Child Discipline Research
Some interesting research from the Families Commission. Only 100 families involved, but still useful results:
The most common disciplinary techniques for under 5s were:
- Time Out 82%
- Distraction 77%
- Rewards 76%
- Praise 69%
- Withdraw Privileges 60%
- Reasoning 58%
- Smacking 41%
- Shouting 41%
- Ignoring 38%
- Hugs and Smiles 31%
- Make child apologise 18%
They also rated effectiveness:
- Time Out 43%
- Withdraw Privileges 30%
- Distraction 27%
- Rewards 24%
- Praise 11%
- Reasoning 10%
- Smacking 9%
- Hugs and Smiles 9%
- Shouting 5%
- Ignoring 5%
- Make child apologise 2%
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Tags: child discipline
October 16th, 2009 at 8:52 am
a smack on the bum from a loving parent to a wayward child is never an assault Mr Key.
October 16th, 2009 at 8:54 am
41% are smacking their Kids – good work Sue – 41% (more or less) of good parents have become criminals.
October 16th, 2009 at 8:57 am
The Families Commission is just another toothless tiger.
October 16th, 2009 at 8:58 am
I think these are quite positive results. Especially as presumably the shouting and smacking will vary from possibly a lot to very little. Most parents will smack their kids at some time, it’s a matter of how often and how.
October 16th, 2009 at 9:04 am
I wonder what techniques the Mongrel Mob use ? They were a family once too.
October 16th, 2009 at 9:29 am
sorry – didn’t read any more once I saw ‘research’ and ‘Families Commission’.
October 16th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Monty said: (edited)
41% are smacking their Kids – good work Sue and all of the National Party MPs as directed by John Key and Labour Party MPs as directed by Helen Clark (so many parallels) – 41% (more or less) of good parents have become criminals.
Isn’t it odd how good drivers become law-breakers the moment they exceed the speed limit! How easily that is done. Replies please from anyone who has never crosssed that line.
October 16th, 2009 at 9:36 am
VI
Did you really mean no replies at all to your comment?
I have crossed that line but want to add to your comment as it makes a very good point.
But can’t if I adhere to your admonishment!
October 16th, 2009 at 9:36 am
This could be useful for parents (some anyway) – it shows that we aren’t just a bunch of whackers, it shows that parents use a wide range of mainly non-violent methods of child discipline. That could encourage more parents to do likewise.
October 16th, 2009 at 9:43 am
Pete we all do and have done anyway, long before the socialist twats started to jump up and down.
That Key still sees his way to criminalise me and others for using whatever we options we see fit at the time as the experienced responsible people on the ground, instead of dealing to the people who bash, PI’s and Maori, according to Key at family First conference.
Pisses me off as he has clearly thought through the consequences on ordinary people and thinks it ok to screw around with families that work.
which is on Youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB83zVFs4Tk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7iMhIqvpQA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqaBxLgqpbw
JOHN KEY Q&A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZFVbK5EjRk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPEowEzpSxI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOkAthKQ8c4
October 16th, 2009 at 9:47 am
You cannot reason with an Under 5. Humans do not develop reasoning skills until at least the age of 7. Attempting to reason with someone that cannot reason just confuses them.
Young children need strong assertion and clearly defined boundaries.
October 16th, 2009 at 10:00 am
with a smack if the child warrants it, some don’t some do and the issue and situation (which may include environment over past little period) affect your decision at the time.
this isn’t a do as you’re told – smack – I thought I said – smack thing at all.
I recommend you watch the QA with Key right at the end he says it.
The Pi’s and Maori community leaders came to him and said you must change this law our people are bashing our kids and they won’t stop.
Utter lazy thinking by him and liberal reverse racism.
October 16th, 2009 at 10:28 am
The effectiveness (or otherwise) of any method is linked to the context – the situation and the age/stage of the child. As senzafine says, you can’t reason with a young child, while trying distraction with a child of 12 is likely to be equally ineffectual.
