Strollerderby : manners

Forget Thank You, Teach Your Kids Netiquette

JeanneSager — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:33:00 GMT

Your kids finally have down when to say "please" and "thank you?" Looks like it's time for the next round of manners training: how to be polite on the 'net.

South Korea has launched a program in its schools dedicated to teaching little kids to be nice on the 'net. It sounds like they need it.

Not that South Koreans are particularly obnoxious! But according to research, South Korean kids are among the youngest internet surfers in the world. A group called the National Internet Development Agency of Korea, determined that by December 2007, Korea's "internet penetration rate" of people above age six was more than seventy-six percent. The international average is closer to twenty-two percent for kids six and up.

The nation's heads of education have taken a serious look at cyberbullying and its devastating affects on kids (including notable young TV stars who killed themselves after receiving threats online and a teenage girl who hung herself after her appearance on TV about her challenges with weight drew significant amounts of online snark). Here in America, cyberbullying is said to affect at least forty-two percent of our kids who use the internet. Fifty-eight percent of our kids have admitted to having had mean or hurtful things said to them while online. The same number said they didn't bother to tell their parents when it happened.

It seems smart to start the kids young on being respectful and using good manners despite the anonymity of the 'net. But is this something they really need to teach in schools? Check out this video of the little South Korean kids singing netiquette songs:

They're guardian angels to their internet friends, but what about their in-your-face friends?

Via Lemondrop

Today's Parents Minding Their (Kids') Manners More Than Ever

Kate Tuttle — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 15:03:00 GMT

From the BabyCenter folks (you know, the ones who send you emails every week or so with updates on how your child should be developing) comes a new survey about today's parents and their attitudes toward manners. Apparently, manners are back (though in some houses, naturally, they never really left). The BabyCenter poll released this week shows today's parents focusing on teaching their kids proper behavior for a variety of reasons; the top three are "to gives kids a moral compass" (64%), as a reaction against seeing "badly behaved kids" (58%), and to give kids a leg up in a "competitive" world (43%).

Manners are a way for people to show kindness and respect on in small ways, and just make the world feel nicer, if they really connect with something underneath -- but manners that are simply a series of rules and rituals with no underlying positive messages strike me as at best pointless, at worst kind of hypocritical. Which is why some of the BabyCenter responses rubbed me the wrong way. For instance, when 40% of parents say they want their kids to "treat adults with respect" but only 19% feel its important that their offspring "treat other children with respect," I have to scratch my head. What manners rulebook are they reading that says grownups are more valuable, more worthy of good treatment, than children? And if they really believe that, what does it say about how they're raising their own kids?

I grew up in a family that allowed kids to call (most) adults by their first names (a no-no for 40% of the BabyCenter poll respondants); really, though, the rule was that we were to call people what they wanted to be called -- for many if not most adults in our circle, that was a first name, but if someone was introduced as Ms. Smith or Professor Brown, that was the name we used until told otherwise. Flexibility, on this and other aspects of social behavior, seem much more useful to me than a strict set of rules.

That's why, for my kids anyway, I've tried to teach manners from the inside out -- I don't prompt them to say "please" and "thank you," but they see me saying it every day, to family members as well as strangers, and that has seemed to work. As for more complex etiquette questions, we focus on the content (that place where empathy and a sense of fairness overlap) rather than the form. I've spent enough time in the South, where a hotel clerk will "yes ma'am" you to death while completly ignoring your requests or concerns, to have much patience with empty, sugar-coated manners. (And when my younger brother was slapped across the face for refusing to call a teacher "Sir," I'm not sure what that really taught him -- other than to get out of South Carolina!) I don't want to raise kids who talk the talk but don't walk the walk, you know?

What manners issues are non-negotiable in your house, and how do you enforce them? Or do you take a gentler approach, and hope your kids will imitate the behavior you model? And what do you ask your children to call the adults in their lives?

Photo: Nina Leen for Life Magazine, 1959

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Your Kids' Good Manners Could be a Crimebuster

JeanneSager — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 15:29:00 GMT

I can't emphasize it enough: kids need to learn "please" and "thank you."

Get corny - tell them you want the "magic word." Withold toys, tv, anything (even food for a few minutes - really, they won't starve). But make them learn it.

It could save their lives one day. Don't believe me? A masked man tried to hold up a Canadian convenience store this week only to be thwarted by the most common of all courtesies:

The clerk said "please" (actually, he said, "please leave the store," but close enough). According to the Chronicle Herald, the would-be robber stopped and looked at the clerk. ""You're the first person to ask me to leave in such a nice way (and) because of that I will leave," he said. Then he left.

