At the intersection of the new with the old

Many mothers complain today - it is difficult to educate their children, knowledge of pedagogy or psychology does not help, something, it seems, is worn in the air. .. Women's anxiety has an objective basis. In the modern family there have been changes that could not but affect the relationship between the older and younger generations. I think talking about these features of today's family will help mothers choose the right line of behavior.

Not crossing the threshold of a city apartment, today you can confidently say that it grows one or two children - the family basically became small children( the reasons for this phenomenon we already touched on).It has become a one-generation, or, in other words, nuclear, nuclear. In her, as a rule, live a mother, a father and their children. For example, in the RSFSR of such families, 76 percent. Sometimes there are old people in the family - a grandmother, a grandfather along the line of a spouse, or even less often the parents of both spouses.

The one-generation family is so typical today that we do not even remember the multi-generational families who once united under their roof great-grandfathers and great-grandparents, uncles and aunts, nephews and nieces, cousins, senior, middle and younger children and their heirs.

It would seem, - the multi-generational family has sunk into eternity, and there is nothing to grieve - this is the demand of the time. Alas, the consequences of this are much more serious than it seems at first glance.

On the one hand, nuclearization is a progressive phenomenon: family members are less dependent on their innumerable relatives, on traditions planted by old people. Decreased psychological pressure on the personality of others. On the other hand, in a single-parent family, there have been such changes that have had a negative impact on the nature of the relationship of its members

First of all, let's pay attention to the fact that in a multicultural family there were different lengths and contents of a chain of relationships. For example, contacts, children with seniors. They were intense and multidirectional, as children interacted in parallel with relatives and cousins, with older members of the family of different sex and age.

With what variety of minds, characters, temperaments, habits, skills, the child was encountered every day! The ability to observe the abundance of human images is a very significant psychological circumstance of childhood, and its significance especially increases during the period of active imitation: the selective response to the faces, voices, and emotions of others increases. Becoming older, the child is easier and faster to recognize and recognize the different qualities of people, then learns to evaluate them, to distinguish good from bad, acquires the habit of communication.

Watching the natural course of old age, the children learned to understand it, compassion, help the weak, appreciate wisdom. In this atmosphere, the old people felt comfortable too. In one of the studies conducted by Soviet scientists in the mountainous regions of Abkhazia, where a multi-generational family is still preserved, a curious ethno-psychological hypothesis has been suggested. Its most important reason is the psychologically cozy atmosphere in which the old people are. After all, they are respected, loved, and the more, the longer the life journey passed.

Today, young people do not understand and respect old age. First of all, I think, because contacts with elderly members of the family in childhood were severely limited. Where does the grandson or granddaughter take obedience, respect, gratitude towards their grandparents, if the old people live at the other end of the city and visit relatives on the occasion of birthdays or big holidays? And since to their grandparents there is no respect, then strangers and even more than anyone will not respect. Lack of experience of communication of generations with moral teachings can not be replaced.

In a multicultural family, the old people, in turn, helped in the care of their grandchildren and great-grandchildren, understood their needs and claims. It was hardly possible that the elderly person remained indifferent to the upbringing of the child or the training of the teenager's work skills. Now some grandmothers and grandfathers took the position of outside observers, stating: "We are not going to babysit grandchildren, solve your own problems. Nobody helped us. "According to the Soviet sociologist VD Shapiro, the orientation toward grandchildren is weak in both working and non-working pensioners. Only three percent of those and others attributed their grandchildren to the values ​​of their lives.

Looking closely at the interrelations of representatives of the middle generations - their parents, uncles, aunts, children from a multicultural family comprehended the alphabet of everyday diplomacy, acquired the ability to build psychological contacts, to feel distance in communication, and learned mutual assistance and support.

Older children wore younger children, which developed elementary pedagogical skills and the habit of patiently treating the natural needs of children, their whims, noisy behavior. Today, a man who grew up an only child in the family, shuns child's crying, diapers, pots and other attributes of infancy. That is why the birth of one's own child is often perceived as an unpleasant event.

