Backstory for the new kids: ( Multiplicity. )

Second portion of backstory for the new kids: From 2001 to 2005, I lived with a college friend and her small son (known as the Little Fayoumis). For many of those years, I shared child-rearing responsibilities, having approximately the authority of an aunt. A strict aunt. This was his ages four to eight.


Inevitably, the LF started making reference to an imaginary friend. That was all well and good, until he started misbehaving and blaming it on his imaginary friend.

I was about to take him to task for just that, doing stuff and blaming it on his imaginary friend, when I ran smack into a contradiction in my chain of logic. How could I be internally consistent if I had multiple personalities myself while scolding the LF for doing something himself and blaming it on his imaginary friend when he might either merely have an imaginary friend or he might have an additional self-facet or other form of multiple inside his head? I had no way of knowing for sure without having way too deep and possibly leading of a conversation with him, and in any case I was presenting myself to him with once face only (no matter which facet was operating at the time). I was fairly convinced that he just had an imaginary friend who was the product of a lively imagination, but I couldn't be an ethical multiple myself without considering the possibility.

I had to sit down with myself and think about it for a while before I came up with a solution that I found acceptable. In the end, I couldn't fault him for having and talking about an imaginary friend, whether it was solely an imaginary friend or something more integral to his own identity. That was not the problem. The problem was that no matter whose idea it was, he was physically carrying out actions that he had been instructed not to do.

So that's what I addressed. I can't remember the details of how I did it, but I made it pretty clear that when anyone told the LF to not do something, or that he must do something, that any and all of his invisible friends were included in that directive. Furthermore, as the party in charge of body operation, the LF was responsible for making sure that nothing was done that was not supposed to be done, by anybody; if he failed to keep his friends in check and they did something that he wasn't supposed to do, they would all be in the time-out together.

Things worked out after that.

http://www.livejournal.com/community/metaquotes/3398103.html -- some House Rules, some pretty good ones. Aimed at smaller fayoumi.

(For the new -- that unfamiliar word refers to a specific breed of chicken, or people living in the part of Egypt where the chicken is from, but in my household it's come to refer to kids or people-of-any-origin-or-location. Chicken picture in icon.)

This was something I did with the Little Fayoumis when the toybox began overflowing to a point where toys were not being put away.

He and I sat down on the floor, and we dumped the entire toybox out on the floor. (Lunatic's parental recommendation? Put a tarp or something under the toybox if it's been a while. There's likely to be all sorts of crudulous junk in the bottom.)

I explained the rules: I knew that he had a lot of toys, and I knew that there were some toys that he never played with anymore, that he didn't like anymore, that were just no fun, and I knew that there was not enough room in the toybox for all of them anymore, and I knew he was having a lot of trouble finding the toys he wanted with all the stuff he didn't play with in there. So, he should sort the toys into three piles: one pile, in the toybox, of the toys he knew for sure he wanted to keep, the "Yes" pile; one pile, over there, for the stuff that he knew he did not want, for throwing out, giving away to someone who needed it more, or something like that, but definitely stuff that was going, the "No" pile; and a third pile, in the middle, the stuff he wasn't sure about, the "Maybe" pile. He could always take stuff from the "Maybe" pile and put it somewhere else later, but maybe he needed a little more time to think about it.

When the Little Fayoumis and his mom had sorted toys into Yes and No a while previous, there'd been a precious few "No" toys, and a lot of loud and intense wrangling. I was happy, but not entirely surprised, to see that the "No" pile was about 15%, the "Yes" pile was about 60%, and the "Maybe" pile took up the remaining 25%, versus the previous sorting of 90% "Yes" and 10% loudly disputed "No".

I had to rescue a few items that I know he played with a lot from the "No" and "Maybe", after it was all over, but it was accomplished without any yelling. He did go off task a fair deal, but a simple "Is that Yes, No, or Maybe?" got him right back to it.

