Ben BrownApril 7, 2002ReportChild And Parent Behavior ObservationI am almost always surrounded by the interactions between children and their parents. I hear it at my work, I hear it in restaurants, but most of all I hear it at my house.
My mother owns a daycare and every night I listen parents being hit by a barrage of questions. When children are being picked up they always have a couple of questions for their parents. Children are always asking about the meal for the night or whether they can go over to a friend’s house or have some body over. Every night I see 12 different children with twelve different parents and it seems that each parent acts differently then the next. When I thought of observing the children that attend my mothers daycare I decide that I should observe the interactions between the daycares “Problem Child” and his mother. The boy that I chose to observe seemed to have no respect for anyone or anything.
He often made obvious lies and played practical jokes that physically hurt the other children. On the Friday night that I observed him and his mother he was playing on the swing set out back when his mother arrived. His mother came through the front doors and headed out for the back porch. When she got on the porch she announced her arrival to her son and told him to hurry up. He completely ignored her and to my disbelief, his mother let him.
She stayed on the back porch and waited another approximately five more minutes before asking her son to hurry up. He finally got off the swing and accompanied his mother inside my house. When they got into the house the boys mother reached into the bag that she was carrying and retrieved a hat that she had bought him earlier in the day. It was a fisherman’s cap.
He gave the hat one look and decided that he didn’t like it. Without a thank you he let his mother know his opinion. She seemed upset and almost hurt that he didn’t like it and reassured him that they would go exchange the hat for another one the very next day. The child on the other hand had completely different plans and told his mother that he wanted to go that very night. She hesitated for a couple of seconds but eventually gave in to his requests.
It was apparent that the mother did not want to go back into town to get another hat for her son but just gave into a child’s commands for one reason or another. I believe that the mother had been conditioned by her love for her son and not by the child’s actions. It seemed as though she was trying too hard to get the approval of her son and that it tinted her views in certain situations. I also believe that her son’s attitude and behavior can be associated with the relationship that he and his mother share. It appeared that his lack of respect for his mother shone through to his lack of respect for people in general.
Hopefully his negative attitude will go away with age. .