Likely? No, but he's got a point; you don't hear polite requests from most adults these days. And just how do our kids learn? Come on guys, you know this one.

My husband and I have started using "please" and "thank you" to the max - to the point where it's probably annoying to EVERYONE we know - because we want our daughter to mirror our behavior. Guess what? The more "thank you honeys" I say, the more I notice she says "thanks, Mommy." It is a little forced to say "thank you" after every single dish is passed my way while we're cleaning out the dishwasher.

But one day, she might be a better crime fighter than Underdog.

Image: Memphis Memories

Babble Talk: Keep That Kid Away From The Police

Brett Singer — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 23:00:00 GMT

In general when our kids say something inappropriate, they don't mean to. That is, they just mix up a word or two.

Of course, there are mix ups and there are mix ups. Like this one:

Calls popcorn "Cop porn" – Rylee (3)

This isn't likely to be a problem. Unless you are at the movies and there is an officer of the law nearby. "Hey, Dad, thanks for the Cop Porn!" Could be a little problematic.

Read more stuff from kids that could get you arrested right here. You can also submit your own bombastic baby babble.

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Does Your Pediatrician Hate Your Kid?

Amy Kuras — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 16:01:00 GMT

Admit it, you’ve wondered – what does the pediatrician say about your kid when you’re not around? Is he or she a “thank God, this will be easy” kid or is there a “demon child” note somewhere in your kid’s file?

Even though the time they spend with you and your kids might be somewhat short, pediatricians form opinions about the manners, or lack thereof, that their little patients exhibit. Perri Klass, a well-known pediatrician and writer, says in this New York Times column: “I don’t describe my patients as rude or polite in the medical record. But I do pass judgment, and so does every pediatrician I know.”

Those discussions your pediatrician has with you about setting limits, or your child’s social skills, are coded conversations about manners. It is possible to teach social skills, and the lack of them makes life a lot more difficult for people. We all know those kids –or those adults – who just don’t get it and they all seem to have a tougher time in school or at work.

Essentially, little children are completely self-involved creatures, and it’s our job as parents to teach them to be polite — to make them understand that just like them, other people have feelings. It’s probably, I think, one of the hardest challenges of parenting, but one of our more important jobs. And getting this from the pediatrician’s perspective is really interesting.

Babble Talk: Dude Looks Like a Puppy

Brett Singer — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 21:00:00 GMT

There's a routine by a comedian whose name I can't recall that I always liked. In it, the comic talks about his son and how little kids are honest to a fault. The boy walks up to heavyset woman wearing a Guess? shirt and says, "I don't know. 280? 285?" And so on.

I was reminded of that routine by today's edition of Kids Say The Cutest Things:

"I didn't know dogs can drive cars!" said by my daughter Madelyne, 3, when she saw a not so attractive person driving a car past us who resembled a dog.

On the one hand, we want our children to be honest. On the other hand, there are times when being honest is not a good idea. When you receive a birthday present you don't like, you don't say, "Gee, this sucks." You say, "Thank you for the gift."

Or if you see a person who is particularly unattractive, it probably isn't such a great idea to refer to them as a K-9. I'm just saying.

Get more brutal honesty from people no taller than your kness right here. You can also submit your own trenchant toddler tidbits.

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Are Email Holiday Cards Tacky?

Brett Singer — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 19:00:00 GMT

You know the drill. The holidays are coming and you need to get the family card ready. In my house, my wife takes the lead on this, mostly because I'm not inclined to do it. Some people are tremendously organized and take the whole process very seriously — photos taken by a professional no later than the 1st of November, cards printed by Thanksgiving, in the mail by December 1. Most people (our family included) use Shutterfly or another online photo service to get their cards made, which is a little boring but very easy.

Even easier, though, and certainly cheaper since there's no printing or postage, is the email card. I've received many from acquaintances and merchants, but I've only gotten a couple so far from family types. I'm not knocking anyone for doing it, especially if the reason is financial. At some point its fair to call The Annual Holiday Card a luxury item, even if it doesn't cost that much. I haven't priced them out so I don't know how much the cards will set you back. But they certainly aren't free, nor are the stamps. So if someone chooses to go this route, whatever the reason, that's your choice. (That's a disclaimer meant to make up for what I'm going to say next.)

Still, it's not the same, is it? The email card? Maybe I'm just old-fashioned but I still like to get regular mail (when it isn't a bill, catalog, or junk), and I enjoy hanging the holiday cards I receive on my door for everyone to see. I suppose you could print out the email card, but that seems a little silly.

