Parenting is a learning experience – and the people we most often learn from are our children. Some of the main areas of educational instruction we receive from our children fall under the broad umbrella of economics, capitalism, and a free market economy. First let me state that this education is not free, it is not voluntary, and it is certainly not painless.
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. Sharing instruction 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 – also known as interference – that sharing becomes part of a toddler’s frame of reference. At this point the toddler has to make a decision: He must either learn to run faster or bite the bullet (not the other child’s arm!) and come to terms with the fact that sharing is here to stay.
This latter alternative does not sit well with these little guys, so we as parents try to find some way to make sharing palatable. Unfortunately we don’t stop there. We go one step further. Not only do we 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, and requires some serious ammunition.
So, how do we do this? It goes something like this: “If you let Yitzi use your toy, then I’ll give you a lollypop.” Does this sound like sharing? No, it doesn’t. We have now moved into the bribery stage of childrearing, although we parents like to think of it as “incentives.” It seems to make sense. You don’t really want your child to be unhappy, so you replace the object of his desire with something more enticing. In doing so, you’ve just killed three birds with one stone: Yitzi is happy, your child is happy, 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 preschool stage of life, and gives you the false impression that your child actually likes sharing. You even have the mitzva notes to prove it.
Let’s continue to follow this line of thought and explore our children’s 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, becoming a well-honed technique that can and will become a standard both in the home and at school. I am not talking about the motivational charts that our hardworking rebbes and morahs 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 is totally our fault! It is role reversal at its finest. I cannot begin to tell you what it 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 two paragraphs ago? Well, now he’s asking for a hamster. No. I am not kidding. Of course he has gotten eight years older, but still. In those eight years of giving incentives, we’ve gone through stickers (how I miss that stage), matchbox 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 on to incentives for other behaviors: chores, for example. This is yet another brilliant parenting idea that flies in the face of reality. It starts with, “Sweetie, pick up your toys and put them away.” It ends three hours and two temper tantrums later – yours and his – with you finally picking up the toys.
Obviously, this stage of childrearing 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 kvetching, 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, you’re thinking, okay $1.69 for three nights of dishes, no icky food on the plates, no puddles of water and no kvetching. Not bad; I’m in. Then he says, “Can it be a large slurpee?” 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 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 regarding one’s parenting 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: “Malky, if you go upstairs and get me my shoes, I’ll let you wear my blue headband on Shabbos.” 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 naiveté that the “lollypop” mother had at the beginning of this essay).
Well, after a while, Malky catches on that she is only being offered items that her sister has no use for. Let the games begin. Malky 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 capitalistic barter-stage behavior. This method works on both younger and older siblings and often even works cross-generationally (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 my son asked me if he could take a can of pickles to school. As a nurturing parent, I not only gave him permission, but I also asked what the occasion was: a siyum, perhaps, a birthday party, or a class celebration? He looked confused, then answered, “What? No, it’s so I 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 one pickle – forget about a whole can? I mean, my son could’ve put food on our table for a week if I had let him take the whole can to school. Of course, we would have been eating multiple bags of Utz 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 my son, I didn’t let him take the pickles. Of course, my decision was rewarded with the high pitched shrieks of “But you promised,” “That’s not fair,” and most importantly, “Everyone else’s mother lets them” (which, by the way, isn’t true). I have to say, I’m just thankful he didn’t remember back to his toddler days and say, “Weren’t you the one who told me I had to share.” I don’t know if I would have a good response for that, other than, “Who me?”
