Your role as a parent is important
As a parent, you will be your child's favourite toy and playmate during her formative early years. Make the most of this privileged relationship whenever you can.
© Jupiter
As a parent you will be called upon to play many roles for your child. You will be your child's first friend and probably her best friend for life. At one time we thought that a child was not alert to the world around it until it reacted overtly to what was going on. Indeed Saint Thomas Aquinas saw it on an even longer scale. He said, “Give me a boy until he's seven and then take him”, the idea being that a person could be formed during the first seven years.
We now know that this formative time is much shorter than that. A child starts to absorb information about its environment from the second it is born. The fact that it can't focus its eyes on a distant object until the age of about six weeks does not mean that it cannot see. It can. A newborn baby can focus perfectly well at a distance of 20-25cm (8-10in) and that's where your face and your hands should be if you want your baby to recognize you and watch you. Babies are responding to sights, sounds, smells, touches, conversations and ambiences as soon as they enter the world. If parents realize this and take this fact seriously it puts them in a highly responsible position. It means that they, and not teachers, are responsible for a child's first learning.
You will not only be teacher but playmate, counsellor, educator and disciplinarian. Your influence will be pivotal. A child learns from its parents' friendship and hostility, happiness and sadness, content and discontent, the blueprint for a loving relationship, the architecture of a conversation (indeed a baby is conversing in as short a time as two weeks so you need to know how to recognize primitive baby conversation). All the early skills - walking, talking, socializing and intellectual development - are absolutely in the parents' hands and no one else is culpable if things go wrong. This means that modern parents have to be active, interested parents who take on their roles as teachers with seriousness and dedication, the moment the baby is born.
The importance of consistency for children
All children require one strong, constant, emotional bond early in their lives. If this is missing because the parents are inconsistent in giving their child love, sympathy and reassurance, or because the mother is replaced by several inadequate mother substitutes, your baby's early need for a secure relationship may be thwarted. Part of your role will be to teach your child to respect other people's rights and property, and this will be enforced through discipline. For discipline to be effective it should be firm and consistent, but it should also always be sympathetic, understanding and considerate.
Very often a child's delinquent act is directed at a neglectful parent with whom she cannot communicate. Parents who don't talk to their child have very little chance of influencing her, whereas a mother or father who has observed and respected every step in their child's development and readily accepted her idiosyncrasies and failures, will nearly always be in a position to talk over problems with that child.
Parents setting limits for a child
Research has shown that children actually don't like a lack of boundaries nor do they thrive when they are undisciplined. In fact they do best when the limits of behaviour are clearly defined and constant; this makes them feel safe and secure. It's your role to set standards for behaviour and conduct appropriate for the age of your child, and to create a framework in which your child can get on with her life free of unnecessary control. Research has shown that both over-restrictiveness and inconsistency have adverse effects on children. Ideal parents are warm, affectionate, accepting, understanding and encouraging of independence.
One of the most important aspects of parenting is being a model for your developing child. A boy observes his father and quickly realizes what is going to be expected of him as he grows up. He models himself on his father, he copies what his father does, he picks up habits from his father.
In the same way a daughter learns from her mother what is expected of her and what it will be like to be a woman. It's the atmosphere and behaviour inside the home from which the children first learn social behaviour and social roles. As they grow older they will determine their own moral values and their standards from those that are displayed by their parents. Children can still thrive with only one parent to learn from, but they are obviously better off with two models to check against rather than one.
It's my belief that children need the interest, the help, the support, the teaching, the counselling and the love of fathers. Certainly in matters of discipline, both parents are needed because families should make important decisions as a unit, and children should see both their parents taking an interest in and making decisions about the important times in their lives.
New Babycare
Copyright © 2009 Dorling Kindersley
Text copyright © 2009 Miriam Stoppard
Posted 03.11.2010
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