| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/24/2009 2:29:35 PM | Children Learn What They Live
By Dorothy Law Nolte, Ph.D.
If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.
If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.
If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive.
If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves.
If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy.
If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy.
If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.
If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.
If children live with tolerance, they learn patience.
If children live with praise, they learn appreciation.
If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.
If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.
If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal.
If children live with sharing, they learn generosity.
If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.
If children live with fairness, they learn justice.
If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect.
If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and in those about them.
If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.
This thread will probably get deleted but this poem has remained in my mind from the first trip to the ob/gyn when I was pregnant with my son. It is full of so much common sense and wanted to share it with the other parents who may never have read it. We don't get "manuals" with our little bundles of joy and yet this is a pretty good instruction book, don't you think?
If you know it, what if anything did you feel the first time you read it? | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/24/2009 2:32:17 PM | | Why would it get deleted? It's on a forum full of parents, after all. Thanks for sharing it. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/24/2009 8:31:44 PM |  Thanks for posting this itsallinthesoul I really enjoyed reading it. I think this is a forum that people can just read and enjoy. I do think this poem is a good instruction book. Every child is so different yet as parents we should all strive to be the best parent we can be and to enrich our childrens' lives. As parents we have to try to always be a positive influence and set a good example despite our own shortcommings. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/25/2009 2:55:29 AM | | This poem is so true. I had some awful experiences as a child ( domestic abuse, violence, abandonment an d finally foster care) and I love seeing positive poems that act as inspiration to me to be the best parent I can be. I'm so lucky and blessed to have my son, and he makes every day brighter for me.I think it's lush that we can all strive to be better. It's also really pleasant to see some constructiveness (is that even a word?!) on here. Thank you. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/25/2009 8:12:46 AM | | Thank you for posting this, it seems like valuable material for my parenting web portal, I will research the author and see if she has some interesting material & books other than this beautiful poem. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/25/2009 8:38:51 AM | | I remember seeing this every time I went to visit my pediatrician and it now hangs in my hallway. And yannow, I should probably stop and read it more often. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/25/2009 9:30:34 AM |
, I should probably stop and read it more often.
So should I  like perhaps when I am wanting to give them back to their creator....hahahaha, you know those moments when you are at your wits end and want to say/do something but don't.....
My 15 year old is upstairs cleaning as we speak so I don't have it so bad....I asked, he said "Sure Mom" without any attitude. My daughter is with her dad and I'm missing her even though she is the one who at times I want to send back to her creator. Absence does indeed make the heart grow fonder.....
disclaimer - wanting to send her back to her creator is a JOKE!!!! | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/25/2009 6:20:39 PM | I didn't feel anything when I read it.
But it makes sense. The amount of a priori knowledge humans have is scant. Most of our behavioral patterns are picked up like everything else we learn: From watching our parents.
Thus the old saw about a boy marries his momma, a girl marries her daddy.
And it goes beyond the few character traits listed here. They learn to talk like you, eat like you, listen to similar music (if updated for the time), etc. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/25/2009 9:54:38 PM | It is a sad that so many parents don't practice these basic ideals. I had a former co-worker tell me I was being a push-over because I used the words "please" and "thank-you" when getting my child to do something. I asked her how she handled it and she said "I TELL them what to do and if they don't then I TELL them I'm going beat their butt, and then when they don't, I beat their butt."
Hmmmm . . those kids are in detention all the time for fighting, bad language, etc. Apples really don't fall far from the tree, do they?! | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/26/2009 1:19:31 AM | Yes, I have gotten this poem in e-mails and it is in a few of the classrooms where my children attend...it is very true to life...while at the same time eye opening!
All of the things listed are so common sense-ish...it is surprising to read and then the "aha" light clicks on in your brain...
It is always good to have a refresher and as posted before...re-read as often as necessary to become a part of the way we live! | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/26/2009 4:23:40 PM | I like this poem. I do. I can remember reading it when I was small at the doctor's office.
But I also feel as if no matter how you might practice these notions in the home, the world despite your friendliness is not a nice place to live. A child who lives in poverty, no matter how kind and loving the parent, will still face ridicule and shame, and will learn bitterness and hostility. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/26/2009 9:51:04 PM |
But I also feel as if no matter how you might practice these notions in the home, the world despite your friendliness is not a nice place to live.
Errr.....?? I am not sure I understand the link between the friendliness of the world and how respectful your home environment is. Are you saying that because the world outside home is abusive, then it is okay to be abusive at home?
A child who lives in poverty, no matter how kind and loving the parent, will still face ridicule and shame, and will learn bitterness and hostility.
Wow. Just wow... what a sad and hopeless way to see life. And thankfully, it is also time after time proven wrong. Children become bitter and hostile when their parents see life as a hostile and bitter place - not because they live in it.
Have you seen the movie "Life is beautiful" ("la vita e bella") about a kid who is raised by his dad in a nazi camp, and how he is shielded by his dad from understand what happen around him. A beautiful and moving film about hope and love. It might move you, perhaps, like it moved me... | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/27/2009 4:51:51 AM | ConsciousSoul:
Don't imply that I wrote a parent should be abusive simply because the rest of the world is. I have never, and would never, treat my children unkindly.
But no, I don't think this world is a 'nice place in which to live', and I don't intend on growing my children up sheltered from that reality. They will run into 'bad' people the rest of their life, and they should be made aware that these people are out there, and terrible things do happen.
Sad and hopeless is the way of the world, not my way. And true to that, it has been proven more times than it has been proven not. Children do not necessarily become bitter and hostile just because their parents are.
I am hardly bitter, but I am a realist and I see the world for what it is. I choose not to walk with my head in the clouds or rose colored glasses pulled over my eyes. Sometimes life forces you to view the world in another perspective.
Your movie might be moving, but I have never claimed in anything I wrote that love and hope can't be found in even the most drastic situations. But the fact of the matter is, those situations exist. And there isn't always a happy ending. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/27/2009 6:14:50 AM | KylieKyote,
I do not contest the need to prepare children for the real world nor the importance of being a realist. But I contest your idea that kids living in poverty always end up bitter or hostiles. Child development is much more heavily related to parenting style and parent attitude than any other factor, including the socio economic level.
I never claim there always is a happy ending. In fact that movie I was talking about has a terrible ending. But the point is, you were the one saying that poverty always end up with a bad ending. And I was opposing that idea. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/27/2009 4:02:48 PM | | I didn't say always end up hostile and bitter, but they do face the world in all of it's ugliness. And the sad fact the effects of this can be devastating to how a child will grow up and see the world. | |
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| Children Learn what they live
Posted: 7/27/2009 4:11:13 PM |
this can be devastating to how a child will grow up and see the world.
Yes it can be but that is where a parent with a positive outlook can make the difference. If you are raised in an affluent family and receive little in the way of effective parenting, would you turn out any better really? Economics is only a factor when the parents feel that breaking the cycle of poverty is an impossible task and pass that message onto their child(ren) instead of the message of work hard in school, get good grades, get a job and save for college etc..... you can be whatever you want to be and never let what you see around you bring you down. If it wasn't possible, then nobody would ever break out of poverty...the fact that so many do indicates it is not impossible. Raising a child in a single family home carries higher risk to children but like all risks, they can be mitigated with strong parenting. | |
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