The bottom line is that kids benefit from safe and fair boundaries on their behaviour, respect for those enforcing those boundaries (which can be disolved by abuse of course) and an awareness that there are consequences for deliberately moving outside the boundaries.
Also, parents need to check their motives when directing kids to do stuff. Getting them to do the vacuuming because you’d rather not do it.. and then disciplining them when they don’t get busy isn’t on in my view.
October 16th, 2009 at 10:34 am
I wish in this debate we could really hear the specifics of people’s arguments rather than all this talk on “a socialist agenda”, or whatever. What is the issue? Is it simply that the state is attempting to intrude into what some feel is their domain only? Is it the attempt to give children human rights distinct from their parents? How hard is a smack? Does it cause a red welt, bruising, What implements can you use to give a smack? Is it intended purely to prevent a child putting him/herself in a situation of harm, or is used as ‘corporal punishment’, i.e. after the fact. The referendum was about a light smack as part of good parenting (note the loaded adjective ‘good’) — but now people in the media are suggesting we all voted to return corporal punisment or something? Is it OK for a parent to smack in anger?
As far as I have heard, the police have stated that parents that give their child a light smack will not be prosecuted. The law is intended to shut down the previous defence of “reasonable force”, meaning because of the vagueness of that definition, people committing obvious child abuse were getting away with it. Further, a child is not your property and society does have a right to ensure the child’s human rights are being upheld. I don’t think anybody has been prosecuted for a light smack now and then, correct me if I’m wrong. The cases I have heard have gone much further than that — hanging a child on a clothes line, beating with a stick. Be careful if you’re rushing to defend these people.
P.S. MikeNZ, I wish you would remove the NZ from your moniker, it does the country a disservice and we know we’re youre from based on your racist outlook.
October 16th, 2009 at 10:40 am
Emphasis mine. So in your view it’s fine to shoplift, but only illegal if you are prosecuted for it?
October 16th, 2009 at 10:41 am
I couldn’t give a fat rats arse what our brain dead government and the cowardly weasels in it are happy to support, when it comes to my family, my wife and myself make the laws. Shonkey and the National socialists are sell outs and dickheads to boot. So how many millions have the family commission spent on complying this piece of treacle. If the family commission and it’s stupid supporting government believe a piece of legislation will fix all that is wrong in the world then the bastards have rocks in there heads.
October 16th, 2009 at 11:10 am
Only 100 families involved? Clearly the Families Commission needs additional funding, to undertake such important studies.
I have almost no faith in surveys*. Particularly long ones. In my experience, even when I try to complete them in earnest, I get bored after the 10th question and go faster and faster to get it done and stop thinking about my answers. I also try to look cleverer and kinder than I really am. I particularly dislike the ones which ask you to rate a statement from “Strongly Agree” to “Strongly Disagree”. Invariable they swap the order at some stage but I don’t notice and complete the survey in completely the wrong order.
The only surveys I trust are the ones undertaken by condom/toothpaste/biscuit/chocolate/underwear manufacturers and which are then written up as stories in the newspaper.
*I haven’t read the report. I suspect the Families Commission do something more elaborate and expensive than a simple survey. Certainly more expensive.
October 16th, 2009 at 11:12 am
“he cases I have heard have gone much further than that — hanging a child on a clothes line, beating with a stick. Be careful if you’re rushing to defend these people.”
BlackMoss, rather than launch into personal attacks on MikeNZ try reading your own post. Not of those opposed to to this law telling good parents how to parent support hanging a child on a clothes line. I hope you are not referring to the 3 year old girl that was murdered.
If you do not know the difference between a smack open the bum with an open hand and abuse you should not be telling others how to parent.
October 16th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
Family First Media Release –
October 16th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
Not really, most parents do their best but I think most would also admit they are not experts, especially when they first become parents. And most parents would welcome information that would help them be better parents.
October 16th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
The one thing that all this research fails to take into account is the individual temperament of children. There is no one size fits all technique in parenting a child. I have raised 3 and each one responded to different modes of discipline. One of my children would not respond to anything other than a smack – although I never spank my children without an explanation in terms they could understand. He was clearly and willfully defiant – but for him, he needed to know where the line was and whether mum and dad would follow through on the consequences if he crossed it. Oddly enough he was the happiest after those times of challenging his parents rules and losing.