So what do you think? Are the email cards tacky? (The Obamas did one in 2006 [see image at right], but I imagine that was for general supporters, rather than family and close friends.) And have you gotten/sent one yet?

image: respublica

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Don't Neighborhood Hop for Trick or Treating

Amy Kuras — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 17:31:00 GMT

When dusk falls and the little ghosts and goblins come out tonight, where will you be? Do you stick to your own neighborhood, or do you try to scope out the spots with the best candy?

I am hugely, hugely against neighborhood hopping. I live in a mostly poor city, and the neighborhood where I grew up was one of the only decent ones for miles around. On Halloween night, it was literally impossible to get into and out of the neighborhood because of all the cars choking the streets. First of all, let’s discuss driving kids around for Halloween – at the risk of sounding old lady, when I was a kid we walked for our damn free candy.

I love Halloween; I have no problem buying copious amounts of candy and handing it out to all of the neighborhood kids. What I don’t like is people who don’t live in my neighborhood, who I have never seen before or since, taking advantage of my generosity and good will and making it impossible for those of us who live in the neighborhood to simply make it home from work.

I feel for kids whose neighborhoods are too bad to trick or treat, but social service agencies, churches and the Y all throw free Halloween parties for those kids to have a little fun, and I’d happily buy candy for those groups. I’d also happily give out candy to just the kids, but not their mothers, siblings whose voices have already changed, and toothless baby cousins. Whose bags, believe me, I have been instructed to fill.

It ruined Halloween for me when I lived at home. Now, I am right across the city border from a more affluent suburban community on one side and north of very well-off neighborhoods. Our middle class enclave gets few, if any, outsiders, and if we do it’s a manageable level and I don’t mind.

So my take is: Stick to your own neighborhood, and if that’s not an option, find a party or event that your family can go to instead for trick or treating. And if you must neighborhood hop, park the damn car and make ‘em walk.

Art: Gus Grimley

The Good Manners Books - What Do You Say, Dear? vs. Tea for Ruby

SunnyChanel — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 21:41:00 GMT

One of the things that is just about the cutest, sweetest and most breathtaking sites is a toddler or small child with good manners. Currently, I’m in the midst of trying to get my own offspring to possess a pocketful of pleases and thank yous without having to be cued to recite these pleasantries on demand. In the quest to instill some manners, I checked out one of my child hood favorites on the subject from my local library, What Do you Say, Dear? By Sesyle Joslin and illustrated by the great Maurice Sendak.

I had such fond memories of this book. As I read it to my toddler and got to the pages with passages such as “You are a cowboy riding around the range. Suddenly Bad-Nose Bill comes up behind you with a gun. He says “Would you like me to shoot a hole in your head” What do you say dear?” along with scenarios of crashed planes, a orchestra of bears who want to eat the party goers, and a knight who cuts off a dragon’s head.

Instead of instilling manners in my baby, I may have inadvertently instilled some nightmares into her subconscious. I’m all for the odd and quirky, but I think this book may have been a wee bit to brutal for my sensitive little one. More her speed would be the girly-girl Tea for Ruby by Sarah The Duchess of York Ferguson and illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser of Fancy Nancy fame. This tale is of a young girl getting a crash course in manners in order to get ready for a tea with the queen and I doubt there is nary a gun, sword or plane crash on any of the pages. This is the fourth children’s book by the Duchess of York and it was released last week. She sites the disapperance of manners in both the US and the UK and wanted to address the topic, and teach the kids a thing or two with this new book. And really, who better to know how to get ready for tea with the queen than with someone who’s actually done it right?

Kurt Warner, family quarterback

Brett Singer — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 15:00:00 GMT

We hear a lot about football players who behave badly, so it's always nice to read about those that don't. Kurt Warner, the Super Bowl winning quarterback who is currently having a late-career resurgence in Arizona (he's 37, which is old for the NFL) is also a father. A father of seven. Two of the seven were from his wife Brenda's previous marriage; one of those two has special needs (not mentioned in the Times article).

Warner is a great sports success story; he was stocking shelves at a supermarket before joining the Rams and leading them to a Super Bowl. He's living proof that NFL players don't have to be highly touted, heavily recruited college athletes in order to play well. If the Times article is to be believed, he and his wife Brenda are also pretty good parents.

Kurt and Brenda (a former Marine) have a list they call, "Eight Rules for Being a Warner Daughter or Son." Some highlights:

1. Everyone has to agree on which strangers’ meal to pay for when dining at a restaurant.

The Times describes a situation where the Warners pick someone and pay their tab, without their knowledge. In other words, if you see Kurt and Co. at a restaurant, you might get a free meal.

