Are You a "Curling Parent?"
Many of you who watched the last Winter Olympics became captivated by the curious sport of Curling, where players slide a stone across a sheet of ice towards a target area. Probably the oddest looking aspect of the sport are the “Sweepers” whose job it is to sweep ahead of the stone to reduce friction and allow the stone to travel further and to stay straighter.
Danish psychologist Bent Hougaard coined the term “Curling Parent” to refer to those parents who insist on sweeping everything that may get in the way of their child, their own polished stone. Such parents are excessive hoverers, continually making sure that nothing is interfering with or negatively affecting their child. They are always sweeping.
Another term that even the colleges are referring to with increased frequency are “Lawnmower Parents.” Like the Curlers, the Lawnmower Parents look to smooth down and mow over all obstacles that could be in the young person’s path. Such parents may attempt to call the college professors about their child receiving an unsatisfactory grade. Lawnmower parents have even been reported to interfere with the salary negotiations once the child becomes an adult.
Modern parenting has countered what it believes to be the sins of the previous generation’s parenting style.
Have we placed the pendulum too far on the other side? Are we accommodating, modifying, smoothing and making nice to the child’s detriment?
It would certainly seem that a bit of “dusting oneself off” (to borrow a dated term from another generation) and getting back in the game may be of great value to most kids as a life’s lesson.
Tags: Parenting, Parenting Styles
Comments
"Curling??"
It's kind of funny cause my first reaction to reading this article was... oh, if I could only do that, wouldn't my daughter's life and mine be so much easier! Ok, that was very honest of me wasn't it.. then I slapped myself silly... are you kidding me.
Shoot, life is hard. My daughter had ADD. We struggle daily, weekly and hourly. It's like a merry-go-round that spins at times slow and sometimes very fast. But we are all on our own paths, unique and never-ending learning paths. I have always liked to think that the older we get, the easier it becomes, but not necessarily. New learning experiences for any aged person require, yes mistakes, and recovery. The deepest learning experiences comes from those where we make mistakes, learn to solve and recover.
Those recovery skills are absoutely invaluable!!!
They send up red flags in our brain processing, allow us to instantly, at lightening speed, make changes in our behavior for the future. If we prevent our children to not experience those frustrating situations, those mistakes and learn those recovery skills, we are truely robbing them of life. I am in a constant "review and plan" process with my, soon, 9 year old daughter. Review the immediate past and plan for the immediate future. One step at a time for both of us, paused ever so often with a time out for both of us from the big game of life.
I do see how some parents make it easier for their children. I am a teacher as well. "Supporting" children has become a substitution for compensating for not spending time with them. The state of the economy has pushed more parents to working, children the afterschool care or daycare, and parents want to overcompensate for time not spent with their kids. I get this, but do it in other ways. Throw a frozen dinner in the oven, make a quick salad, turn off the TV and phones and read on the couch with your child.
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