Missing him

I apologize for the sound of crickets around this blog lately. In addition to not having much time, I have to admit I’ve also been a bit mopey in recent days. Never an attractive feature in a blogger!

My husband left for Vancouver nearly two weeks ago, and I still have two weeks to go before the boy and I get to join him. It has gone quickly, I suppose, considering we’re already at the midway point, but boy do I miss that man! Just the little things, mostly – snuggling with him on the couch, cooking meals together, playing with his hair, cuddling with him at night, talking with him about the unimportant details of my day, hearing about his day, simply being there to support and encourage each other in both the big and the small things. We email and talk on the phone, yes, but it’s not the same.

Friday was to be my last day of work, but I agreed to stay for two weeks longer because it is a busy time there right now. I took Friday off and Monday is a holiday, so the official countdown is seven more days of work! Training frustrations are admittedly making this countdown even more prominent in my mind. I try to remind myself that pregnancy hormones never do anything good for my tolerance and patience levels.

The boy and I officially moved out of our temporary home yesterday. We had a wonderful summer in the house (hard, smelly water aside) and will miss it, especially the land around it. We harvested the remainder of our carrots, a large bunch of peas, and some zucchini. I’ll be going back soon to grab the numerous tomatoes and cucumbers after giving them a bit longer to ripen/grow (the house is currently sitting empty as the owners try to sell it).

So, for the next two weeks, we’re crashing at my parents’ house. It’ll be nice to spend some time with my parents and four sisters, but naturally it is not without its own frustrations. Those frustrations seem much smaller and more tolerable, though, once I remind myself of how far we will be moving away and how long it will be until we get to visit again.

It is a conflicting time, emotionally. Happy to have more time to spend with family. Looking forward to being with my husband and having my son’s quiet routine back. Sad that my husband isn’t here right now, but sad too at the prospect of having to say goodbye to my family again. Both nervous and excited at the idea of living in Vancouver. Oh yes, and let’s not forget those pregnancy hormones.

Ah, the emo-ness. Forgive this post. I did want, though, to explain why it’s been so quiet here – lack of opportunity, lack of time, and lack of enthusiasm. I do have a couple posts mulling around that I’m looking forward to sharing with you. I have another list of neat Etsy finds, some pregnancy musings, and a more practical post on discipline in response to all those who have said “I agree…but how??” – not to mention more than a few comments to respond to! Please, bear with me in the meantime, as I try to make the most of what little time I have left with family here…while also counting down the days until I can snuggle myself against that wonderful man again.

Behaviour Modification: Praise

While my previous entry focused on the punishment aspect of behaviour modification, I also wanted to talk about the other side: praise and rewards.

Praise and rewards are often considered a more “gentle” approach to parenting, but a closer look reveals that it is merely a “tame” version of punishments, just the flip side of the same issue – and the results are the same.

At its most manipulative, parents who use this parenting method seek to control the behaviour of the child by withholding attention until the child does something “good”, and then heaping on praise, giving them rewards, or showing lots of “positive attention” as incentive for the child to continue or repeat the behaviour in the future.

At its most innocent, parents have no other “motive” than simply wanting their child to feel loved, appreciated, and valued. Many were not praised as children and do not want the same for their children. But indiscriminate praise is not without its own dangers.

Instills Wrong Motives

Just as with punishment, the praise and rewards aspect of behaviour modification neglects to develop internal motivation within a child. Instead, the child obeys merely to gain praise or receive a reward. The child is taught to do the “right thing”, but for the wrong motives. True compassion, a sense of justice, good decision making, and sincere motives are not formed when praise is used to promote good behaviour.

Internal motivation, rather than external, will prompt a child to make a decision for the sake of the outcome itself. A child should be taught that chores are done in order to contribute to the functioning of a healthy household, not in order to earn an allowance. Good choices should be made because they are the right thing to do, not because they will be rewarded with a new toy. Grades earn a sense of pride in one’s work, not money or praise.

Instead, we have an entire generation of people who need external acknowledgement and appreciation for every little thing they do. There is no sense of self-pride in one’s work, no desire to do something if nothing is to be gained, no intrinsic joy in learning, and no value to an activity outside of what will be obtained from it.

Eventually, a child brought up with praise and rewards will find no incentive to make good choices when the parent isn’t there to notice and to praise them or when no reward will be gained from doing so. Not only will a child do things for the wrong motives, but they will come to do the “right” thing only where rewards or praise stand to be gained. Over time, they will need more praise or bigger rewards to achieve the same results. As they attain greater independence (for example, getting a job that enables them to buy their own “rewards”), they may decide it is no longer “worth it” – there is no need to do chores when they have their own source of income, no need to earn good grades when they don’t need the monetary reward, no incentive to behave a certain way to obtain an item they can now purchase for themselves, and so on.