4. After ordering at a restaurant, be able to tell Mom the server’s eye color.

5. Throw away your trash at the movie theater and stack plates for the server at restaurants.

I like these a lot, especially the eye color thing, since I've never heard it before. I see people treat those in the service industry (waiters, waitresses, taxi drivers, etc.) like crap all the time, and I see kids do it as well. Forcing your children to pay attention to these folks and treat them with respect is important, and knowing their eye color is an interesting way to do it.

This isn't to say that I plan on tacking a copy of Warner's Rules on our door, but it's food for thought.

Source/Image: NYTimes

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Kathie Lee Gifford Likes Her Kids Dumb

SunnyChanel — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 21:36:00 GMT

This happened a couple of weeks ago, but it’s something that has puzzled me since. On the fourth hour of the Today Show (which they inexplicably gave to Kathie Lee Gifford, and even more inexplicably, I was watching), Kathie Lee and her co-host/sidekick/doormat Hoda Kotb were discussing a recent poll from some mass media outlet (I can’t recall which one) pertaining to whether parents would prefer to have a child that was smart, popular or polite among other things.

The winner was to have a child that is polite. Kathie Lee was completely stunned that ANYONE would pick having their child be smart rather than polite. She cited going to dinner with a family with rambunctious kids and the parents saying “well they did get into – insert name of super good school here”, in the same tone as if the parents said “well, I sold my child’s soul to Satan…”.

Now I love me some pleases and thank yous as much as the next mom, but to opt for a polite child over an intelligent one just doesn’t make any sense. It’s like the old proverb "Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish and he will eat for a lifetime” If your kid is really smart, they’ll learn that being polite will get them farther. Yes, a free spirited child can be more challenging than a totally obedient one, but in the long run, I’d take smarts over manners in a heart beat.

Photo: NBC Universal - Today Show

Childfree and B*tchy. Why Yes You Are

Rachael Brownell (Redsy) — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 22:57:00 GMT

I get the tension between breeders and non-breeders, the child-free and the child-imprisoned, the kid-friendly and the no-kid-near-my-silk. You don't want my kids in your restaurants, or in your house or anywhere near your precious stuff. That part is perfectly clear.

What isn't clear is why it is necessary for some people without children to express their extreme dislike of all people small and whiny, who have a funny knack of being everywhere.

If you hate children to be where you are, you ought to move into one of those nice 55 and over parks where children are banned so you can retire from the messy business of living among the inconvenience of small smelly human beings.

[Photo Credit: GeoCities]

How Not to Behave at a Birthday Party

Jen Chaney — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 15:32:00 GMT

This MomLogic blogger is way ticked at a mom and dad that came to her kid's birthday party. And frankly, it sounds like she has a right to be.

They repeatedly asked if the host was paying for parking or buying wristbands for the parents. Then they questioned who was supervising the children. And, as an exclamation point on the day, they changed a dirty diaper on top of a picnic table.

All of which certainly qualifies as rude. But does this make them, as the blogger contends, the rudest parents ever? I'm thinking no, only because there are ruder things that they could have done.

They could have:

--Asked the host if she would reimburse them for buying her kid a gift.

--Taken the birthday cake to another table, then started charging the guests for each slice.

--Spiked the Kool-Aid because they found the party "too boring, yo."

--Put trick candles on the cake, then forced the birthday girl to keep trying to blow them out until she breaks down into spasms of sobs.

Can you trump that? What's the rudest thing you've seen someone do at a birthday party?

Photo: MomLogic

Charm School for the Modern Kindergartener

Hannah Tennant-Moore — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 05:50:00 GMT

It’s a sad state of affairs when children have to receive formal training to learn to bus their dishes at the mall. According to the Boston Globe, etiquette classes are becoming increasingly popular amongst youth as young as four—or I suppose I should say, amongst their parents, since we all know no healthy kindergartener wants to spend his time away from school learning to use a salad fork. According to one wise eight-year-old, an hour-long class feels like “5,000 hours."

Proponents say that the classes lack the white-gloved formality of etiquette classes from days of yore, focusing instead on more relevant lessons such as how to pleasantly consume fast food at the mall. Did you know, for instance, that it’s rude to cut in line? And Judith Ré, who teaches “A Day of Social Savvy,” says that afternoon tea classes are about “learning how to have a conversation, how to keep it going or how to end it.” So that’s where the bores I avoid at cocktail parties learned to talk to people! Whatever happened to letting our children be human beings, with authentic personalities and opinions?