One of my children I can’t recall ever having to spank, while the third only rarely needed a bit of a warm-up… One thing that I have to point out is that after the age of 7 we rarely had any need to spank or discipline our children. Now they are all young adults, very little trouble with them through the teenage years and they are all happy, healthy, independently thinking, well adjusted human beings.
I was always a hard disciplinarian – My children are not the center of the universe and the sun didn’t shine from their butts at birth. My view is children are born cute narcissists. Their first learning is total self centeredness, which is natural given that they are totally dependent on their parents. Discipline teaches them how to relate to the world outside of themselves and that in this world actions have consequences… some of which are very hard indeed. However you have to balance discipline with love and laughter – neither of which were in short supply in my home.
Finally as a footnote, the child I needed to discipline most often… well he’s off into a military career. He just can’t stomach weak minded undisciplined people who moan about how hard life is because they didn’t get an x-box for christmas.
October 16th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
“And most parents would welcome information that would help them be better parents.”
Help like Dr Benjamin Spock gave parents before he realised he got it wrong?
October 16th, 2009 at 1:32 pm
I find it fascinating that the Greens want to tell the 99% of parents who do not kill or abuse their kids how they should raise them yet we NEVER hear a word from the Greens when a Mowree child is killed or abused.
October 16th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Spock’s best selling book had a revolutionary message to mothers – “you know more than you think you do.”
Power to the parents – do you disagree with that Chuck?
“His ideas about childcare influenced several generations of parents to be more flexible and affectionate with their children, and to treat them as individuals..”
What is wrong about that?
“Some have seen Spock as the leader in the move toward more permissive parenting in general and have blamed him for what they perceived as being the negative results. Spock’s supporters believed that these criticisms betrayed an ignorance of what Spock had actually written, and/or a political bias against Spock’s left-wing political activities. Spock himself, in his autobiography, pointed out that he had never advocated permissiveness”
October 16th, 2009 at 2:07 pm
Pete, I do not have his book here to argue bits and pieces. However, I understand that he changed his view on a number of major points. There is nothing wrong with an expert or anyone else changing their mind because of new evidence. However, if the experts get things wrong they do not have to live with the results – the parents do. Neither do sue Bradford or Helen Clark. I do not think either of them could demonstrate their skill at being good parents.
October 16th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
Chuck, as a non expert parent I changed my view as I learned new things – and learned from successes and failures.
I have no idea what Bradford’s parenting skills would be like, I presume she has learned too. No one knows what Clark’s parenting skills would be like, presuming they are currently the same as mine were when I first became a parent – nil. Actually for all I know she may have some experience with children, I had none when I started.
October 16th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
I had some great parenting skills from well before I became a parent. My own parents modeled loving care, consideration, respect for me and each other, and they set fair and enforced fair boundaries. They used different forms of discipline to suit the context an issue, and for my age-and-stage. Most significantly the loved me unconditionally. As I grew old enough to have ‘adult-like’ conversations that explained how and why they did things they way they did.
October 16th, 2009 at 2:38 pm
USEFUL?……….I would say it is all expensive irrelevant nonsense showing nothing.
October 16th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
getstaffed, I concede the point, a law charge is arguable to specifically allow a certain level of smacking in my view. You would have to be careful with the definition. I still highlight the lack of discussion about what people think consititutes a smack.
On another tangent, how do smacking advocates reconcile being allowed to smack children with the fact that if you apply any form of violence to another adult, you could be charged with assault?
Also, the existence of even one well-rounded, successful individual brought up without smacking shows that it can logically be done. The argument I s’pose is that all children are different–the more relevant perspective I would say, is that all parent’s are different, meaning that there is a danger of fulfilling a self-fulfilling prophecy if you insist that it is necessary to smack your children sometimes, because in such a declaration you are assuming other methods would fail.