Fosters Praise-Dependency

The overuse of praise soon fosters praise-dependency. As mentioned above, the child will come to do things only for the praise, rather than just for the sake of doing them. Above that, however, they are apt to become people-pleasers. This may seem fine to the parent at the time, until they discover that the parent will not always remain the sole source of the child’s praise-dependency. Seeking to please others is far less desirable when the people your child is seeking to please become his peers instead of you. The child will not have developed appropriate independence, autonomy, and critical thinking, rendering him far more susceptible to peer-pressure in his desire to gain praise and acceptance.

In his book “Punished by Rewards”, Alfie Kohn phrases it this way:

Praise, at least as commonly practiced, is a way of using and perpetuating children’s dependence on us. It sustains a dependence on our evaluations, our decisions about what is good and bad, rather than helping them begin to form their own judgments. It leads them to measure their worth in terms of what will lead us to smile and offer the positive words they crave.

Even dependency on adult approval comes with consequences. As Kohn cites in his book, studies find that students whose teachers praise them heavily demonstrate less task persistence (diminished intrinsic motivation) and become tentative in their responses, answering in a questioning tone of voice. They are less likely to take initiative when it comes to sharing their ideas with other students, and have a tendency to back off from an idea they had put forward as soon as an adult disagrees with them.

Prevents Natural Learning

Praise disrupts the natural learning process by circumventing the natural rewards that follow a child’s choices. The child’s attention is directed away from these real rewards of their efforts and focused instead on an artificial reward (including praise) bestowed by someone else. Praising a child for sharing, for example, undermines the natural rewards of the action (such as making another child happy) and directs the focus to the parent’s approval of the child’s actions. In doing so, the natural learning experience is disrupted.

Indiscriminate praise comes with particular drawbacks. “Too much praise” renders all praise worthless. Our current strategy in schools, for example, of praising all children equally (in order not to hurt anyone’s feelings, of course) prevents them from coming to recognize their own personal strengths – and, concurrently, denies their personal weaknesses and potential areas of growth.

Reduces risk-taking

Afraid of losing approval or of not doing as well, highly-praised children will become more risk-averse, choosing instead to “play it safe”. A child’s creativity is reduced in the process. At the same time, however, praise encourages competition between siblings or peers, rather than building relationships and developing skills in working together.

Both as a result of forming risk-aversion and instilling wrong motives, praise promotes doing the very minimum required in order to attain the reward. There is no internal motivation to go “above and beyond”, no intrinsic value to learning, no desire to risk failure on a more ambitious undertaking if it means losing an adult’s approval.

Contradicts the Gospel

How repeatedly the Bible tells us that we cannot save ourselves! Our faith is a gift of God, our salvation through Christ alone. Our works can never save us – they are merely reflective of our love for God. Likewise, our child’s “works” do not make him a “good boy or girl”, and their value does not come from what they do. Scripture tells us that it is our hearts that matter more than our outward actions. “Good behaviour” that comes from wrong motives is not true obedience at all.

Constructive Praise

Yet despite all of these drawbacks (and more), most parents balk at the idea of never praising their children – myself included. Sincere praise is, indeed, vital to our relationships with our children, and can be constructive when given the right focus.

Most importantly, praise should always be sincere. Rather than manipulating the child, sincere praise allows us to share in our children’s joy, support their endeavours, and provide specific feedback on their actions. When you are excited, let it show. Express your sincere happiness and enthusiasm over their growth. Be honest about your feelings.

Use thanks instead of praise. A simple thank-you is all the acknowledgement that obedience needs. When a child does something “big” to help out, be sincere in your appreciation (“thank you, that really helped me out and I appreciate it”). There is no need to praise a child for doing what you asked him to do in the first place – just thank him.

Be specific with your praise. Make observations and use descriptive rather than value-based language. Point out the natural rewards of a child’s action. Don’t go overboard praising every little thing a child does.

Praise effort and intent instead of focusing only on the end results. Acknowledge struggles, mistakes, and the process itself rather than just the outcome.

Reflect back to the child and ask them questions. “What do you like about your drawing? What do you think about your grades? How does that make you feel? What do you think about the results of that choice?”