Contact with numerous children enriched adults. If a woman gave birth to 8-12 children, then she spent most of the time with the next baby. Let's say that every 1.5-2 years a newborn has appeared in the family. If we multiply this interval by the number of children born, it turns out that in contact with the kids, the mother spent 12-24 years. It's only with their own, not counting the children of relatives living next door.

Such a contact was also important for men. Even if the father turned out to be a man callous, rude, alienated, he gradually became more patient, tender, kinder. After all, he almost always interacted with the child, cradled it, held it in his arms, observed in various states.

Current moms and dads who have raised one child do not have time to adapt to infancy, feel the whole gamut of parental feelings, develop a habit of communicating with the baby.

In the period of youth, many are focused on their everyday problems, are engaged in studies or, for example, the construction of a youth housing complex. .. Therefore, the infant period of one's own child is remembered mainly for some unpleasant moments associated with childhood illnesses. Concentrating on yourself has dulled our parental feelings, the ability to rejoice and admire a small creature.

The humanistic experience of the only child growing up in a single-parent family is limited mainly to contacts with the father and mother, occasionally, if lucky, with a grandmother or grandfather. The nature of such relations is imposed: the child wants or does not want, he is forced to capture a few stereotypes of behavior shown to him in the family.

In such conditions, the probability of "hard imitation" increases when a child learns and repeats in his behavior the advantages or disadvantages of a limited number of relatives. The smaller the size of a family, the stiffer the imitation. The monotony of the characters, minds, habits observed in the present family tires the child's psyche, because it seeks new impressions and experiences. Particularly clearly the effect of "fatigue" is manifested in cases when children do not understand, do not accept or condemn the behavior and inclinations of parents. Filling of the vacuum of impressions occurs due to images from the outside - the child seeks peers, authorities outside the family, casual acquaintances.

The television hero plays a special role in overcoming poverty of impressions. Conditional, collective, far from reality, he takes possession of the imagination of children and adolescents. Girls often try to imitate some pop star, brightly made up, shiny, like a Christmas tree toy.

Boys copy the manners and style of clothing of popular guitarists, drummers or performers of hits. In adolescence and early adolescence, a person is maloritic, it is impressed by all the unusual, catchy, and it is, as a rule, transient and artificial. Is it that at the age of sixteen the boy understands that, for example, the characters of the beat-quartet "Secret" on the stage realize a stage image created in the spirit of the times and requests of young people, and that in life they are normal people with wives and children living in worldly cares? Alas, fanatical admirers of a fashionable ensemble try to imitate him in life: they wear ties, jackets, head of hear and smiles a la "Secret".But what is relevant and entertaining on stage, is absurd and primitive in everyday reality.

"Attachment" of relations in the modern family is due not only to the small number of its members, but also to the specifics of the home. In the past, the house was followed by yard buildings, a garden and even an adjacent street. A considerable part of the time the children were away from home and were left to their own devices.

Another situation today. The limited housing space, poor sound insulation, often the absence of a child's room - all this leads to the fact that the line between the life of adults and children is blurred, childhood is dissolved in the prose of life. Today there is an early "declassification" by children of everyday life, the parents' conflicts easily come to the attention zone of the child, and examples of indifference, anger, aggression of the elders. Adults need to strictly control their words and deeds.

As family members interact on a few square meters, each is to some extent deprived of independence, being under pressure from those present. Especially the children. They are demanded of them, they are taught, they call for order. All strive to command - mother and father, grandmother and grandfather. The psychological pressure on children by adult family members has increased significantly today.

The degree of adaptability of children to adult residents of the apartment, the degree of mutual assimilation, spiritual and physical dependence has increased. Children are often forced to restrain their natural emotional impulses, independent actions, living by the mind of adults. In such "conditions, parents involuntarily suppress the child's" I ", make him dependent and unstable.