Mind you, its not my bag to criticize parents who are stretched to try alternatives when their children are failing to respond to other methods and are being difficult. I mean there are some particularly difficult ages, I’m sure. By the same token, though, I am puzzled while some people seem so hostile towards some of the other non-violent methods of discipline…
October 16th, 2009 at 3:18 pm
I don’t think that its that people are hostile to other forms of discipline, more that they’re hostile to being told that they cannot use something which has been prevalent in every culture at all times since humanity was borne.
What they object to, is that they are being told to ignore thousands of years worth of instinct.
October 16th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Next they’ll be telling us not to eat things that don’t belong to us, or not to force unwanted sexual advances on people. It’s political correctness gone maaaaaaaad.
October 16th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
Pete George 1:14 pm,
You raise an important point, Cerium.
We, as a society, are being told that to do basically anything, or to hold any particular view, that ‘we’ must seek advice from so called ‘experts’, or ‘professionals’.
So rather than being encouraged to be self reliant, we have to seek out advice, and opinions, from those ‘who know better’ than we do. Ultimately these ‘experts’ are sanctioned by the state. Simply saying that I’m a good parent and I apply common sense (and perhaps Biblical principles) is not sufficient to counter the ’state sanctioned wisdom’. The Bradford Abomination further weights the might of the state above the wisdom of good parents in how children are to be raised.
Increasingly it will be those that make the laws; politicians, those that enforce the laws; government agents (CYFs , police, courts), and those that are regarded as the ‘experts’ (Phsychologists, Sociologists, Families Commission, et al) who will shape how children are rasied, and the values they are to hold.
As a result, the future of our nation looks very glum indeed.
October 16th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Kris,
I believe Chomsky refers to this as the rise of the technocrats. They wave their magic hands over something and tell you it is now safe and good.
October 16th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
I think it is parents in the early childhood period of an upbringing that shapes how children grow up more than anything – relatively free of state dictate.
The problem we have with the state is as much our fault as the state’s. Any time there is a bad case of abuse or mistreatment the public demands that the problem is fixed, prevented from recurring. But it’s very difficult to have laws that target only the problem parents and don’t impinge on normal good parenting in it’s many forms. So the state reacts as best it can and then we find that it potentially may affect all of us.
If all citizens were good and law abiding we wouldn’t need laws, and if we weren’t so demanding of solutions we may not get so many.
October 16th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Pete George 3:34 pm,
The thing is Cerium, the laws, prior to repealing Sect. 59, were more than adequate in their ability to differentiate between ‘child abuse’ and parents going about their everyday lives and raising their children.
It is only the slack enforcing of what were existing laws that has lead to the public outcry for government to do something. This is clear when one considers the (86% against) high lack of support for the Bradford Bill. One also only needs to look back to the 70s and earlier to see that the status quo worked exceedingly well.
I blame liberal, left wing, socialist politicians and judiciary as the primary reason for the mess our society is in today. Our society has systematically disempowered parents, and those that held high moral standards, and then, essentially, blamed them for the mess society is in today. Shame on these liars!
October 16th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Kris K, I’m not going to disagree with some of the points you raise about our society relying too much on a technocratic approach (Adam Curtis’s BBC documentaries are great viewing on this). But I just don’t share this doom and gloom aspect of NZ today-I’m quite happy apart from a few financial fears. The reality is NZ is a much different place now — lots of different social groups with different aspirations, different backgrounds, and perhaps not the same kind of homogenous society of the 70s. If I were a homosexual, a maori or a woman, I imagine I would have more freedoms now than back then.
October 16th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
getstaffed asks:
I can answer that easily. No, I don’t think it’s fine to shoplift, but only because I’ve asked myself the question from a moral standpoint and reached my own conclusion that it’s wrong to take something that is not mine.
That’s because my life experiences have taught me to believe, as Alan Wilkinson so brilliantly summarised here on Kiwiblog:
(I swear I’m going to have that printed on a t-shirt).
When it became apparent that those who make our laws are self-serving, incapable of honesty and willing to prostitute our trust; when those administering it are just another gang, but with better uniforms and weapons; and when our “justice” system results in outcomes no sane or just person could possibly countenance, I decided to live my life according to principle, not law.
