CONTRARY PERHAPS

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVI, Issue 3439, 5 March 1932, Page 3 (Supplement)

CONTRARY PERHAPS

A CHILD'S POINT OF VIEW. If you will think of it, you will agree, after a day's observation, that 99 per cent of the time we demand that a child get our point of View, whereas we seldom try to get his. Take, for instance, the toddler enjoying the mysteries and thrills of dressing himself. This is a new and delightful experience, one to be tasted and lingered over. From the mother's viewpoint, it is something to be done as quickly as possible so that breakfast may not be kept waiting.

Take breakfast. A clean tablecloth is a virtue in mother's eye, whereas the intake of oatmeal is something far more enjoyable to the child, something to be gone after and taken in with pleasurable emotion. Why must mother take all the joy out of a warm breakfast by fussing about a iew dribs of cream on a tablecloth?

Take the afternoon call, when your child is dragged along. Quiet, smiles, clean clothes are your standards of good behaviour, while those of the child probably consist of exploring the lady's dressing table, smelling the powder or perfume, handling the china dog or climbing the breathless heights of the davenport. Not that the child's viewpoint is always one we can allow him to maintain, for certain respect for the property of others must be instilled into him; but on the other hand, so many times we might easily get the child's viewpoint where everything must seem to a child to be fashioned for adults. We demand that he get ours so often, let's take time out to see if we can't get his when it is justifiable to do so. Remember that all things are new and interesting to a child. All things must first be handled that they may be registered in the senses and pigeon holed in the child's memory. Let him handle things when you can, telling him that he must be careful of them and why. Let him make a noise when he is a train of cars or a roaring lion. It is your viewpoint which says "hush!" not his.

Set aside a room, a basement or attic space where he can do things from his point of view. Glow with pride and give vocal praise when he has drawn what he terms a horse or dog. It may not,. from your point of view, look at all like an animal, but it does from his. See through your child's eyes whenever you can. Goodness knows he is asked to see through adult eyes a lot more than through those of his own age.