Praise vs. Less talk

I read a book called The Continuum Concept by Jean Liedloff and I’ve been trying to figure out a way to explain it to people- which I haven’t (really). This concept didn’t strike me as “out there” or so incredibly wild that I couldn’t see how it works. Rather, I just saw in how many ways I’d have to trust my instincts more. On Liedloff’s website she gives a list of practices that are in tune with the continuum concept, as well as describing others that she finds “a baby subjected to modern Western childbirth and child-care practices often experiences,” like…

sensing (and conforming to) his caregivers’ expectations that he is incapable of self-preservation, is innately antisocial, and cannot learn correct behavior without strict controls, threats and a variety of manipulative “parenting techniques” that undermine his exquisitely evolved learning process.

The way it reads within the continuum is: “sensing (and fulfilling) his elders’ expectations that he is innately social and cooperative and has strong self-preservation instincts, and that he is welcome and worthy.” This idea that babies/children are innately social and cooperative is one that, if you think about it, you may find that you agree with BUT you may not practice. When we praise a child for being social with someone, in a sense we’re telling them that we don’t expect them to be social. When we praise them (or show how amazed we are) at their “sharing” behavior, we’re telling them with our words, tone of voice, and body language that we don’t expect them to want to share. When we tell a child (this one’s the hardest one!) to “be careful… I don’t want you to hurt yourself/fall/etc” we’re telling them that we don’t expect them to have any self-preservation instincts. We will be watching the whole time and we will pull them away when it gets dangerous.

We have a propane-fueled “wood stove” heater in our living room and it can get pretty hot. Before reading the Continuum Concept I kept bilingual baby away from it all the time. I kept going over and telling her how it would be hot in the winter. First off, I couldn’t reconcile the fact that she knows only the present, so this “it will be…” made no sense at all. After reading the book, I’d let her pat the front of the stove thinking that it would make much more sense to teach her hot vs. cold when there actually was a difference to show her. The day came when the heater turned on. She was so intrigued by it. She went up to it (with me right behind her) and slowly moved her hand toward it. She kept looking at me to see what she should do. I kept telling her that I was there. Nothing else. I didn’t want to tell her that she’d get burned because if she really did have “strong self-preservation instincts” she wouldn’t. I didn’t want to tell her to be careful because she was being careful. Any knee-jerk comment I would have made would have been pointless. She eventually did lightly touch the glass of the stove but she didn’t put her whole hand on it and she didn’t put her whole weight on it nor did she leave it there for more than a mili second.

She has now taught herself how to be careful around the heating stove. I kept myself from telling her that she had done well or that she was a “good girl”. I really just kept thinking that I was there for her to explore and I wasn’t going to blow extra air out my mouth to say anything more than “I’m here”.

What would you do?

Here’s a link to the Parenting Pit giving 5 reasons to stop saying “Good job”.