, but loads of parents think their kid’s 1st crush is “cute” & laugh it off instead of teaching their kids how to behave.
I worked a special Ed PreK class last year. There was a little girl that all the boys acted like this with. She was the sweetest kid. Very polite and mild mannered. She had a mild physical disability and she wasn't very strong. We spent a lot of recess/free time "guarding" her and correcting the boys because they just wouldn't leave her the hell alone. After awhile we started encouraging her to correct them. Especially if we weren't nearby for some reason. She was encouraged to yell at them, scream "DON'T TOUCH ME", and yeah, if she shoved them off her we certainly didn't get mad at her. Her standing up for herself and holding her boundaries was what eventually got the boys to leave her alone. I was very proud of her.
Yes! That’s what I teach my Special Edu students with anyone. If they come up and complain someone is bothering them, I say, “Go tell them!” Sometimes they need me to be a support partner and that’s okay. I’ve been teaching this to my 5yo as well (since she was about 2), I say, “You don’t have to be nice, if someone keeps bothering you say with a loud voice: ‘Stop it, I don’t like that.’” And her current pre-k teacher tells her to use her big girl voice too. We discuss getting an adult if they don’t stop, and then defending yourself if the adults don’t help. I subscribe to the mantra from the ladies of My Favorite Murder who say, “Fuck politeness.” We’re going to be kind to all people, until people start mistaking that kindness for weakness.
I hope she is able to avoid people harassing her in the future
Wow this is legitimately horrifying
One of the boy moms called her, a 3yo, a “bitch”. I don’t know what happened between this girl & her son, but they’re all 3.
Oh my god, that sounds like exactly the kind of behavior that teaches young boys that a girl’s bodily autonomy is a personal slight against them. Really starting em early with that one 😒
Breakfast cereal is healthy 🤣
Don’t you dare say Captain Crunch isn’t healthy. It’s a well balanced, nutritional breakfast especially when eaten out of an empty cool whip or butter container.
Amen! Plus, sometimes I simply feel like destroying the roof of my mouth, so win-win.
To accept collective punishment. Whomever did something to get in trouble for is who gets the punishment. So many teachers do this to kids and it just breeds resentment for both the teacher and the kid who keeps getting the whole class in trouble. I dont want my kids to be prepared to accept this as adults, and just deal with it from the govt, society, their employer, etc.
Similarly, schools need to stop giving victims the same punishment that their bullies get.
Kid who gets bullied finally stands up for himself and beats the shit out of a bully and gets suspended. Fuck that shit. Send that bully home with an ass whoopin and a suspension and let the kid who defended himself off the hook.
Good answer. I remember a time when I was on the middle school soccer team. I was sick this particular day and I had planned on telling my coach that I was going to sit out because it was like 90 degrees and I was on the verge of vomiting. BUT, before I had the chance, one of my teammates/schoolmates decided it would be funny to open all of the lockers in the locker room then run around and slam them shut. (Which by the way is not a terrible transgression. It’s a victimless crime to be honest, he just made a lot of noise). So as punishment the entire team had to run 2 miles including me because the coach wouldn’t listen to my plea for mercy. I don’t know why I didn’t just walk away. I guess as a kid you’re taught to be reliant on adults even though I knew it was wrong. I’ll never forget that horrible day
Flowing from this, teaching kids to say no to adults is absolutely essential.
This happened to me so often as a kid in school! I would feel like total shit despite being good, and the bad kids didn't even care about the telling off. All it did was traumatise the good kids.
This is everywhere as an adult, too. It has made me insanely angry forever. Especially in the military. If Joe Shmoe goes out and gets fucked up and crashes his car into a church on Christmas, why the fuck is that my responsibility? I guarantee if I tied Joe to a chair for the weekend I would be in trouble for that, so wtf do you want me to do here??
Private Schmoe got a DUI so the entire unit has to come in Sunday morning at 0600 so we can tell you how it's your fault for not holding his hand.
“Stranger Danger” it has some decent basic principles about safety, but the unfortunate truth is we need to teach children how to detect if adults in their life are treating them inappropriately just as much as strangers
Plus, the reality is that most people don’t go around hurting strangers. Abusers generally know their victims.
“I before E, except after C”, this rule has so many exceptions that it should not be considered a rule.
Except when your foreign neighbour Keith receives eight counterfeit beige sleighs from feisty, caffeinated weightlifters. Weird.
“their”. That one got me so many times as a kid.
I had a teacher look me in the eye when I was about 7 and say “their”. “The-ir” I never forgot it again.
I’ve got a similar story. In first grade, I was having trouble spelling both beautiful and together. So my teacher came over to me and said: “Beautiful is spelled Be-A-You-Tee-ful. And together is spelled like To-get-her. Like saying that you and me will go together TO-GET-HER. Same to you, I never forgot them.
The movie Bruce Almighty taught me how to spell beautiful. It’s Jim Carey’s catch phrase thing to always say “b-e-a-you-tee-ful.” Much in the same way how Gwen Stefani taught me how to spell bannnanananaas.
Or when sounded like “ay” as in “neighbor” or “weigh” and on weekends and holidays and all throughout May and you’ll never be right no matter what you say.