It’s not that I’m opposed to manners or good conversation. But these are practical, instinctive skills that should be learned at home, naturally, from attentive, kind parents. And considering that no inattentive parent is going to pay $80 for an hour of etiquette training, I don’t see any reason these classes should exist. Some child development experts worry that so much regimented time is not healthy for youngsters, who should be, well, playing. This feeling was seconded by a nine-year-old who bemoaned the fact that he was made to take an etiquette class on “his only day off.” And we wonder why the United States has the highest rates of anxiety and depression of any country in the world.

Then again, the etiquette crisis facing today’s youth does sound pretty severe. As one instructor lamented, “So many of these children had never seen two forks.” Oh the horror! My panties start bunching at the mere thought of it.

Photo: www.academyofetiquette.com

Tall Kids Can't Eat As Kids, But I Have Your Revenge Strategy Right Here

Kelly Mills — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 23:14:00 GMT

We all know the all-you-can-eat buffet is essentially a no-holds-barred contest between restaurant owners and patrons. As a customer, it is your job to try and get more than your money's worth from the buffet by eating so much that you have to be wheeled out on a guerney, weakly pumping your fist in the air in honor of your victory. Restaurants often try and counter this by slowly refilling the platters in the hopes that you will get full, or giving you wee little plates to pile with food, or serving nasty-ass stuff, or just giving you dirty looks as you make your fifth round with your napkin tucked into your shirt and slightly askew. I know I've hit an all-you-can-eat sushi place so gladiator that I believe they tried to charge me the polar bear entry fee the next time I went.

One restaurant went below the belt in their mission. They posted a "you must be no taller than this sign" thingie as a means of qualifying kids for the child price. So basically, if you are taller than 4' 6", you are not a child at Sushi Park. Such was the case for eleven-year-old Nikki Kaplan, whose family left when they learned she would have to pay like an adult.

Nikki's mom is trying to get the laws changed (it's legal to charge by height) but I have a much better idea. I suggest gathering a very large group of smaller-statured folks of varying ages and convening on Sushi Park. Hell, you can borrow a couple of my grown cousins. Then have each person claim child status, and obligingly demonstrate by standing next to the sign. Then go to town on the spicy tuna rolls until the restaurant cries "Uncle!" and agrees to change the policy. Problem solved.

Book of the Week: "Do Unto Otters" by Laurie Keller

Gwynne Watkins — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 17:08:00 GMT

"A Book About Manners" may sound like a preachy subtitle, but let's get one thing straight: kids love books about manners. Books like Jane Yolen's H ow Do Dinosaurs Eat Their Food? and the Maurice Sendak-illustrated What Do You Say, Dear? allow readers to revel in the characters' outlandish, hilariously rude behavior, all under the guise of learning to say "excuse me." Now we can add a new book to the pantheon: Laurie Keller's silly, slightly grotesque Do Unto Otters.

Do Unto Otters (Henry Holt and Co., 2007) the story of a rabbit who panics when he discovers his new neighbors are otters: he's never met any otters! What if they're smelly and rude? A wise owl advises him to simply "do unto otters as you would have otters do unto you." For the rest of the book, the rabbit imagines different scenarios in which the otters might be rude, and devises polite solutions. The illustrations are a riot; many pages are jammed with cartoons of bug-eyed forest animals exchanging pleasantries, bickering, and learning to say "thank you" in Japanese. It's an odd book for sure, but that's part of its charm -- and underneath the Japanese lessons is a stealthy moral about embracing people who look and act a little different.

Judgment Day: Emily Post for Kids

Karen Murphy — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 17:38:00 GMT

Hell. Oops! That word is probably bad etiquette! That's okay, I don't eat soup daintily from the side of the spoon like I'm supposed to, either. Hey! Did you know? There's an updated Emily Post etiquette book for kids out now. I'm thinking it's more or less a good idea, but I sure hope things have relaxed a bit from the old Emily Post from the 50's that my mom had. Calling cards, hello? And proper attire for a "morning" wedding vs. an "afternoon" one? Though social mores have relaxed quite a bit since then, haven't they? After all, I'm pretty sure none of you are wearing a girdle right now, or a darling little pillbox with a half-veil. (Are you?)

So...politeness and kids. Do they go together, I mean, at all? I'm always told how polite my kids are, like it's something unusual. They're not polite in public, they're terrified into submission! I think good manners really stem from an overall sense of respect. I'm not so good with rules, with people deciding what I can do and when, but I do get the concept of general respect for others which I believe translates into behavior that feels good to the other person. Which I think is what etiquette is really about. Knowing when to pull a chair out for a lady? Maybe it's not so important, but the underlying respect for another person that's behind it, coupled with knowing a behavior that can express that respect, that's what counts.

What elements of good manners do you think is important for kids to know?