Principles and morality tell me it is wrong to steal: thus I won’t steal. It also tells me that parents should be free to raise their children as they see fit, provided that they do so in a reasonable manner. Reasonableness is mostly easier to determine than those in power care to admit – if I slapped your hand you’d probably decide I wasn’t a desirable dinner companion but I doubt you’d run to the police. If I hung you from a clothesline and beat you, you would – and I’d deserve to be punished.
Instead of fretting about whether we’re abiding by laws passed by scoundrels and enforced by thugs, we should simply do what we know to be right, and let others judge us on that. And if that judgment falls to a jury, so be it; I am reasonably confident in the common sense of ordinary New Zealanders – a confidence our politicians clearly do not share.
October 16th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
Rex your position makes sense only if we have common values as we can’t reply on common sense if we don’t have common values can we?
BlackMoss
– I am a NZ citizen equal to any other and used to be a racist etc etc (you put what you want there) before 1993, now I am not, I like Rex hate hypocrites like those in the National Government right now.
– A child is not a little adult, it is a child and under 5yrs a child can’t be reasoned with as has been posted somewhere else today.
- The details you ask for have been done to death on this blog before over sec 59 and what is smacking, go look in the archives.
You’ve come late to the discussion go back to plunket or barnados.
A smack on the bum from a loving parent to a wayward child is never assault.
October 16th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
eStrata – Good comment. And welcome!
October 16th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
BlackMoss 4:46 pm,
I really do see it as “doom and gloom”. I believe the moral decline within society far outweighs any financial fears we may have. We manage to get through recessions. But if our society has no moral foundation then we are unlikely to recover from that without a major philosophical change in our values system; sadly, I don’t see that happening any time soon, if at all.
The only people I see who have benefited from NZ being “a much different place now”, is those with a philosophy at great variance to the majority of NZers who still hold high morals and family values. Amongst those ‘beneficiaries’ are; homosexuals, radical feminsts, Maori radicals, green extremists (Gaia worshippers), Muslims who refuse to intergrate into NZ society and view NZ as nothing more than a future Islamic enclave, and any others who go against what used to be strong, moral, NZ values.
October 16th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
MikeNZ,
> I am a NZ citizen equal to any other and used to be a racist etc etc (you put what you want there) before 1993, now I am not, I like Rex hate hypocrites like those in the National Government right now.
-Well stop going on about the Maori and the Pacific Islanders like they’re the only groups that commit child abuse, white people do it too, so Ive heard. Those born in the islands would know quiet a lot about discipline I would say.
> A child is not a little adult, it is a child and under 5yrs a child can’t be reasoned with as has been posted somewhere else today.
-I’ve not raised a child, but I would argue a child of 4 years old and younger would know when they are doing wrong, I would expect them to have a concept of guilt about doing wrong as well.
>The details you ask for have been done to death on this blog before over sec 59 and what is smacking, go look in the archives.
-Fair enough, I’m after live debate though.
October 16th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
eStrata 1:14 pm,
Isn’t it interesting that the most wilful of your three children, the one who needed the more ’severe’ discipline to bring him into line, has opted for a military career; perhaps one of the most disciplined and structured vocational choices one could make.
And welcome, indeed.
October 16th, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Kris K,
I’m picking we’re going to have to agree to disagree about this one, but in my view the extremists are actually quite a small group of people, most people I meet tend towards being moderate and just want to be able to live their life in peace. A lot of young people I meet are refreshingly moral in their outlook, i.e. many seem concerned for the environment, cynical of corporate motives, and not as obsessed with money as we all were back in the 80s. In the 1970s NZ was mainly set up in particular for one part of society, white (heterosexual) males–rugby, racing and beer and all that… I think its positive that we’re now a more cosmopolitan place.