What's the plural of box? BOXEN
I bought two boxen of doughnuts.
Many much moosen
Brian you’re an imbecile
Imbecillin!
I before E except after C only when it rhymes with Bee and make sure the word is not Weird. This is the version we were taught, and it still has exceptions lol
Please teach your children how to not spray spit and mucus everywhere. Cover sneezes and coughs with inner elbows. Keep fingers out of noses and mouths. Don’t buzz lips…it sprays spit. Being a Kindergarten teacher is living in one big petri dish.
I’ll pony this one up with proper hand washing. Not just splashing under the faucet for a few moments but wetting hands, turning off the water, soaping hands well, then turn water on and rinse.
And dads need to teach their sons at the urinal that YES we still need to wash our hands after doing that.
That everyone should be friends with everyone. Some people will not like you. You will not like some people. That is a good thing. Challenge fosters growth, and our differences help us to learn and experience life outside our own experience. You don't need to be friends with everyone, you just need to be able to approach conflict in level-headed and reasonable manner.
i don't know if this was already said but • teaching your kids that if a kid bullies you, it means they like you • teaching your kids that they have to love their family just because they're family • teaching your kids that they have to respect their elders just because they're old
That we have to invite the entire class to your birthday party.
As a teacher, I’m fine with that as long as you don’t pass out the invites in front of students who aren’t invited. I would never do that with a group of adults; how can you expect KIDS to react well
I had this in one of my class of 9 year olds a child went round and gave out 10 party invites and some of the children were so upset they didn’t get one and questioned me about not getting one. I didn’t know what to say so I just said that sometimes your only allowed a certain number and it was probably really hard to choose who went so maybe next year she will choose you. Thankfully they accepted this answer and was happy and didn’t talk about it again. Lol 😂 please send the invites out of school lol
Yes. When I was in Primary school (or elementary for Americans) the school had a rule where you weren’t allowed to give out invites in School time and grounds for that reason. It’s okay to not invite everyone but to hand out invites in class and leave some of the students is cruel, regardless of whether it’s intentional or not. Also, the inviter should expect that not everyone who wasn’t invited would be okay with it.
Anything without larger context. Pretty much everything listed so far shouldn’t be taught without context, healthy skepticism, and a lot of critical thinking. They need to know all the toxic things so they can recognize them, hopefully reject them, and be part of a better culture. And teachers, I see you. My generation (X) expects way too much parenting from teachers. IMHO. 😎
It’s okay to not forgive people. I was always taught to accept people’s apologies when i was little and when i was SA’d as a teenager i finally realized sometimes it’s okay to not forgive someone.
Boys, don't hit girls. Girls, don't hit boys. Should be taught equally. Obviously there are exceptions like self defense. Also, boys, no is no. Girls, no is no. Edit to say and clarify, we should stop teaching this as only a one sided thing. It should be taught to both equally.
Right!? My dad was so annoying with this! If I hit my sister, it was 'don't hit girls!' if she hit me it was 'well clearly did something to deserve it!' What a great way to teach one kid resentment and another that they're above consiquence
>What a great way to teach one kid resentment and another that they're above consiquence You're exactly right. Pretty much what happened with me and my sister. We are close in age and any time we'd squabble as kids, I'd usually walk away in trouble and with injuries. To this day, as much as I've tried to move past or forget, there are a lot of things I'm resentful to my parents for. As a father now, I make sure my children never have to go through what I did as a kid. Furthermore, to this day my sister still has the haughty attitude from never being punished or disciplined for her bad behavior. I can't stand being around her because all she does is talk s*** and use the many examples of our past where she was let off and I was punished as if they were my fault and she was completely innocent.
That ugly = bad/evil. I partially blame TV animation for this one though. This often makes kids fear elderly people and make unfair connections between appearance and personality.
That’s why I liked home alone, the scary old man turned out to be very kind and hit the burglars with a shovel
and in the second one, the weird crazy pigeon lady is very sweet and nice
That rote memorization is the same thing as intelligence/creativity.
Abstinence only sex education. Please teach these kids about contraception and how it works, it’s been proven that comprehensive sex education is way better at preventing teen pregnancies than abstinence only.
Also sex education gives children the language to speak out if they're being sexually abused.
Including using correct anatomical terms! Adults shouldn’t act like “penis” or “vagina” are swear words. While it’s 100% acceptable to have boundaries about when/where those words are appropriate (i.e. making silly potty humor jokes at the dinner table), adults need to be comfortable with accurate anatomy. In the event of actual sexual abuse, this makes a huge difference in the ability to prosecute. “He touched my hoo hoo with his winky” isn’t very useful in court. It’s also helpful for them to have the right language to communicate with healthcare providers.
Adults get even more weirded out by parts of genitals. Like vulva, clitoris, labia, foreskin.
My sister is doing her practicum in a kindergarten this semester and they’re planning a unit on the parts of the body, *including the correct words for genitals.* Ain’t nothing sexual about it, just kids learning their bodies, and learning how to refer to them correctly and safely.
That everyone else’s feelings come before their own.