Evaluating the above-mentioned psychological merits of a multigenerational family, of course, it is not necessary to exaggerate them, and even more so to idealize. There is no question of the return or even a partial repetition of the old way of life, as he has exhausted himself functionally. Of course, in the old days the family also nurtured different people - good and evil, altruists and egoists, but the manifestation of negative individual qualities was still strictly limited to family and social morality.

Having realized what has been lost, we must try to compensate for the moral losses. In particular, it would be good if well-thought-out means of education to shape a person's more fundamental humanistic potential.

The one-generation family provides the society with people with limited humanistic potential, for, as we have already said, communication with each other of its members is held back for various reasons. Subsequently, this certainly makes itself felt in various spheres of human life. Like a boomerang, the limitations of humanistic experience return to the family - and to the one that brought up the particular person, and to the new personality that this person creates for himself.

In the formation of the humanistic potential of the child, of course, it is impossible to overestimate the role of the mother - after all, it is from infancy that she must teach her child to be kind, to love the neighbor, to protect the weak. But how much more complicated is her task today!

Modern woman herself lacks humanistic experience, and life circumstances often encourage her to "impose" children are not the best-behaviors of behavior. The "quality" of motherhood, however, like paternity, today determines the unfavorable situation that has developed not only in the family, but also in society.

For example, recently in our socio-political system command-willed management style prevailed. He entrenched himself in the family, manifesting himself in the habit of the mother to point out to the child, to pull back, to demand unquestioning obedience.

Some mothers are rude, insulting and even cynical with their children. In the mouths of these women often sound words and assessments that belittle the child, in particular his mental abilities. Mom, for example, nothing to say to a teenager: what nonsense you are carrying;keep quiet, you still have little reason to argue;do not stick your nose when the elders are talking;do not ask idiotic questions;cease to be crooked like a fool;behave like an abnormal.

No less expressive is the speed of speech, which casts doubt on the physical merits of a son or daughter: you turn as if you had an awl in one place;go away from the mirror, you will not become a beauty anyway;you are a jelly, not a man. Saying such words, the mother does not think about what kind of mental trauma the child does. After all, the attention of children, especially in adolescence and early adolescence, is concentrated on one's own self, they are awakened by interest in their appearance, and their sexual attractiveness is being assessed. Therefore, rash and cruel phrases, abandoned by the mother, can cause the strongest offense.

In the arsenal of "educational" tools used by moms, also humiliating teachings.

. .. A boy of eight years old asks his mother to buy strawberries, which they sell right at the exit of the metro. The first berry is expensive, mother can not afford, and she throws her son in annoyance: "If you go to work, then you will buy it!" It is easy to understand the woman's state of mind, which can not make the child happy: she feels both vexation and envy of money people. Nevertheless, even in such a situation, one can not offend the dignity of the child. Why should he survive so many negative moments at the same time: refusal to satisfy his desire, hint at financial difficulties of the family, reproach in juvenile and spongy?

Other mothers do not even understand that they are cruel to children. For example, a child falls, and the mother laughs at him. He hurt himself slightly, but he raised a heartbreaking cry, because he was offended by his mother, who did not sympathize with him. Incidentally, the words "before the wedding will heal" also traumatizes the baby.

One day I had to witness an unpleasant scene in the park. Passing by the pond, the girl of seven years stumbled and was almost waist-deep in the water. There is no danger, especially as people are around, but the child could not independently overcome the sloping concrete beach, covered with slippery greens. The girl desperately tried to get out of the water and took one vain attempt after another. Her movements became more and more nervous, she was frightened. The mother, carried away by the conversation with her friend, continued to retire along the shady avenue, not noticing that her daughter was in trouble.

I approached the child and gave a hand. The malfunction would end in a slight fright, but then there was a mother who discovered the absence of her daughter."What's wrong with you?" She asked, and realizing what was wrong, she laughed loudly: "Wet chicken!" The girl cringed with resentment. And who knows if she will turn to her mother for consolation, if she has a real trouble with her.

