Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET A Delicate Balance by MARGARET DICKSON children will eventually be just fine once they are out on their own in the real world. As a parent, I know of no more exquisite torture than watching your child in distress Much more problematic are children who have never been allowed to take and being unable to "fix" the situation. responsibility for their own actions, positive or negative. When a parent rushes in to When children are young, parents often address whatever the trouble is with relative "save" a child from a scary or difficult situation, the child does not have the opportunity ease. A skinned knee, a broken toy, a spat with another child can all be dealt with, to learn to solve his own problems. What is more, the child can develop a sense of resolved and forgotten. As children get older, though, the issues become more complex entitlement that the world should always work the way he wants and more difficult to understand and to handle. it to. Such children often have difficulty working with others, coSchool days bring conflicts with those in authority, operating and collaborating in group settings. In short, they may troubles in relationships with peers, academic challenges not really grow up at all, because they have never been allowed and all the issues that come with human maturation. Young to fail or to take the consequences of their own actions, so they adulthood continues the complexity with broken romances, have not learned how to cope with real world situations. unfulfilled educational and career aspirations and the Lahey correctly asserts that teachers do not teach only anticipation and apprehension that accompanies taking up academics, but much broader concepts, which are really the adult responsibilities. building blocks of a mature and successful human being. Says Parents naturally want to ease the way for their children, Lahey, "We teach responsibility, organization, manners, restraint no matter what their ages, but there is a fine balance between and foresight. These skills may not get assessed on standardized helping a child to grow into a productive and compassionate testing, but as children plot their journey into adulthood, they person and stunting their maturation, risking rendering them are, by far, the most important life skills I teach." childlike creatures in adult bodies. Yes, indeed. We all know parents who love their children so fiercely, they These are also the skills that good parents teach children by cannot allow them to suffer in any way. These are the parents Over-parenting is not a good thing. correcting them when they are wrong, holding them accountable who do the school projects while the children play. These are for their actions and the actions they do not take and by the parents who always take their child's side on any issue, modeling these behaviors themselves. Good parents seek not only to protect their without ever acknowledging that their child might be in the wrong. These are the children from pain, harm and failure, but to give them the skills and experience to cope parents who ask their friends to give their children jobs to avoid rejection and failure in with the pain, harm and failure that inevitably comes to each and every one of us. the open job market. In writing this, I have been reminded of a friend who, many years ago when her Writing in The Atlantic, Jessica Lahey, a teacher, tells us why such blind love is not a children were young, did a bang-up job on her child's North Carolina history project. good thing. Her article is entitled, "Why Parents Need to Let Their Children Fail." During the process her child popped in periodically to find out how "her project" was Lahey recounts the story of a mother who wrote her daughter's paper for Lahey's going as her mother labored over a scale model of a famous North Carolina building, class. The whole episode was unfortunate in many respects, of course, but it was complete with tiny silk azaleas under the windows. My friend was so proud of the "A" particularly unfortunate since the mother plagiarized entire paragraphs from various her child received, she called all of her friends with the happy news. websites. I shudder to think what the girl learned from that behavior! The mother As far as I know, that child has grown into a fine young woman, but the delicate line confessed, the daughter finally wrote the paper herself and Lahey began pondering the between responsible parenting and over-parenting was definitely crossed concept of "over-parenting." on that project. She found a study from Queensland University of Technology which looks at overThe lesson here is apparently not how parenting, citing such examples as children kept so close to home they are not allowed MARGARET DICKSON, Conto go to camp or to take driver's education, parents who cut up their 10-year-old's food much love is too much but how to love both tributing Writer, COMMENTS? or cook separate meals for picky 16-year-olds. Chances are good, Lahey says, that such completely and responsibly. Editor@upandcomingweekly.com. Celebrate Valentine's Day With Us! 484-0261 Valentine's Day Special 1304 Morganton Rd. Mon-Sat: 6am-10pm Sun: 7am-3pm Surf-n-Turf for Two $39.95 Banquet rooms available up to 100 guests Serving Fayetteville Over 50 Years! Put Up & Coming Weekly's Pocket Guide In Your Pocket! Fayetteville, Ft. Bragg & Cumberland County's "First Responder®" for local information & hospitality! By scanning the QR code you will be saving the 2013 Pocket Guide directly to your Smart Device for easy 24/7 access to local information. This is NOT an APP. This is an Adobe pdf file that is best viewed with Acrobat Reader. For more information call 484-6200 or visit www.upandcomingweekly.com. WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM SCAN THE CODE! FEBRUARY 13-19, 2013 UCW 5