Nothing to write about aka writer's block

So like my post tells you, I am currently feeling the block. Yep, nothing comes to mind when I want to write and so I doodle. And I doodle some more and I'm hoping I'm going to find inspiration suddenly from doodling, but no, it ain't happening. Is just doodle and nothing else. So today I told myself I've got to write. I don't care how crappy it soles out but I am going to write. And so here's my writing which isn't much but i'm just going with the flow. Sometimes, I think resisting your thoughts or trying to manipulate them makes you blocked. And being critical to the point of hating your own work. That has happened to me on many occasions and the reverse is true too. You love your work to the point of being blind to all your mistakes on that piece. Not gonna help. Oh and nothing is as pathetic as getting influenced by every silly piece of crap you read. Guilty as charged on that one. Yay! I've got a paragraph almost here! Whew! Feels so therapeutic to write. Nothing relaxes me and de-stresses me like getting all my feelings and thoughts on paper. It's like purging your system. Do it. And trust me, it feels so good, you'll get addicted. I sure am.

My two plus year old LOVES his milk! For him it is the way to start his day and the way to refuel and the way to go when his routine goes for a toss. For a few months now, I had noticed how he wouldn't let go of a toy even at meal times and would insist on holding on to them on his high chair. A lot of times, this led to the milk spilling, a tantrum and eventually a fresh glass of milk being placed in front of him.

A week ago, he was again all set to drink his milk, while holding onto a toy phone in one hand and some other toy (I forget what) in the other. My repeated instructions to "be careful or you might spill your milk" were obviously lost on him. The very next second the glass toppled onto the tray and the milk was all over it. My immediate impulse was to yell, but I held my tongue. Instead with a calmness that I just didn't feel, I took the tray (with my son screaming in the background), emptied the milk into the sink and replaced it. I took a towel to my son and told him (very calmly) that he had to wipe the tray clean. Which he did ( and fortunately that stopped the screaming since he loves to mop!) Now came the difficult part. The fresh glass of milk that my son was expecting. I did not bring it. I told him since the milk spilled he couldn't have it. He reminded me that there was more in the kitchen (I am not kidding!) I was shocked to hear that. It suddenly hit me, that here was a perfect example of why kids lose respect for food- because they never feel the lack of it! I knew I had hit upon a "teachable" moment. I told him that yes, we had milk in the kitchen but that was for later in the day. The "right now" milk was gone after it was spilled (I took care to not blame him directly) and so he had to go for his nap without having had milk. He fussed a bit but I stayed firm (oh and yes it made me feel terribly guilty) and anyway, he dozed off.

While he slept I just couldn't make up my mind about the rightness or wrongness of my act. I kept debating over and over in my head. One part of me was feeling really guilty while the other held onto the belief that I had done no wrong. Finally, when my son woke up we cuddled for a while as we usually do and then I couldn't wait to test my theory that I had in fact helped him learn an important lesson. This is how our conversation went:

Me: Sweetie, did you drink your milk before the nap?

Son: No.

Me: And why was that?

Son: Because milk fell down. Milk fell down, so no milk.

I leave it to you to decide if my theory was right.

We had a wonderful time today baking cookies with the kids at Kinder Club (that is the activity center I run- for toddlers) The best part was watching the kids wait patiently for their turn to beat the batter, or knead the dough or arrange the individual bits on the baking tray. And with 8 kids in all, the wait must have been very challenging. But wait they did and they even shared- 2 kids holding the spatula together! It was simply amazing.

That brings me to the point I am trying to make with this post- how to teach kids to share. I know there is enough literature on this, but well, it can never really be enough when you are having a hard time teaching your child to share, right? So, I hope this post will make some contribution towards helping kids do just that- share.

I am of the opinion that morals and manners are best learnt through watching and NOT through "being taught". So if you want your child to share, go ahead and expect them to do so. But by no means should it be enforced. Children as young as 16-18 months old understand words like, "wait" and "share". So use them wisely and gently. Here are some things I do to help kids understand and begin to share:

• Keep only one or few of each type of material- this automatically encourages sharing
• When a toy/material is creating a lot of anger and tension, I watch the 2/3 kids who are engaging in the "Mine! No, mine!" battle (with or without the words) with a , "this makes me sad" look. Sometimes that is enough to make them pause for a few seconds (they are still holding on to it, but the tug-of-war has stopped). I immediately get down to their level and say, "this is everybody's toy, and we have to share. So who would like to wait with me first?" If I have a volunteer, great! If not, I make suggestions like, "S, would you like to wait while C finishes playing?" or something to that effect. While waiting we sing a song, "I wait for my turn..." (to any tune you like- I learnt this great trick from a former colleague and good friend).
• If even suggestions don't help or if the kids are too involved in the yanking and grabbing to even notice me, then we call a "time-out" for the toy/material. I gently take the object away while talking to the kids about how the "toy" (I use the actual name of the object, like ball, puzzle etc) likes to be shared. I say something like, "Excuse me! The toy needs a break now. Friends are more important than toys. Its not nice to fight with friends over toys. So let's put this away and find something else that we can do together."
• If a kid finds it very challenging to wait or share, I give him/her a lot more opportunities for sharing and waiting. Sounds harsh? Actually it isn't. The operative word here is "opportunities". So all you have to do is create the environment and more often than not, kids respond positively. For example, if a child has difficulty waiting for a toy/material or a turn, I would make that kid my "helper". So when its time to wash hands, this kid helps me by calling all the others to come to the wash area, while one kid is already washing his hands. This way, the kid has already "waited" for a turn! In a few days, waiting isn't so difficult for the child anymore.
• And lastly, always remember that this is a child, a young soul you are dealing with. You simply cannot expect a 2 year old to mature into a 5 year old in a day. Nurturing and helping them grow and learn is a process that takes TIME. So before anything else, practice patience. After all, the best teachers are the ones who never stop learning!

This one is a really old debate- protect kids or let them learn from their mistakes? And whatever it is that you choose, where do you draw the line? Touching a hot cup of tea may be OK, but how about running on to the road? Or touching a cup of hot tea may NOT be OK, but how good/bad is not letting him use a public swing for fear of infections?

I think I fall somewhere in between the two extremes and frequently swing from one end to the other. Here are some of the things on my NOT OK list:

• Walking unsupervised in traffic areas (he has to hold my hand)
• Sharing water bottles or spoon/fork etc. with other kids
• Being alone in the bathroom, for however short a duration
• Handling sharp objects (knives, scissors etc)
• Climbing on things not meant for the purpose
• Eating hard candies, nuts etc
• Touching the stove, oven or anything that is boiling hot

I can't recall any more, though I'm sure there will be many others.

So how about yours?

By the way, my son is now 2 plus and this list is current.

Stay true to nature

I cherish my childhood memories. I am sure most of us who have had "regular" childhoods, would feel the same way about theirs. And what is it that I so cherish? It would have to be the freedom, the blissful lack of adult interference while with friends, the lack of toys which forced us outdoors and the consequent exposure to nature. Climbing trees, feeding little pups and kittens, making sand castles, collecting stones, deliberately splashing about in puddles, getting soaked in the rains, making our own play dough with mud and water, getting creative with bits of twigs, cloth and papers...the fun was endless.

When I see kids today, I feel saddened by the acute lack of any of these experiences in their everyday lives. Sometimes I meet parents in the playground who yell at their kids for playing in the sand/mud! How truly tragic!

A few days ago, I had the opportunity to read Maria Montessori's, "The Absorbent Mind". I haven't yet had the leisure to read it cover to cover, but from the little that I read, my takeaway was this: staying close to nature is the best way to nurture. Nature has provided for every conceivable need of man and animals, but we forget that in our greed. The best and most expensive things in the world- be it clothes, food or toys-ironically are the ones that reach closest to giving you a "natural" feel. So when nature has already provided us with the best possible resources, why look elsewhere? Why try so hard to replicate (and invariably fail at) something that already exists in its most perfect form? Parents willingly spend thousands to buy their child the best sand play box, yet when the child picks up some sand at the playground they rush to "protect" the child. Now children are constantly supervised, by parents, maids and teachers- the more you supervise/interfere, the more "involved" you are. So they are effectively never free from adult interference, never free to explore their environment by themselves. I never realized how interfering I was until influenced by Montessori's book, I put to test some of her principles. I was amazed at how much my son could do on his own, without my "help" (excruciating as it was to watch him struggle) and how pleasantly quiet the house felt- no whines, no raised voices and no tantrums (they don't call it the "terrible twos" for nothing!). And not one of my experiments involved his toys. Not one.

So now I am going to record these "moments" when they happen. This one was truly a light bulb moment for me!