October 16th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
MikeNZ says:
Quite true. But I think on a huge range of issues the majority of NZers do have common values – as was demonstrated in regard to parental rights and freedoms on the S59 issue. “Grey” areas tend to arise where a minority wishes to live differently to the majority, but NZ has now shifted to a point where the majority will tolerate that provided the minority do not expect special treatment or tries to enforce its belief on others – the shift on homosexuality being a prime example.
The problem we have is that Parliament was, once upon a time, designed as a House of Representatives. It has not been that in a long time, however, morphing into an exclusive club of people who think that their ability to lickspittle their way into a safe seat preselection or a party list ranking invests them with greater wisdom than the hoi polloi.
Parliament used to make laws to regulate the “grey” areas that refelected the common values of the time, and protected the rights and freedoms of citizens from the capriciousness of a Monarch. Now it has become our capricious, unheeding ruler, intent on giving it’s police force greater powers to spy upon, arrest, and interrogate its own people.
In the main we have common values, yes. It’s just that they’re not shared by the people we elect to give effect to them.
October 16th, 2009 at 6:41 pm
Thank you Rex
I concur.
What can we do to redress the situation as I see it people can only lose hope with the way things are going.
October 16th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Black Moss
Clearly You are new here.
Today I went on about Pi and Maori because that was what John Key said at the family first conference recently (for the first time publicly), showing his (and his parties) reverse racism.
I have been a community policing officer (refering to the child protection unit and social workers), so understand full well the cross socioeconomic, gender, psychobabble of who is a victim of physical/emotional/sexual abuse, you assume much.
Did you go and look at the youtube vids of what he said and the Q/A that I posted elsewhere on this blog, if not go and do that. Though it won’t change what he’s done in breaking the social contract with NZ voters as Rex has so eloquently explained.
Is see from your answer you don’t know what you are talking about and are coming from a predetermined position, so I won’t bother answering as I don’t want to waste my breath.
So I’m not after Live debate, it has been done to death here since last year.
I want to get the lazy thinkers and reverse racists out of parliament and properly thoughht through law written.
October 16th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
@Kris K:
Should we replace them with experts sanctioned by the church? That used to be the way things worked…
October 16th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
What appears to be overlooked in much of the online debate about child discipline is that “discipline” is only a tiny part of the relationship between parent and child. Also overlooked is that child discipline is not an activity that is seperate (in the way that taking the car for a WOF is seperate) from the entire relationship between parent and child. Taken further, child discipline cannot be seperated from the relationship between the child, parent and cohort community.
October 16th, 2009 at 7:27 pm
Repton 7:16 pm,
Depends on which church.
You wouldn’t want the Catholic Church for instance, or one headed by a fruitloop like Benny Hinn.
But, in general terms at least, I like your thinking. Definitely worth further consideration.
Get back to me with more specific suggestions and we’ll review it.
October 16th, 2009 at 7:32 pm
Today at the supermarket I watched a “white trash” grandma attempting to control her ?5 year old grandchild who was sitting on the front of the trolley and giving her grief with noise and squirming. Neither looked like Mensa types, but who am I to discriminate? We are all equal and one law for all etc.
Their conversation went thus; You little fucker…I’ll break your fucking arm if ya don’t shuddup. I told ya, pull ya fuckin head in …. jesus, wait till ya bloody mother gets home… christ you’re asking for a bloody bash … wait till that cunt gets home ..she’ll fuckin do ya. …… and so on.
Now, that woman and I have something in common. We are both parents who believe that smacking a child is a valid means of child control. However, she is a low bred breeder of useless stock who wouldn’t know a nuance or reasonable thought if she fell into a hole with one. The antismacking law will have no effect whatsoever on her family or mine because, for our own reasons, she will not notice it and I will ignore it. Funny; my child is prospering, hers will not.
October 16th, 2009 at 7:40 pm
noodle 7:32 pm,
So when are CYFs going to visit the grandmother?
And people like this are actually permitted to breed, surely not?
October 16th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
noodle – the granny you describe is not the mother and can’t smack the child.
October 16th, 2009 at 7:44 pm
Kris – sounds as though that grandmother had a Christian up-bringing, given her use of Jesus’ name and title.