We sorted the "No" pile into trash and charity/re-use, and I packed up the "Maybe" pile quietly out of sight, to go through later. (In practice, the "Maybe" items were generally "No"s in disguise.)

Active toybox volume was reduced by 40%. Mess on the floor was reduced. Dirt in the toybox was eliminated. Kid frustration at inability to find a specific desired toy was reduced by a few decibels. Success!

Little Fayoumis's homework today was because he hadn't been doing it in class; he'd been spacing out instead. He asked if he could have some PS2 time. I said no, because of the homework issue.

There were tears. He was going to go take it up with Marxdarx, but Marx was asleep. He and I sat down and hashed out what, exactly, was not fair about it. He had mistakenly thought that his restriction was related to the fast math, which it wasn't -- it was based on the packet of papers with the orange slip that said "Too much homework :( Wasn't working."

After he understood that, he was resigned to his fate. He'd thought something like that he'd been in trouble for not passing his fast math level and that he'd be restricted from the PS2 until he passed it. Or something.

Kid logic does all kinds of things.

When Little Fayoumis and I hang out, we usually get to discussing theoretical things, like behavior, and what's acceptable and what's not, and science, and all sorts of things.

Today, my lava lamp was the lesson on convection, and we clarified that "worthless" is "totally not working for anything", and a lava lamp that wasn't doing the convection thing right wouldn't be worthless if the light was still working.

Today we discussed "cool" and "awesome". Little Fayoumis said that Mommy's co-worker who was over the other day was his best guy; I asked what about Darkside? Evidently they are all his best guys, because they are cool, and what makes them cool is that they are awesome. Clarifying further, some of the things that actually make people awesome is if they're funny, if they like games, if they have cool hair and cool clothes and like Strongbad. Then he digressed about how Strongbad had played some trick on Homestar. I firmly told him that being mean made someone mean, not cool, even if you thought they were cool, if they're being mean to someone else, it's still mean and not cool.

Then we got into thornier ethical territory: what if someone asks you if they're cool, but you think they're not cool? If you tell them they're not cool, that's mean. If you tell them they are cool, that's a lie. So what you do instead is find something that is cool about them, and talk about that! Like, if they're good at spelling, tell them that. That way, you will be telling the truth and being nice!

I'm often going to be using behaviorist philosophies on kid care.

I think there are two things one wants to do when raising a kid. One wants to have the kid understand what they're supposed to do, and one wants the kid to actually do what they're supposed to do.

With a sufficiently bright kid, explaining what you want them to do and why is going to have them understanding it. You may have to take it to several levels on the "why", and that may lead to you challenging your own parenting assumptions, but if you really want a kid to do something, they've got to want to do it themselves, and understanding that it's something that will benefit them is going to help with them wanting to.

The other half, of course, is getting the kid actually doing it. Understanding it alone will provide impetus for maybe up to five instances of the kid actually doing it, if you're lucky. If you're not lucky, the kid will understand the theoretical portion of it, and still won't want to do it, because there's no immediate benefit for doing it. So you have to make it a habit, or provide motivation in some way.

And that's where the behaviorist stuff comes in. You tell the kid that the ultimate goal is whatever the ultimate goal is, and part of the way to get there is to get this task (whatever it is) done. And part of that is making something or other so it happens every time. I believe in getting consent from the kid for the conditioned change in their behavior.

For quite a while, Little Fayoumis was having trouble responding to hails when he was focusing on something else. Most kids who can attain that level of focus do. I explained to him that we wanted him to respond when we called his name. He already understood the theory. The theory was doing him absolutely jack when he was focused elsewhere. So, we went briefly over the theory once again (reinforcement is often good) and then we practiced.

"When I say your name, you say, 'What?', okay?"
"Okay!"
"Little Fayoumis?"
"Um, what?"
"Yay!"
*massive giggling from Little Fayoumis*

"Little Fayoumis?"
"...what?"
"Yay!"
*glee from LF*

"Little Fayoumis?"
"What?"
"Yay!"

