SCIENCE-BASED PARENTING

The last few days have been much better, in terms of getting the Highlander out of bed and out the door. I had a long talk with one of his teachers. She pointed out that because he was doing so well with his behavior in school, he probably was pretty much out of coping skills by the end of the day. It’s a new school, new teachers, new language… and he’s not only the new kid, he’s one of the youngest kids. That’s a lot of work.

So I’ve been cutting him a little more slack, and it seems to be helping. I hate the feeling that I’ve let him win in some weird, undefined power struggle sort of way, but I’m holding on to the idea that what I want is to get him to school on time without feeling like I’ve gone three rounds with Wanderlei Silva. I’m the leader, he has a job, if he does the job, I’m leading.

I hope.

So these past few mornings I’ve just turned his light on, put a glass of milk down, gone into the next room and turned on the TV. In between “Maya and Miguel” he gets dressed, right after “Martha Speaks” we’re out the door. We say maybe 10 words to each other. And this suits our style just fine.

As I often do when contemplating a parental success, I wonder to myself, “How would a lesbian couple have handled that?”

You know, because I’m the dad, and according to common wisdom and the leaders of both national parties, a kid without a dad is a kid without a hope of getting into college or staying out of jail or learning to throw a decent curveball.

Not so much. To the surprise of pretty much no one who would pay attention to the results anyway, the most important things for a kid are stability, comfort, routine… regardless of whether Heather has two mommies or not, it’s quality of parenting that matters.

The study cited is a metastudy, which is always tricky, but a comprehensive one. And the authors were unable to find any evidence that parental gender is a serious factor in the well-being of children.

I’ve been accused in the past of being close minded or even bigoted because I don’t think that there is any reason beyond bigotry to be in favor of male-female legal marriage and against same-sex legal marriage. But to me, this is an example where we allow expressions of bigotry at the highest level without batting an eyelash.

I’ll be curious to see if every presidential candidate in 2012 still thinks that children are better off with a mother and a father.

You all remember that anti-drug campaign on TV in the 80’s and 90’s where the dad finds his kid’s stash, asks him where he learned about that stuff, and the kid shouts back “I learned it by watching you!”  The dad goes pale, and calm voiceover guy reminds us that “Parents who use drugs have children who use drugs.”  Good times.

Well, this post isn’t about drugs, but it’s the first thing I thought of when I read Laurie T.’s post over at Rational Moms titled New study suggests girls learn math anxiety from their teachers.

She says, in part:

Young girls [of female teachers with math anxiety] develop math anxiety, then grow up to be elementary education majors, then pass on that same math anxiety to other young girls, who then avoid studying science and engineering. This is a vicious cycle!

They learn it from their teachers just as much as they learn it from their parents.

A solid education is a key to an inquiring, skeptical mind – having half of our young population already behind the 8-ball when it comes to basic math skills should not be acceptable. I encourage you to head over to Rational Moms to read Laurie’s article.

..Rob T.

So last night I was reading “Dumbo” to the Highlander, and I paused for a teaching moment. If you don’t know the story, there’s a part where the Ringmaster has Dumbo (a baby elephant with giant ears) attempt to jump on top of a pyramid of Elephants standing on a circus ball.

Chaos ensues. Elephants are hurt. The ringmaster is embarrassed. Dumbo is humiliated and ostracized.

“Highlander,” I asked, “Was it fair to ask Dumbo to do that? Should the Elephants be mad at him?”

He wasn’t sure. We talked, briefly, about leadership, about setting people up to fail or succeed. I’m pretty sure he didn’t get it… it took him a very long time to understand that “Where the Wild Things Are” is about how parents and kids can make up after they fight, and still love each other. We’ll talk about it again, and at some point he’ll get it.

But what I’m wondering this morning is when I’ll get it. Because parenting and leadership have a lot in common. Especially emotional literacy.

Which, frankly, I don’t have a lot of in the morning. I tend to be short tempered and angry, and the Highlander is exactly the same way. We have to get out of the house and neither of us want to be up. He won’t put on his shoes. He wants to watch TV. He wants to play. He won’t put on his shirt. One second he’s happy and cooperative, the next second he’s focused on something else, sullen and stubborn.

It’s morning, and he’s three years old. He’ll make himself cry until he throws up, and I have no tools at all to handle that situation.

But I’m the leader here, the parent. The guy with the answers. If I take my assumptions about power structures out of this and approach this critically, there’s a simple problem here: we need to be out the door at 7:30 in the morning. This is a task and if we both accomplish it, we’ll both be happier.

I’m wondering how I’m like the Ringmaster here, demanding that my big eared little elephant perform on command without laying the foundations for performance or taking his abilities into account. And I’m wondering how I can set us both up to succeed.

The general consensus in the literature is that the key to the morning is the previous evening, that the best way to have a good morning is to get everything together the evening before. So it seems like the smart thing to do is to institute a whole new night time regimen, getting everything ready, clothes, backpacks, everything.

If you’re like me, you’ve made dramatic sweeping changes before, and they didn’t stick. Expecting yourself to be a whole other person overnight… I’m skeptical about that. It sounds like I’m being the Ringmaster and Dumbo.

The Greater Good institute, a center devoted to the science of human happiness, recommends approaching big changes in micro-steps, accumulating success over time.

What micro-steps would you make to set your morning up?