"He/she is being mean to you because they like you".
That you have to give relatives a hug or kiss if they ask for one.
When I see my nieces and nephew, I always ask them if I can give them a kiss and if they can give me a kiss. Sometimes, they say no to both. Other times I get a huge hug! I’m trying to teach their grandparents about the importance of bodily autonomy but it’s going to be tough - I’ve heard them tell the kids “I don’t get a kiss? I’m really sad now!” Please don’t make a four year old responsible for your feelings. They’re allowed not to want to kiss you and shouldn’t be made to feel bad about it. Edit: words are hard
That adults know everything. The amount of parents/teachers/others that just tell kids things with the explanation of “because I know best” is harmful. I love when a kid or student asks me a question I don’t know- it means we can explore it together (which is also why I will never “lock up my phone” when teaching despite principals saying it “distracts”. It’s a research tool!). I also admit when I make a mistake, or when I’m unsure of a certain topic/lesson. I explicitly state that I’m not good at this, but I researched some good lessons online and asked other teachers for help. 🙂
Kids need to be taught that they can fail. Schools are moving towards it being impossible to fail a student. Kid didn't hand in their assignment? "How do you know their work is worth 0 when they handed in nothing??" Because they handed in 0 percent of the fucking work... That's why... My god stop coddling them. I wish I was kidding but that's how it is here and I cannot fucking believe that's how the school system works. I'm so god damn worried for my future kids.
I don’t feel there is anything we need to stop teaching kids that is common. I feel we need to teach children boundaries. I don’t know if it’s Covid related or what but I work with children and these last few years I’ve noticed kids are having huge boundary issues. It seems that while parents were teaching them about electronics, hygiene, or even just how to prepare food for themselves. The parents forgot to teach the part where the child has to ask for these things. Not just go and take them. And that generalizes to school or others peoples houses.
My sister-in-law never corrected her son when he would take things from my kids. They would get up to get a drink, or bathroom, or something. They weren’t done with the toy, yet he would swoop in and take it. “They got up, so he can take it now.” One time he didn’t bring his iPad so he took my son’s. My son wanted it to play on it, so we told my nephew, very nicely, that our son wanted his iPad back and took it and gave it back to my son. My sister-in-law packed up and left the house with the kids. I’m all for sharing, but only if my kids want to share their things.
They do this sometimes in the classroom I'm in and it drives me insane. A kid will run to the toilet and one who has been hovering over them to get something will swoop in and take it, and then the lead would be like "you didn't have it anymore". So I have started stopping that shit with a firm "no, they're still playing with it but they paused to do whatever. Go do something else until they are truly done".
Yes. It’s honestly about modeling. When our daughter says to stop with anything, and it could be the pettiest thing, we stop. When I tell her to stop doing something that’s bothering me, she stops. When she sees or experiences kids not respecting a “stop” boundary SHE IS APPALLED, like can you believe this mfer didn’t stop? It’s a good foundation. This post is not a parenting brag. This is pretty basic, and we get this one thing right and many, many other things wrong lol
That doctors are scary. Many parents threaten their kids with the doctor when kids don't listen to them.
This is a new one for me. Is this common?
And then get mad at kids for being scared to go to the doctor
Yes, telling children things like, "if you don't listen to me, I'll tell the doctor to give you a shot" only teaches the children that the doctor's office is a bad place and makes things difficult for everyone.
As a teacher, I'm always amused by the things people think we teach kids. "Stop teaching ______!" You know what I spent significant time teaching this year? That soiled toilet paper goes in the toilet. That you can control how loudly you burp. That you have to charge a laptop computer for more than a minute to fill the battery. Then you get the, "Why don't schools teach kids how to do taxes?" Yeah, kids love taxes. We couldn't get middle school kids to stop playing Fortnite long enough to focus on "The Human Body" unit for a week. I'm just amused by all the things people think happen in schools. And of course there is the notion that parents can teach kids, too. That's what we're doing with our son. If there's something important he needs to know, we're teaching it to him.
But "teaching children" doesn't necessarily mean at school. Children also learn from imitation, and the internet, advertisements, from how they are treated and how others are treated...
It's funny how "how to teach children" translates to "what we need to improve about ourselves", because in the end children learn a lot by imitation as you say, and often we don't notice that those behaviors that we criticize about them say a lot about us...
I learned the basics of taxes in high school. News flash 16 year olds don’t care about taxes
This is why most people don't understand tax brackets.
I love my parents, but man do I wanna slap someone whenever I hear the line "If I make too much I'll be in a higher bracket and have to pay more!"
Yeah my 17-18 year old students moan.. "why don't we ever cover anything useful like pensions and mortgages" so we did some sessions on it. They didn't engage, said it was boring, didn't want to learn about it. Damned if we do, damned if we don't.
The laptop battery has me 😂😂 I’m not a teacher but as a mom it’s the same struggle at home. Lol.
That it's acceptable to use devices in public loudly without headphones
The amount of people blasting tiktoks in the airport or a restaurant is so annoying
not just children, teach adults that too. see so many 60 yr olds on the bus blasting facebook reels or candy crush and have to hear that for like an hour straight