OUR BABIES

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 4 April 1925, Page 15

OUR BABIES

By Hygeia.

Published under the auspices of the Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and Children 'Plunkct Society).

fn a * lecture delivered at the Third English-speaking Conference on Infantile Mortality Sir Maurice Craig, A!. [>., had something interesting to say. - Inattention and Laziness. The doctor points out that the faculty of attention may develop late, and yec the child may be quite normal. If, However, . the child.' has been able to concentrate on its work and afterwards loses its faculty, something must be wrong—most probably the child has become fatigued through over-stimula-tion . With regard to laziness. Sir Maurice has come to the conclusion that most children are not lazy; they are anxious to learn. •‘ln most cases of so-called laziness and inattention it is the nervous system putting up its own lines of defence, just as tne stomach arid gastric apparatus do if one continues to tiike food that cannot he dealt with. Thu nervous system itself makes it impossible for the child to continue to work. Inattention is often a defensive mechanism to prevent one going on.’ Memo, by Hygeia.— It is frequently just about puberty that this state of “inattention” and “laziness” super, venes. If the child were f freed from strenuous school work for a time and given scope to develop naturally, it would return to jts studies refreshed in mind and body, and easily able to perform tasks which had become very irksome and really beyond its powers; but, as was stated in a previous article, it is just at this period that our present educational curriculum puts a strain on the developing hoys and girls, frequently to their lifelong damage: Fears and Dreads.

“Fears are often found in the finest nervous system. But remember that half the fears children get are because they do not understand or have not ex. perience. Fear s generally are about things we do not understand. If you can # understand about a fear quickly it will often disappear. This js why it is so important that a parent; should look after the child. There is no individual who can take the place of the parent. The child will always look to its parents for explanations of fear and things ’of that kind, and will talk with the parents when it will not do so with anyone else. The parents ought to know, and must know, and should be able to relieve the child quickly. Let the child know that fears are common to many people, and that it is not different in this respect from anyone else.

The Repressed Child

■ “The repressed child, must l>e assisted in order to be able to get that expression which it so badly wants. You have to teach it, not by telling it not to do thi s or tnat, but by opening up its life, so that it appreciates that u is being drawn into things, and thus; it is able to develop. This may mean much time and trouble, but it is worth it. “Remember (hat with the repressed child it is the morbid things it never speaks about that are doing the most damage. Bring it out, talk it out, and in that way it is got rid of. The child must have - that assistance; if not, the repressed child may lie-gin to get a sense of inferiority, which may remain with it all through life. It argues in its own mind to its own disadvantage until the dav comes when it has quite decided that it is a hopeless proposition, and in that way it loses a good deal: of its interest in life. This sense of inferiority does not end with childhood. What the child is, so will be man. These small beginnings go on growing until they eat. into the life, not only of the child, hut of the man, and finally undermine and interfere with all his menta-1 activities. Dicipline.

“Dicipline is a very long process. People will tell you that what our instincts are that they must for ever re-, main. Don’t believe it. It is not true. \Ve can alter ourselves enormously, fake self-preservation, which is one of the fundamental instincts. Where does that find a place with tne fully-trained soldier? He will expose himself in dangerous positions and to death with a trained dicipline. Whatever the instincts are it may be possible to condition them. Schoo] Life. “If you f have instability and an undisciplined condition, knowledge is a worthless asset. You must stop education in order to get stability and discipline. Yon often see a very unstable child, and are told it must go to school —that it would be a terrible thing to take it away from school. 1 say that it is often wrong to leave it there. Knowledge will never be of any value to an unstable person. Sloppy-min ded ness. “Again, you have to remember \in training children that ‘sloppv-ininded-ness,’ unpunctuality, does not. appear to he of much account to a child. In s ome homes the parents do not appreciate that this sort of sloppy outlook on life is important. It is really or intense importance to the child. A child with a high intelligence may acquire

knowledge, and yet an unmethodica. condition, long passed into a habit. wil| be its downfall. It is our duty to stop errors in the very earliest stage, because the earlier it is done the easiest js to correct and the less the damage to the individual. “One is constantly hearing sclioo.masters blamed for some defer-1 in a child, when the fault really lies with the parents. If they appreciated a!i the tilings mentioned they would attend to and look more carefully afte: their offspring. “Finally, |et me remind you that in |the biological world (both vegetable ana ianimnl) everything that develops rapidly tends to ‘ have a short life-history The human brain and the strength m it lies in it s slow development. That iis the fundamental, the true physi • lological position. But we are not satisfied to leave it there. The modern tendency is to hurry the development along. By doing this we are taking risks against which we must protect the child. If the child is brilliant, protect it. Wo cannot be too watchful ; that child may break down. The vast percentage of those who are successes in ]jfe were mediocre children, or dull. The brilliant ones are worn out. There are executions, hut you cannot take the exceptions as your standard. Character. “The longer one lives the more one comes to the conclusion that it is Jcharacter' that counts. Everything else is built on character. Character is the ionly- thing, that leacl s to true mental I,stability.', and true mental stability is |an asset; of infinite importance/’