Be aware of the intent behind your praise. Don’t use praise in order to shape a child’s behaviour. Be aware, also, of the effects of your praise so that you can recognized when your child is becoming praise-dependent – doing things in order to gain your praise rather than just for the sake of doing them. Observing this behaviour allows a parent to recognize that they need to reconsider their current method of praising. Perhaps the praise needs to be scaled back, perhaps the parent needs to reflect back to the child more, or perhaps some of the praise can be replaced with more specific observations.

Finally, praise who they are, for they have value simply by virtue of being. Their value does not come from their behaviour, their achievements, their appearance, or anything else. Though we may always be aware that our love is not conditional, our child needs to see, too, that our approval of him is not based on anything other than who he is.

I’d like to end with a comment left by Summer at Wired for Noise on my last post about punishment. These two short sentences sum up both entries perfectly:

“I want my children to act in certain ways because of internal motivation, because they understand these are the good things to do, because it makes them happy. Not because they are afraid of punishment or expecting a reward of some kind.”

May it be so with our own children.

Hello world!

I’m excited to be here at the new Mommypress.com Blogs. I’ve imported my blogspot posts, so feel free to browse around!

On moving with a toddler

Ah, moving with a toddler. Now there was an interesting experience.

The drive was about 35 hours long. I did it in three days when I moved to Ottawa originally, but I didn’t have a two year old and a couple cats in the backseat, so we gave ourselves four days and said we’d stop when we needed to each night.

Surprisingly, though, we didn’t need the four days. The little guy did amazing on the trip. We made it 10 hours on the first day. He fell asleep just before we were about to stop for the night on the second day, so we kept going, making it 15 hours that day. Another 10 hour push and we were home. He was pretty fed up by the last three hours of the trip, but unfortunately for all of us there was literally nowhere to stop! Ah, northern living. Fun stuff.

Honestly, I think the toddler did better than the cats. They were unhappy felines the entire trip. They refused to get out of the car to use the litter box or have food and water every time we stopped, so they went each long day with full bladders and empty stomachs. Lucky for them, they decided the hotel washrooms were an acceptable place to relieve and refuel themselves each night.

Just after leaving Ottawa, there were a few brief moments of “oh my, how are we going to survive this trip” when first one cat started meowing, and then the other – and then the toddler joined in. We both groaned at that point, with visions of 35 hours worth of three meowing voices. Fortunately, he lost interest in imitating the cats within a bearable span of time. The cats themselves kept it up for much longer (and received many a grumbled threat from my husband about leaving them on the side of the road to fend for themselves in the wild), but we’re here, so we must have survived.

We had talked often with the little guy about our upcoming move in the month prior to it. We talked about saying goodbye to this house, driving to a new house, and seeing Grandma and Grandpa and all his aunties. He seemed to understand and he handled all of the changes with amazing calmness. The hardest part has been his repeated requests for two of his friends, Luke and “Liah” (Eliah). How do you tell a little boy that he’ll never see his friends again, or at least not for a few years? So far he hasn’t found any little friends to play with here, either, other than his four aunties (the youngest being only eight years old) – and even if he did, he’d only have to say goodbye to them again when we move to Vancouver in the fall. That is always the hardest part about moving, though – having to say goodbye to so many of the people you care about.

The brightest spot, on the other hand, was coming home to family. It has been such a blessing to see the little guy really getting to know his grandparents and aunties. I grin every single time I hear his excited squeal of “GAMPA!!!” when he sees us turn in his grandpa’s driveway. It just melts my heart. I’ve been enjoying spending time with the oldest of my little sisters (she’s 23 now), and, of course, with the rest of my family. It will be hard to say goodbye in the fall. While we don’t have family in Vancouver itself, my in-laws are all in the area and, I’m sure, itching to visit whenever they can. I know Jacob will miss “Gampa” and all the rest horribly, but he loves his Opa and Oma and two aunties too. Hopefully we will be able to see them often.

And then, come Christmas, he’ll have a new little brother or sister to get to know. How blessed we are.

We are so happy with our new home here. It’s hard to believe we were paying slightly more rent for our little condo back in Ottawa as we are for this three bedroom, two level house now. It sits on four acres of land and is just outside of town, about a 10 minute drive to my workplace. Country living has been wonderful. With both of us being introverts, the extra privacy and quietness is great, and our huge yard has gotten lots of use already. There are little shoes filled with sand from the sandbox, sweatshirts that smell of woodsmoke from the firepit, a freshly dug garden, and lots of land and forest to explore. We will miss it when it’s time to leave.

We won’t miss, though, the hard smelly water and the painfully s l o w Internet connection. You can’t have it all, I suppose.

But how blessed we are to have so much.