After all, in the relationship of parents and children nothing passes without a trace. Other mothers reap the benefits of education, not always understanding their guilt. Sometimes they are genuinely surprised: why are children disrespectful, rude, alienated from home? Especially a lot of reproaches against adolescents.

Such motherly naivete, really, is amazing. How can you count on the love and affection of children, if their human dignity was degraded? In response, an adolescent can develop an inferiority complex - he gets used to thinking that he is stupid, clumsy, ugly or immoral. In the future, he can behave differently. For example, to follow, so to speak, on a given trajectory, that is, to continue playing in life the role that his parents gave him. In accordance with their assessment, he, becoming a young man, an adult, pretends to be stupid, clumsy, sometimes even flaunting these imaginary flaws in order to at least somehow reduce his experiences.

A teenager can also choose the form of protest - rebel against humiliations, insults. Psychological protection is manifested in rudeness, stubbornness.

He is also able to avenge the "safe" children - in this case, his inferiority complex is manifested in envy of peers who are praised, who are pleased, in increased conflict with "good" boys and girls.

Not receiving a proper portion of attention from the mother, another child achieves it at least in the form of censure or punishment. That's why, being small, he sometimes is capricious and stubborn, and after growing up, he is rude and contradicts his mother. But she needs to change her anger at mercy, caress the child, treat him with understanding and trust, as he becomes attentive and complaisant.

Once again we emphasize that constant urging, pulling up and threats cause the child strong emotions, and they suppress his intellectual activity - attention, namyat, thinking. However, this is familiar to adults. Experiencing a strong emotional excitement, we are less and less accurately understanding what is happening, emotion interferes with thinking, therefore, responses are born with minimal participation, and even with complete disconnection of consciousness.

The entrenched children do not just lose faith in their strength, under the influence of negative emotions they are stupid, can not cope with the simplest life tasks, are lost in expectation of condemnation or insult. The perplexity and incompetence of children cause displeasure and generate new nit-pickers. There is a vicious circle.

As a result of a variety of negative stimuli, the human will is harmed. Its tone weakens, which makes itself felt in various aspects - moral, industrial, social, family. Such people lack the will to self-determination and self-restraint, it is difficult for them to overcome internal contradictions. The lack of independence of many men and women is explained by the fact that their personality was suppressed in childhood.

If a toddler or a teenager is subjected to strong negative stimulation, his psyche is constantly in tension and gets used to working in this mode. For the rest of his life, he may have a need to remove the psyche from a state of rest, periodically get nervous shakes. When the situation is calm for a long time, he himself begins to be nervous, tends to recharge additional external energy.

You probably met people who from time to time there is an urgent need to quarrel with someone, to quarrel, as they say, to cause a fire on yourself. They like to make a scandal in a shop, a bus, to disrupt the interlocutor, to bring the child to a white heat, "recharging" his nervous system in this way, pumping it with the nervous energy of others. The people involved in the conflict do not suspect that they become energy donors of people who in childhood received a large dose of negative stimulation.

Finally, the most horrific consequence of massive negative stimulation - the child is gradually convinced of the lack of maternal love. And the impressions of childhood are preserved for life, and how hard it is for a man to constantly realize that his mother did not love him!

It seems to other fathers and mothers that in the child's head there is a certain filter, by which all the accidental, coarse, unpleasant, joking words are eliminated, and only the manifestations of their love remain in consciousness. I can assure dads and moms that there is no such "love filter" in children, in their minds acts "a receiver of wrongs and injustices."He fixes everything that hurts the child's soul, and broadcasts through all "channels", affecting emotions, feelings, thoughts, ideas, dreams, motives.

It is clear that the mother is not a programmed machine, and she is different in her relationship with the child: in some situations she demonstrates compassion and care, in others she is categorical and prejudiced, in the third she behaves patronizingly. Consistency in her actions can give way to fervor, conviction - to moralizing, justice - to ill-considered punishment. Nobody is immune from mistakes and extremes, nevertheless one should understand the typical behavior style with the child.

