Parenting is a learning experience. The people we most often learn from are our children. One of the main areas of educational instruction we are privy to falls under the broad umbrella of economics, capitalism and a free market economy. First let me state, this education is not free, it is not voluntary and it is certainly not painless.
Let’s explore the history behind this premise. It all begins with the widely accepted notion that sharing is good. Now, I’m not saying that sharing isn’t good, I’m just saying you need to be careful.
Instructional sharing begins when children are approximately two years old. If you think back to when you first began parenting toddlers you may recall that sharing is clearly not on their priority list. They prefer the grab and run method. It’s only with parental nurturing, or interference as is often the case, that sharing becomes part of a toddler’s frame of reference. At this point a toddler has to make a decision. They either must learn to run faster or bite the bullet and come to terms with the fact that sharing is here to stay. This latter alternative does not bode well with these little guys so we as parents try to find some way to make sharing manageable. Unfortunately we don’t stop there. We go one step further. Not only push this concept of sharing, but we also strive to inculcate our children with the notion that “sharing is good.” Let’s face it. It’s a hard sell which requires some serious ammunition.
So, how do we do this? It goes something like this. “If you let John use your toy, then I’ll give you a lollypop.” Be honest with yourself. Does this sound like sharing anymore? No, we have now moved into the bribery stage of childrearing. We parents like to think of it as incentives. It seems like it makes sense because you don’t really want your child to be unhappy, so if you replace the object of his desire with something more enticing. In doing so, you’ve just killed three birds with one stone, John is happy, your child is happy and you are happy and you’re only down by one lollypop. Not bad! (or so you think). This goes on for the next few years, gets your child through the pre-school stage of life and gives you the false impression that your child actually likes sharing.
Let’s continue to follow this line of thought and explore our childrens’ behavior as they become more sophisticated and we become more exhausted. This so called “incentive method” has a way of taking on a life of its own. It becomes a well honed method of motivation that can and will become a standard both in the home and at school. I am not talking about motivational charts that our hard working teachers put in place so that our children will stay in their seats (and we will stop getting phone calls home.) I am speaking of the “Mommy, can I earn it?” syndrome the “Sibling System of Laziness”, the “Lunch Room Black Market Economy.”
The “Mommy, can I earn it?” method, which let’s face it, is TOTALLY our fault. It is role reversal at its finest. I cannot begin to tell you what is has cost me. Okay, really I can begin to tell you and here I go.
First of all, as a math teacher I would have to describe this in terms of exponential growth. This means that things get out of hand really quickly. Remember the lollypop that we offered our child only 2 paragraphs ago, well, now he’s asking for a hamster. No. I am not kidding. Of course he has gotten 8 years older since playing then, but still. In those eight years of giving incentives, we’ve gone through stickers (how I miss that stage), match box cars (not too bad), LEGO (now you’re killing me) and walkie talkies (these were pretty fun.) I don’t know how we moved from the inanimate to the animate but now we are haggling over a hamster. Trust me, it wasn’t my idea. Well, maybe the idea of “incentives” was my idea, but this is ridiculous. We have moved out of incentives for sharing and moved onto incentive for other behaviors, for example, chores. Yet another brilliant idea of parenting flies in the face of reality. It starts with, “sweetie, pick up your toys and put them away” and ends, 3 hours and two temper tantrums later – yours and his – and with you finally picking up the toys. Obviously, this stage of child rearing requires incentives. However, as each behavior gets established, you begin to notice that your incentive program is working… against you. Every time you want your little sweetie to go where no child has ever gone before, like to the kitchen to do the dishes, you find an incentive program being thrown in your face. The tables have now turned. It goes something like this, “Mommy, if I do the dishes three times in a row without complaining, flooding the kitchen and not leaving food on the bottom of the plates, can I get a slurpee?” Before you realize that your child has just used your method against you, your thinking, okay $1.69 for three nights of dishes, no icky food on the plates, no puddles of water and not kvetching, not bad. I’m in. Then he says, “Can it be a large?” Now, you begin to have an inkling that something is off, but you can’t quite focus on it as you tell, him, “no, sweetie just a medium.”
You don’t realize that you are on a slope that is more slippery than your kitchen floor used to be, until you hear, “Mommy, if I stop hitting my sister can I get a hamster?” Now, I’ve got to tell you, I not sure which is more disturbing, the fact that he is committing to being nicer to a hamster than his own sister or to the fact that I have lost control over my own, self imposed method of behavior modification, which, I hate to point out, my son has mastered and is now teaching to his other siblings. It’s really a painful day of reckoning with ones parental skills. But let’s move on before I cry.
We have all observed the motivational method called the “sibling system of laziness.” Perhaps you even employed it while you were growing up. It goes something like this, “Molly, if you go upstairs and get me my shoes I’ll let you wear my blue headband.” Of course the sibling doesn’t mention that she had no intention of wearing the headband. So once again, it’s a win – win situation… Not so fast! As we all know, this only works on a naive sibling (similar to the level of naivete that the “lollypop” mother had at the beginning of this essay).
Well, after a while, Molly catches on that she is only being offered items that her sister has no use for. Let the games begin. Molly has knowledge and knowledge is power. If she uses it wisely, develops her mediation skills and feigns indifference to the headband, she might end up getting a necklace, a bracelet and the headband out of the deal. We have now moved into the Capitalistic barter stage of behavior. This method works on both younger and older siblings and often even works cross-generational (depending on how tired you are when you get home from work and want your slippers from upstairs.)
The degree to which “Lunch-Room Black Market Economy” exists came to my attention when in the course of conversation, my son told me that someone brought ajar of pickles to school. As a nurturing parent I asked what the occasion was. Perhaps there is a birthday party or a class celebration? He looked confused for a moment and then answered, “What, no, it’s so he can trade them at lunch.”
Now, I know and you know that despite all rules, regulations and ordinances there is trading that goes on in the lunch room. What I didn’t know was the value of certain items. Do you know what you can get for a pickle, forget about a whole can? I mean, my you could put food on your table for a week. Of course you would be eating multiple bags of chips, cheese sticks, granola bars and all the carefully cut up vegetables in little sandwich bags that often end up in the garbage since they have no market value whatsoever. Much to the dismay of the above mentioned “pickle-bringer” his mother put a stop to it when as soon as she realized what was going on (luckily for her son this took a few weeks.) I’m sure her decision was met with the high pitched shrieks of “that’s not fair” and more importantly, “everyone else’s mother let’s them,” which, by the way, is NEVER true.)
Suffice it to say, that I don’t think this was how she envisioned her son sharing. At this point she should just be grateful he didn’t remember back to his youth as a toddler days and say, “Weren’t you the one who told me I had to share.” I don’t know if she or anyone else would have a good response to that other than, “who me?”