Lavinia Plonka Encourages Parents To Relax With Their Children

Did you know that even the placement of a baby's crib can affect a child's development? Whatever the crib's relationship to a sunny window, the baby instantly orients his gaze towards the light, perhaps making one eye dominant or creating a skeletal bias towards turning in that direction. Does this mean you need to dash into the nursery right now and place the crib in a symmetrical relationship with the window? Does not-knowing this fact make you a bad parent? How can a parent truly know what is best for a child?

Relax. Odds are that no matter what you do, your child will not turn out as anticipated. No matter what books you tead, what courses you take, much of the advice will more than likely be refuted or reversed 20 years from now. Just take the example of the medical industry's swift response to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Some studies revealed that SIDS victims were found on their stomach. Suddenly, a whole generation of children was kept from rolling over. A few years later, researchers noticed that these children were taking longer to crawl. Obviously it takes a while to learn to crawl if you spend all your time on your back. The solution? The industry, because let's face it, babies are an industry, has created a new responsibility for mothers -Tummy Time. Supervised time spent with the baby on its belly. Of course, making the baby roll on her belly according to Mom's busy schedule creates stress for the child. She becomes unhappy and uncooperative. The solution? Tummy Time classes and Tummy Time toys. Not to mention competitive mothers who worry that little Kathy is not on her feet yet, while Jeffrey next door is already walking.

As I researched this article, the litany of factors contributing to parenting problems became overwhelming. Economic pressure, over-medication, television, diet, education, the erosion of the extended family and advertising only scratch the surface. Should I send my child for music lessons? Is it safe for them to play unsupervised? What if he refuses to eat vegetables? How much television is too much? Why is she sulking? Is he learning disabled? Are these vaccines necessary? I'm so tired!
For many years, Western society has engaged in the form of child development called 'socialisation'. This process was what good parents were supposed to do in order to make their children proper members of society. This process of socialisation combined with the above factors has resulted in a generation of children unlike any other. Auto-immune disorders, learning disabilities, diminished perceptual abilities, attention deficit disorder and simple rage run rampant among today's children. What is a parent's responsibility? How can one possibly weave through the confounding barrage of conflicting information out there and just facilitate a happy childhood? Most parents are well intentioned and follow the advice of doctors, specialists, well meaning friends and, of course, the media. But perhaps in the process some common sense has been sacrificed on the altar of 'specialists'. Along with that, a sense of responsibility also disappeared. Not in the sense of a parent feeling responsible for his child, but in the sense of 'response-ability'. The ability to respond and not react, may be the key ingredient in filtering through the morass of input a parent processes each day.

Here is some food for thought for 21st-century parents.

A child starts learning an hour after birth, and bonds with the face that it sees most often. Those funny grimaces are 'Baby trying to figure out how to look like Mom'. That means that if Mom is not around in those precious first few months, Baby becomes very confused. Of course, cutting edge psychologists are actually telling parents to schedule 'face time' with their infants: just put your face appointment in your Palm Pilot and Baby will be fine. But perhaps face time means something more. Instead of sitting the child in front of the electronic baby sitter, the child will learn more of quality from watching you. After all, a study by George Gerbner, Ph.D. of the University of Pennsylvania, has shown that children's TV shows contain at least 20 violent acts each hour and also that children who watch a lot of television are more likely to think that the world is a mean and dangerous place.

One of the things that happens during development is something called myelin growth. Myelin is a protein sheath that coats the nerves and helps conduct the messages in the sensory/motor system. Children have bursts of myelin growth from birth to adolescence. They learn from interacting with their environment and with others. When they watch TV, what are they interacting with? Even if it is not a violent show, the child is in a passive situation. They can talk to the TV, but it won't talk back. It's a one-way experience. Then a child tries to relate to people in life, but the myelin sheath has been programmed for a non-interactive life. There's a bumper sticker I often see around here. It says: Kill Your Television. This is a violent reaction to the violence done by the media but perhaps knowing how TV affects the mind can inspire you to other solutions.

Relax

Children actually respond to the outer environment while still in the womb. The frontal lobes control our higher thinking functions, making us intelligent, sensitive individuals. However, they only develop when the organism perceives that it is coming into a safe world. If it perceives a state of anxiety in the mother, a stressful environment, then Mother Nature in her infinite wisdom assumes the baby is going to be born in a dangerous era. Frontal brain growth is sacrificed and the brain stem known as the reptile brain gets all the nerve cells. This creates a baby that is really good at survival, but lives in fear of danger. The frontal lobes continue to grow for a portion of childhood, so if the household is safe, nurturing and relaxing, the child will grow up with literally 'more brains'. Joseph Chilton Pearce, the world renowned educator and author of many books on child development said: "In very young children, the primary caregiver's emotional state determines the child's state, and therefore the child's development in general...The emotional state we are in when learning takes place becomes an integral part of that learning."

The process of socialisation spoken of earlier is a big contributor to parental anxiety. By the time a child is crawling, the word "No!" is being uttered about every nine minutes. Suddenly the child has gone from unconditional love to "No! Don't touch that! Don't do that! Watch out! Danger! Danger!" Very good for the reptile brain. Not good for an intelligent future. Find ways to make your house safe. Don't rush proper social behaviour. Children forced into early toilet training, weaned too forcefully or forbidden constantly develop much more compulsive behaviour than children in more relaxed societies.

Listen

The last few generations have believed that children should be seen and not heard. And today's children are rarely, truly heard. They're analysed, vaccinated, labelled - like products. They've been scheduled with activities so that there is never time to just listen. I was once teaching a children's theatre class and a ten-year-old boy needed some extra help with his scene. I offered to come an hour early the next week. He whipped out his Palm Pilot to see if he could fit it in between his accelerated math tutoring, soccer practice and violin lesson. When you listen, don't just listen to the child's words. Listen to her actions, to her behaviour. And most of all, listen to yourself. Not just in the moment of crisis, because by then you can no longer be 'response-able' and you can only react with your reptile brain. Take time to listen to yourself in a quiet moment. Whatever your spiritual practice, a few minutes of listening to silence can make you more supple, more interested in what is really taking place, not the stories that are whirling in your and in your child's mind.

Set An Example

Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Waldorf Education once said," 95% of a child's learning or 'structures of knowledge' form automatically in direct response to interactions with the environment, while only about 5 °/o form as a result of our verbal teaching or intellectual instruction." In other words, actions speak louder than words. "Do as I say and not as I do," is the biggest mistake a parent can make, because your child is learning from your every move.

If you can allow yourself the time to do the above, you will be in a perfect position to ferret out what is useful in the constant information barrage directed at parents today. And at the same time, you may discover a new kind of relationship with your child.

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Lavinia Plonka's latest book, 'What are you afraid of?' Has been published by Tarcher Putnam, 2004. http://www.laviniaplonka.com/