When everything changes

Bad blogger. Bad, bad, neglectful blogger. Shame on me.

Ah, but where to start. I’ll have to stick to the short version, because the long version would simply be too, well, long.

First, we’ve moved halfway across the country. We’re back in northern Manitoba, the same tiny little town my husband and I met and grew up in. Quite the experience, being back here again – but that would be the long version. Suffice it to say that the boy is loving having his “gampa”, “gamma”, and four aunties around to give him lots of attention, and we’re loving the big beautiful house we’re renting for the same price as our little condo back in the city. Oh, and we’ve dug up and are ready to plant our very first vegetable garden.

Second, and the reason for the move, I’ve returned (temporarily) to work full time while my husband becomes a full-time SAHD. I say temporary because we’ll be moving again in the fall, the rest of the way across the country, to BC where my husband will be returning to school (electrical engineering) and I will again become a work-at-home mom. As my husband was unable to find work after the company he worked for shut down last June, I applied for and accepted an opportunity with a post-secondary educational institute here in Manitoba. While I could have returned to my former job full time in the city, it would have meant long days without seeing my son. Moving us here meant, in addition to having my family around, that I could come home every noon hour and spend some time giggling away with the little guy. It’s not an optimal situation, but it seems to be working well so far – again, though, I’ll try to stick to the short version.

Third (and arguably most exciting), we’re expecting again! What a long year it was, waiting for this wonderful blessing. The baby is due mid-December, and we are planning a midwife-attended homebirth. We are so excited. I haven’t been feeling too bad so far – bouts of mild nausea here and there, a definite lack of energy, not much interest in food – but nothing at all like my first pregnancy where I was horribly sick 24/7 for the entire first three months. I’ll take the occasional mild morning sickness over that any day. We’ve been talking to the little guy about the baby, but I have no idea how much he really understands. Right now he’ll say there’s a baby growing in mommy’s tummy and that he’s going to share his milk with the baby. He’s currently nursing 1-3 times a day – I don’t plan to actively wean him at this point, but I won’t be at all disappointed if he gives it up on his own! Fortunately I’ve had very minimal pain while nursing and no apparent change in my supply so far.

Well, that’s the short version. I’ve got more to say – so much more – but I’ll save it for later. Everything always seems to happen at once, doesn’t it? I think I’m ready to settle back into the blogging world, though, now that we’re settled in here. Settled in and waiting expectantly for a gloriously warm and exciting summer. Come soon, sun.

Ah, Spring

How I love thee.

It’s the time of year where some people are out in shorts and sandals while others are still huddled inside parkas and winter boots. Me, I’m somewhere in the middle – still sticking to longer skirts, but I couldn’t resist slipping out the sandals in place of the winter boots today. Ah, happy feet. I detest socks.

When my husband makes fun of me, I just remind him that Jesus wore sandals. Hence, I am more godly than he. *pats self on back*

I love the smell of spring – that warm and wonderful fresh spring smell. (Or is it the smell of melting dog poo and rotten leaves? Either way, I love it.)

I can feel my spirits rising already. The warm sun, the growing patches of grass, the warm breeze, the longer days, the warmer temperatures, the lack of biting cold, the warmth, the lack of snow, oh yes, and the warmth. Mostly the warmth. And the long walks where you come home feeling refreshed instead of wanting to die from the cold.

On the other hand, at least winters here aren’t as bad as they were in northern Manitoba where I grew up. I haven’t forgotten those -50C days that froze your nostrils and eyelids shut and left icicles on the men’s mustaches. Woohoooo, those were the days. Is it any wonder I have such an aversion to winter?

Then again, the snow forts we built were pretty awesome.

Still – spring, glorious spring, is here at last, and I am one happy lady because of it.

Wouldn’t it figure that next week the little guy and I are headed back to northern Manitoba – still firmly in the throes of winter – to visit my family? Ah well, goodbye sandals. I shall see you again when I return.

More illness

This has not been a healthy past few weeks for us! My poor boy is snuggled up on my lap, blessedly sleeping – something he didn’t do much of at all last night.

It seemed like he was just getting a bit of a cold (cough, runny nose), but now he’s got a fever, vomiting, lots of crying when he’s awake and sleeping in between – and his diapers! I’ll spare you the details. He’s pretty much down for the count right now and hasn’t wanted to leave my arms since early last night.

Ah well. It’s as good a day as any to slow down, relax, and snuggle my poor sick baby until he feels better again.

In the meantime, your prayers would be much appreciated. And if you could add one in there for my husband, he has a job interview on Monday. After six and a half months of being unemployed, this is welcome news indeed.

