From: llf@alice.att.com (alice!llf)
Newsgroups: misc.kids
Subject: Re: Another Review of _I Wanna Do It Myself_ (Long)
Keywords: time-out, punishment, discipline
Date: 13 Aug 92 18:19:12 GMT
Article-I.D.: alice.23442
Reply-To: llf@alice.UUCP (alice!llf)
Organization: New Jersey State Home for Bewildered Kittens


In some followup, dlin@weber.ucsd.edu (Diane Lin) writes:
> original poster (sorry, I forgot her name).  Dr. Sammons
> advocates the use of time-out as the means of "disciplining"
Well, I'm the one who did the first review.  :-)  I'll answer your
points as well as I can, but I think you missed the major point
of the book.
 
> goal of time-out is to deprive the child of her second objective
> in life, which is to master new skills.  Thus, not only should
> you isolate your child in a different room, but you should make
......
> empty jail cell is the image that leapt to my mind when I read
> this passage.)
Well, to me, this makes sense.  If I put a child in a room with all of her
favorite toys, all she's going to do is play - or to put it another way,
view it as a change in desireable activities.

> IMHO, his time-out method is clearly punishment, a sort of
> solitary confinement for kids, rather than an overall plan of
> discipline.  For example, while he advocates giving plenty of

I'll agree here.  I viewed it mostly as punishment/deterrent,
not as an overall discipline guide when I read it.  BUT I think that
there is a place for punishment, and I think that there is a place
for deterrent, and that both fit into a framework of discipline.
And I think that his "isolation" technique, if you prefer to call it
that, is a whole lot more effective and/or preferrable than spanking
or anything else *I* could come up with.

> Dr. Sammons also cites numerous anecdotal examples from his
> pediatric practice in the book, which are interesting but not

Yeah, I thought I had complained about this in my reivew of the book.

_____
> discourse on the superiority of time-out.  Dr. Sammons also does
> not seem to accept the theory that infants, toddlers and young
> children have faulty short-term memories, and thus should not be
> expected to retain certain rules, even if they understand them.  
Here, we disagree.  I'm in the process of looking for a new pediatrician
for exactly this philosophical difference.  Sammons MAIN point is that
we don't give kids credit for being competant human beings.  I think he's
right.

At 2 months, Lynn remembered the doctor's visits from month to month.
(No one believed us, but she remembered the place, the doctor, and whether
she had a shot the previous month.)  That is NOT a faulty short-term memory.

At 6 months, she was clearly manipulating people around her.  Most people
disagree with me, because they think the word manipulation has incredibly
negative connotations.  But, think about it, manipulation means acting in
a way that gets people to give you what you want by indirect means
for it - and that's what infants do.

Now that she is 27 months, she learns 3 or 4 new words a day and
RETAINS THEM PERMANENTLY, if she feels like it.  Even for words she's
never heard before in her life.  If we explain something to her and she
pays attention and wants to, she REMEMBERS.  Much of her forgetting
appears to be willful.  She remains a "difficult-to-get-to" sleeper
(though once asleep, she sleeps very well).

She is capable of playing on her own, the sitter
says she does it all the time.  However, when mommy is around, she
REFUSES to play by herself.  I need her to learn that sometimes mommy
is not always at her disposal even when mommy is around.  (Or I'm going
to have fraticide when the next baby comes along.)  And time out, as
described in various forms on the net, will NOT teach her.  Neither will
spanking, or anything else because ALL those techniques involve getting
attention from mommy.  (We are not going to make Daddy into the big
bad meany by having him peel her off me all the time.  And given the choice
between negative attention from mommy and positive attention from daddy,
she'll take the negative attention, thanks.)
 
So, I think you missed the point of the book.  Sure, he advocates time out.
Sure he has anecdotes about how successful it has been, but the the big
revelation in the book, IMO, is that even at 6 months or 2 years old,
my child is capable of a LOT more than anyone might believe.  Those
competancy skills now have a descriptive name that allows me to think about
them in a concrete (although ultimately limiting) way and encourage her
to develop and use them.  And from there, I have a better foundation to create
appropriate parenting.

Lynda
-- 
					Member HASA, Atheist-Scum Division
"The One Horseman and Three Pedestrians of the Apocalypse" - Terry Pratchet