Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Hate to be corrected

My first child was a gentle one who only needed to be taught and corrected. Anything more then that would cause more harm then good. Now my second child, my daughter, she would run me over with that approach. She is an intense, passionate and powerful personality. I had to learn to be the one to help her control herself and I had to learn to meet her intensity. In honesty, I learned some of that by reading Wren's posts. I am not naturally intense but I appreciated that it was needed. Different children with different parenting requirements and I'm glad that I can come to such a place to find it.

I can't say I fully understand the one arm incident. Maybe she was intentionally hurtful or nasty (most three year olds tend to be pretty nice people, just often clueless about exactly how to do it).

However, it is very easy for me to imagine many three year olds may make a comment about of ignorance or even out of a mistaken desire to be helpful and I'm not sure in either of those situations it is useful to force an apology. I know as a parent of a child with disabilities, if the comment was just insensitive "hey what's wrong with that kid's arm?" the forced apology would be make the situation worse not better. It is the hush-hush, it is too horrible to even speak of thing that is frankly harder to take. If it is just a matter of a young child saying something "that lady is so fat" "what is wrong with that man's legs?" I do not feel forced apologies are appropriate or helpful. Rather, I think kids benefit much more from an honest conversation about differences, when it is hurtful to point them out, and how it is appropriate to acknowledge them.

As far as knowing your child needs to be forced to apologize, I don't buy it. The many parents who modeled but did not force apologizes, who have kids who naturally developed the ability to apologize can authoritatively say their kids didn't need to be forced. Really, you can't say that your kid did because you didn't try the alternative.

I think you have to parent the kid you have. My child needed me to make him apologize and script it for him until he understood what was required. (And yes, it did freak him out, mostly because he felt that admitting he was wrong would somehow have earth-shattering consequences.)

With this kid, "fake it till you make it" has been necessary: practice saying the right things, and sooner or later, you'll mean them and say them at the right occasion.

P2P, it's great that your child didn't need this level of support. Everyone's mileage will vary in this, as in so much else. But I don't think this is a black-white moral issue; it's a matter of getting the child to perceive and do the right thing, and there's more than one way to get there.

DeeDee

It isn't about "level of support". Kids who aren't forced to apologize aren't getting less parenting or less support; in fact they may be getting much more. It is about a different initial set of beliefs about children. If you believe: kids are willful and must be forced to be compliant, kids are mean and must be forced to be nice, kids are bad and must forced to be good - then forced apologies make perfect sense. If on the other hand you believe that kids are born with a desire to learn and get along with others but they often lack the maturity, resources, and skills to do so - then shaming them and forcing them to apologize makes no sense.

It also probably gets to what you believe about apologies. Some people seem to believe in the ritual for the sake of the ritual. Philandering politician mutters "sorry for disappointing my wife, I'll get treatment" and then it is all better. From my perspective fake apologies are often worse than no apologies at all. Teaching kids to fake contrition teaches them to lie and it makes apologies an act of power (I can force you to apologize).

I believe that kids are born with different levels of desire to get along with others (some with much, some with little, some with none). That my DS has autism surely shapes this belief: some kids are more wired for social skills, some less. Different kids, different parenting strategies.

I didn't say shaming, BTW.

DeeDee

Yes, I will certainly agree that kids on the spectrum may need different types of instruction. I do not think making a two year old on the spectrum apologize is any more productive than forcing a two year old who isn't though.

To claify, DD made a comment about how he could do something, since he had one arm. I cannot remember, since it has been years, but it was a statement. "you can't do ...." It was hurtful since his parents emphasize he can do anything. She had to learn how hurtful it was and wrong for her to say it. To this day, they are still friends and I think it was right for her to go and apologize, though she fought me on it and cried in my arms afterwards. But they played the rest of the summer. I think he would have harbored a grudge against her if she hadn't said sorry. And rightfully.

It was a great learning opportunity and she is great with kids that have disabilities nowa and respectful.

Ren

I strongly agree with PTP on this. Not being forced to apologise certainly doesn't equate to a lack of discipline in our house nor has it lead to a kid that doesn't apologise. Also,raising my daughter been not an easy process from a discipline perspective. We have had periods where quite frankly my daughter was not terribly likable. However dd's now consistently excellent behaviour is regularly praised by teachers/friends/strangers and she has exceptional manners. Hitting, not apologising, or whatever other 'negative' behaviour she might exhibit from time to time doesn't get my daughter what she wants. Following a lot of hard work (considered and consistent removal of privileges or attention being the main tools, combined with explanation and expectation) , she is very clear about what our expectations are and she knows that if we've said no, generally nothing's going to change. There are occasions where we 'bend the rules' and when that happens we'll always explain why it is an exception. That's not to say her behaviour is perfect, but when it isn't there is almost always a reason behind it - stress, hunger, tiredness etc.

We got there through honest explanation and high expectations, not through forced apologies or arbitrary punishments (no one has mentioned arbitrary punishments, I just mention them as I see them in the same category of responses). I also feel (and I'm not suggesting this is what you're doing Ren, this is just my general philosophy) that girls are expected to apologise far too readily. I want my daughter to feel confident in her opinions and decisions and not to have to apologise for them when they don't fit other's views. Also, I want her to take genuine responsibility when she does do the wrong thing and not to see an apology as a free pass. For me that comes about through understanding the impact you might have on others and understanding yourself and why you feel/think the way you do.

I have a recurrent thought when I watch people interact with kids and that is that so often people's expectations of children are very low (all kids, not just gifted). In my interactions with kids, either when we have them over to play or when I am helping out at school, I really believe that when kids are given an opportunity to take ownership of their actions they invariably step up to the plate and are proud to do so.

I don't have anywhere near enough knowledge about kids on the spectrum to have views on your son's needs DeeDee,and just wanted to mention that I don't mean to imply that our experience is applicable to your circumstance.

I'm sure it is all about the tone. I can easily see a three year old making a factual statement not intending to hurt feelings AND another three year old not having their feelings hurt by it. "You can't pick your nose with two hands at the same time" or whatever.


Years of grudge holding for a preschooler seems really extreme. Kid friendships often involve some "you can't" kind of trash talk. Not saying that is full license to be a jerk, but that it is really a situation by situation kind of thing and kids have a way of working this stuff out. Probably all of them have said something meaner than they wish they would have and in time they learn to apologize. Often the forced apologies are a lot more about adults feeling embarrassed than kids actually learning something meaningful.

While I certainly would encourage my child to avoid children who target disabilities for bullying or teasing, I wouldn't encourage holding a lifelong grudge against a three year old friend for something they said. I'd teach my kid the more appropriate matter of fact response would be "oh yeah I can see me..." or "yup, you are right I can't, one arm." In our experience the hard thing isn't the direct comments such as "you can't" it is kids who feel so shamed and worried that they feel embarrassed to even acknowledge reality or worse yet, try to talk you out of if it when you do.

The forced apologizing and the crying kid would have made it much more upsetting to a lot of kids than the original offense.

Really good point. Lots of teen girls out there really struggle with this including, for example, feeling justified in not going out with a guy they aren't interested in because they don't want to hurt his feelings.