For example, you tend to restrict its actions, often make different demands, like to order. What are your motivations for doing this?

Sometimes, the motive is related to the interests of the child himself. Let's say you give him instructions, taking care that he does not hurt himself, does not get tired, does not get into a bad company. But think: is it worth it to patronize him, perhaps he is trustworthy? Remember, if you constantly remind, tell your child what to do, he gets used to the urges and "transfers" the functions of self-control to the educator.

Or maybe the motive of the "limiting" style of attitude to the child is prestigious? You patronize and control a son or daughter to convince others of how good you are. However, nothing can be proved to anyone in this way. And whether it is necessary to "work" on the viewer?

Sometimes we are guided by the motives, so to speak, of the "instrumental" plan: doing something, we want to influence third parties. For example, you limit the actions of the child, but in fact let the husband understand;that he retired from the education of his son or daughter. The more indifferent the spouse to the behavior of the child, the tougher the demands of the mother. Agree, it is unfair - children become "victims" of troubles between parents.

There are motives dictated by the care of their own comforts: you often tighten the child so that it does not create unnecessary trouble for you, does not interfere with your personal interests, does not strain your attention. The requirement, instruction, reminder sounds ahead of the likely erroneous, to be exact, uncomfortable action of the child for you.

Agree that restricting children is appropriate only if it is related to their interests. But you should definitely choose the appropriate form of treatment. If you are guided by other motives, this means that you love yourself, not the child.

While he is small, he goes to kindergarten, goes to school, he is governed by his parents: they teach, instruct, demand submission, and he is forced to obey. But as children grow older, they increasingly begin to manage their parents themselves, and the means that used to apply to them earlier - the boomerang returns to those who started it. Now everyone tries to control each other in the family: the parents - the child, the child - the parents, the husband - the wife, the wife - the husband. When everyone wants to control each other, family life comes to a standstill.

Having learned from the parents the negative type of impact, small children copy it, and with age they begin to consciously use it in relationships between themselves and the elders. So, they learn to manipulate the formulas-appeals that belittle the abilities of the other. It is no coincidence that the most common word among toddlers, schoolchildren and teenagers is a fool. Children also actively use verbal means in their everyday life that cast doubt on the physical merits of others, expressing disdain for someone, expressing offensive and humiliating teachings, metaphors, comparisons - the whole arsenal of negative stimulation tools that they experienced.

Children are skilled manipulators. They manipulate objects, words, facial expressions and intonations from an early age. It is manipulated, that is, they use them in such a way as to influence others, exert pressure on them, force them to behave in a certain way to gain profit.

Here the child plays and copies words, postures, intonations, acts of their parents. This is not just an imitation, his actions are meaningful: the means borrowed from his parents, he tries to influence the doll, the participants in the game, himself."I'll give you so now that you will remember for the rest of your life," he says with a threatening look to the "disobedient" bear. The mother is amazed at how exactly the child reproduced her gestures, intonation and the purpose of the effect, invested in a cautionary phrase.

Manipulating adults, the child is capricious, prompting his father or mother to please him, to take him in his arms. S. simulates the same purpose when he does not want to sleep or eat. Almost every little child knows how to "figure out" how to get someone to approach, for example, by trial and error, the kid is convinced that feigned fear or illness will force the mother to come quickly, to take him in his arms. If these early manipulations are effective, then they are remembered and, probably, will be repeated in the future in a more or less modified form.

Children like to strain us with their endless questions and often enjoy watching our difficulties with answers or exhausting us. A typical manifestation of manipulation is to do an adult luck. The child sees that the mother or father is irritated with his actions, nervous, which is exactly what he is trying to achieve. Goals can be different: attract attention to yourself, punish the parent for injustice, rudeness, cruelty.