Merry Christmas!

I’m late, I know, but Merry Christmas to you all!

It’s been an insane past week and a half with my family, and the next week and a half with my in-laws will be equally insane. We really have to convince both our families to move closer to us! It has been wonderful to see everyone though. Lots to say as soon as I have more than a couple free minutes in a row!

Best wishes for 2009!

Passing the buck

My husband and I both have a bit of an, er, “weakness” as far as books go. Passing by a bookstore without going inside is quite the trial.

But now we can totally pass the buck when it comes to this.

There’s a shopping plaza near our home with a very large bookstore. Our son already knows what’s inside. We can’t even walk by it without him exclaiming books! books! and trying to pull us towards the door. This kid loves books.

And we love that he loves books.

But even more than that, we love that we can now blame our vices on our kid.

Rock on, child.

Sentimental much?

And here is where you get to see me way overthinking things.

I have this plush bear. I got him for my birthday from a friend when I was, I don’t know, about 13, give or take a couple years. I wouldn’t even say “friend”, really – more like we had a mutual friend. And even this mutual friend was only my friend by virtue of our parents being co-workers. So to put it another way, I got this bear from my mom’s co-worker’s daughter’s friend.

He’s kind of a cute bear, one of those posed antique-looking bears with a knit sweater and a solemn face. He looked quite nice sitting on a shelf in my room, where he eventually became part of the decor. Somehow, when I moved across the country a couple years ago, this bear made his way into my over-stuffed car and came with me, even though I must have left another fifty or so plush animals in my parents’ basement. And somehow, when I set up my son’s nursery before he was born, this bear made his way onto the bookshelf, even though the rest of the plush animals that had migrated across the country with me ended up stuffed in a toy box.

And somehow, even though he’s never shown much interest in stuffed animals, even though he’s never really “taken” to any other toys (cars fervently excepted), even though he staunchly ignored the plush bought specifically for him…my son has developed an attachment to this bear.

And it’s bothering me.

I mean, this bear has no meaning! I got it from “my mom’s co-worker’s daughter’s friend”. It was only sitting out because it looks quite nice sitting on a shelf. I have all this other plush that has meaning – the bear I got when I was in the hospital for surgery when I was 12, the beautiful cuddly bear his Oma gave him, the big soft floppy frog I bought when I went through my frog stage, Seabert the seal who was the first in my very very very large plush seal collection, the soft giraffe that was given to my son when he was born, and on and on and on. Of all his options, he somehow ended up latching on to this posed bear that was supposed to simply look nice sitting on a shelf, that isn’t soft or cuddly, that has no sentimental meaning to it…and it’s bothering me!

My logical brain knows I’m being silly. Who cares if this bear has no sentimental “meaning” behind it – my son likes it, just leave it be!

And yet I keep thinking of my own childhood bear. This was one well loved bear. My parents bought him for me before I was even born, and he sat on the back of the couch awaiting my arrival. I slept with that bear every night until I got married (and even then it was only because my husband insisted he was not going to share a bed with a stuffed bear, especially not if I was going to cuddle with it instead of him). That bear kept me safe during my years of hating the dark. That bear’s paws dried all my hormonal teenage tears. That bear stoutly kept every secret I told him over the years. That bear has a story and meaning and he didn’t come from my mom’s co-worker’s daughter’s friend!

(And yet, when my son found said childhood bear and started playing with it, it took an embarrassing amount of willpower to keep myself from snatching it out of his hands with yells of “it’s mine, gimme!!” Buuut we’ll just ignore that little regression to childhood, since I did bite my tongue and grit my teeth and let him continue to play with it in the end. Regardless, he didn’t become attached to it anyway, so it’s all quite irrelevant.)

I had planned to buy my son a bear of his own for his second birthday, a soft cuddly bear that he could drag everywhere and call his and have a sweet little story attached to it for when he asked where it came from some years down the road. And now I’m finding myself tempted to run out and buy it for him now for Christmas instead. Perhaps my mom’s co-worker’s daughter’s friend’s gift-bear could be replaced by a special, meaningful, bought-especially-with-him-in-mind bear. Then when he kissed it, I could think “aww, look at him kissing his bear,” instead of thinking “that bear is just supposed to be a pretty decoration, stop kissing it!“

I know, I know – issues much? Apparently I am far too sentimental for my own good. And now that I’ve got it out, perhaps I’ll be able to let it go and make peace with that fact that my son has become attached to a meaningless gift from my mom’s co-worker’s daughter’s friend. Perhaps.