We repeated this for what was probably about five minutes, and we continued testing it throughout the day. He got to accept the "Yay!" as a valid reward. (Giving a kid a large reward on a regular basis, though it may be satisfying for both, isn't a good precedent to set, as they'll expect large rewards as their right thereafter, and unless you're prepared to continue this for a long time if not forever, avoid it.) He now expects cheering (clap hands, "Good job", "Yay!" and the like) when he does well on something, which is a reasonable reward, and can be given as many times as necessary without a problem. (Unless, of course, sore throat or sore hands or something.)

Regular re-evaluation by the kid as to why they're doing something is a good thing. This helps eliminate the rat-on-treadmill problem. "Do you know why you're washing your hands?" "Because it's good?" "What makes it good?" "It does good things?" "What is the good thing that it does?" "...it's good?" "It gets the germs off your hands. Germs make you sick. So, you wash your hands so you won't get sick." "Oh."


I think it's unethical to condition someone who is capable of giving consent without their consent. I think that conditioning a kid to do something without having them consent first isn't going to get the results either of you wants, and is going to open them to manipulation later. If they're used to having their conditioning regularly explained and agreeing that yes, it's a good thing, they are more likely to reject uninformed, unconsented conditioning later.

From a discussion over in ataniell93's neck of the woods, on what an actual honest-to-gods parent thinks of the whole fandom_scruples thing, and what their plans or practices for censoring or monitoring their kid's internet experience is:

Little Fayoumis is not really online much, and he's not fully reading yet. He's on one and two syllable words, at grade level with first grade. As such, lots of innuendo goes ZIP over his head. I was reading all kinds of stuff when I was a kid, and it does very much go over the head. I went back and re-read some of the Star Trek that I'd been reading, and I was shocked, et cetera, that I'd been reading it, because it was so very racy.

We've explained that we need to watch any R-rated movies *first*, to see why they get the R rating, and then we can decide whether it's appropriate for him to watch them or not. We look at scary, gross, and confusing. He gets to watch most of Matrix: Reloaded; we'll have him leave the room for the Trinity/Neo sex, and have him not watch the cheesecake bit.

He gets to watch Strongbad (http://www.homestarrunner.com/) and some South Park. He does *not* get to watch Happy Tree Friends (http://www.happytreefriends.com/); he does get to play Mortal Kombat.

My parents requested that I please not read any Sweet Valley High books, because they were trash. (Every now and then, I would sneak a few home from the school library. I don't think they ever found out.) I plan to find some particularly disgusting but harmless series of books to bitch, whine, moan, and complain about ("Oh, god, you're reading that crap? Bleugh.") so he feels like he's getting one over on me. For anything that I have a serious problem about him reading, I will explain carefully to him why I don't think it's a good idea that he be exposed to it at this point in time, and request that he not get into it, but say that if he is exposed to it, that he may and should ask me about the things about it that scared and/or confused him.

When he does get to reading stuff online, I will teach him to look at the ratings and read the summaries first. We're probably going to let him read PG-13 and below stuff, when he gets to reading. If he sees an R-rated or above fic that he really wants to read, he should ask us to read it first and see if we think that it's OK for him to read it. If we don't think it's OK, and he still wants to read it, I'll probably just go through and snip out the way-too-intense bits and replace them with summaries if possible. "There was a lot of kissing and mushy stuff."

I do appreciate it when authors of really interesting stories make it easy on anyone who wants to skip the sex bits, by saying something like "NC-17 rated chapter; $CHARACTER and $CHARACTER have some private time together. Not important to plot. Click here to read their private scene; click here to skip and continue with story."

Co-parent (male) reports that LF is often self-centered when he should be thinking of others.

Bad way to deal with this: "You don't really want that" and guilt-tripping by making him feel bad about what he wants.

Possible better way to deal with it:

"That's what you want for you. What do you want for Mommy?" Acknowledges his wants, and that he has a right to want for himself, but also reminds him to think about the other person.