Gradually realizing its importance in the family and getting used to its exceptional role, the child more and more manipulates the feelings of relatives. Posing as a good and obedient, he encourages the mother, father, grandmother, grandfather to make gifts. Sometimes requires that they buy a toy or sweets, rolling up the hysterics in the store. In this case, the cunning kid subjects adults to double pressure, for he knows that it is difficult for a father or mother to withstand his whims and the condemnatory attitude of others.

One form of manipulation is persistence. This is a variant of obstinacy, when children deliberately seek their own various means: endless requests and crying, whining, harassment, irritability, capriciousness, silence. Sooner or later parents give in to an assiduous child, they do not have enough patience to endure its purposeful stubbornness. However, hysterical children, as AI Zakharov believes, are most often with the same parents. The father and mother, often do not realize themselves in that report, are demanding and impatient, stick to the children at any minute, for any reason, react violently if their demands are not immediately fulfilled, read morally, threaten or intimidate. They are inclined to plan each step of the child, entangling it with a network of endless offers and instructions, and for some reason they are sure that they love their child.

Now let's perform a control task, which will be a kind of summation of the results read above.

First of all, be aware of the methods you use to influence the child:

1. I probably pinch my demands on the child.2. Sometimes I raise my voice to him.3. Sometimes I break off in communication with him: I speak rudely, sharply.4. I know, re-penok is afraid that I can punish him.5. Sometimes, I threatened my son( daughter) that I would not go home, take pleasure, punish him with a belt, put him in a corner.6. Sometimes, the child received from me a slap or an angry slap.7. I beat the child because he disobeyed, broke the order.8. I would beat my daughter if she became pregnant without being married.9. I must admit, I am categorical in communicating with the child, I speak mostly in a command tone.10. In our family everyone( almost everyone) likes to command each other.11. I catch myself on the fact that sometimes I read morals to my son( daughter).12. I sometimes get offended by an insulting word that humiliates the pride of my son( daughter): nedotepa, stupid, slobbery, etc.

And here are a few test situations showing your general tactic adopted in communicating with your son or daughter:

1. I guess, the child should be praised as little as possible, otherwise it will completely come out of obedience.2. I do not have time to select sensitive words and expressions in communication with the child - I say how it works.3. My attempts to influence my son( daughter) are usually ineffective.4. I rarely point out the child's positive qualities.5. The child - my what I want, then I will tell him what I want, so I will say.6. I always talk to my son( daughter) in an adult way, without discounts for a child.7. I often have to give a scolding to my son( daughter).8. I want friends to see how my child is obedient.

9. The husband has withdrawn from his upbringing, so I have to be tougher and more demanding.10. It is better to repeat the child once again a certain requirement, than to wait until he breaks it.11. When he was little, I just had to watch, how he would not do anything.12. I always have to remind my son( daughter) something: to come home in time, to fulfill the assignment, to sit for lessons, etc.

Now about the probable results of negative stimulation, if you resorted to it:

1. It seems to me,that the son( daughter) sometimes pretends to be stupid, unintelligent, in order to avoid the fulfillment of certain demands or punishments.2. My child is helpless, dependent.3. He is closed, uncommunicative, uncommunicative( usually or sometimes).4. A son( daughter) is rarely friends with "good" and "right" children.5. The more you demand from a child, the worse it turns out( the more stubborn).6. Perhaps, I "zatyukala" his child.7. When he was small, he was able to achieve his own stubbornness.8. It seems to me that the son( daughter) doubts his abilities.

Incorrect parenting tactics, negative stimulation in communication with the child can turn against you:

1. The son( daughter) sometimes comes to me.

2. My harsh words the child repeats in my address.

3. Sometimes it seems to me that he seems to be asking for rudeness, my sharp remark.4. He obeys only when you raise your voice.5. One hundred times it is necessary to repeat that the child has fulfilled the request.6. He is rude to me.7. The son( daughter) is cold, wary of me.8. It used to happen that a teenager wanted to leave the house.9. As a child, the child asked if I was his mother.