October 16th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
VI,
When I was a child, if I stepped out of line granny, aunt, or uncle would likely give me a smack as well.
Yeah, that woman obviously had a very close relationship with Jesus.
October 16th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
MikeNZ asks:
I have a long and convoluted answer involving a raft of interconnected political and constitutional changes which would probably fall on mostly deaf ears here (and on pretty much any other political blog where people tend to arrive with their POV fully formed and enter into debate with those whose POV differs).
Not that there’s anything wrong with that (as they say) but it’d bore most of DPF’s readers to death I suspect, and I don’t want to threadjack his blog. Perhaps when I get some time I’ll take up the suggestion many people have made and start blogging myself, thus being able to pontificate into a vacuum
October 16th, 2009 at 9:07 pm
Kris K “so when are CYFs going to visit the grandma? They will probably not visit her at all. But they will intervene when the child is admitted to Starship with diseases and/or injuries and talk to the mother, aunties and hangers-on who congregate to smoke outside the unit when not directly needed to attend to the child and need a fag. They, the family, tend to know the system and speak quite confidently about treatments and procedures that the average well person knows nothing about.
The security guards at A+E do a bloody good job keeping parking order and taking care of violence etc. They also quite rightly “allow” patient attendees to smoke outside. I have spent much time fagging and chatting late at night with these relatives of “sick” children and have come to understand that their standard of child care and upbringing is vastly different to mine. Ducking rain on a hospital entranceway at 3am to have a fag with all comers does tend to be an eyeopener for some. I can judge, but can also see. Can you?
October 16th, 2009 at 9:12 pm
Kris said:
When I was a child, if I stepped out of line granny, aunt, or uncle would likely give me a smack as well.
Ah!
Got it now.
October 17th, 2009 at 7:35 am
DPF
Can you start a thread that Rex can put his convoluted solution to the problem of a govt breaking the social contract with it’;s voters?
October 17th, 2009 at 9:38 am
“DPF
Can you start a thread that Rex can put his convoluted solution to the problem of a govt breaking the social contract with it’;s voters?”
Ditto.
October 17th, 2009 at 10:00 am
From Stuff this morning “A principal is pleading for extra support in primary schools after an out-of-control 10-year-old bit a chunk of flesh from her shin and attacked two other staff.”
See its working. Not disciplining our children, teaching them that smacking is wrong and bad and that there arent any conseqences for your actions, is allowing our children to be a gentler,kinder generation. Yeah right!
October 17th, 2009 at 10:04 am
PS. I would love to know what tool/process was used to measure the ‘effectiveness’ of the disciplinary techniques.
October 17th, 2009 at 11:09 am
I was on a school board and have to say I felt the ministry was a poor employer towards the teachers.
all smoke and mirrors
the bot had no power really it was all controlled at minedu and principal and teachers union.
the way the special needs families had to play politics with the principal was atrocious (he was a bully, one with a big smile)
infact that whole area is fcking awful esp for families with kids on the margins of the so called rules. kids still touched but not eligible or partially.
should either fully fund and stop fcking around or have special schools where assets can be used better for their needs.
then there were all the hoops the staff and principal had to jump through to discipline the naughty kids.
the worst ones were like that because of home environment and lack of parenting skills
and to actually say bugger off is so tortuarse
and what about the poor school FORCED to take a kid expelled from another school with no way to say to minedu Bugger off!
incident waiting to happen.
poor sods.
no we need to break and sack all the liberal leftys in minedu, ero, nzqa, principals and teachers unions, parliament and get some common sense back into the system.
I don’t see that happening under Key to be honest, as he’s labourlite sadly.
October 17th, 2009 at 11:59 am
MikeNZ,
My apologies, I did jump to an assumption about your racial views. I can see that your views are based on a lot of personal experience so won’t try to pretend I know more about these things than you do. You should remember that this is an open public forum, and so it would be wise to be careful when making blanket statements about race.
I don’t disagree with common sense by any means so maybe our views aren’t that far apart on some things.
October 17th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Black Moss
Thank you for the apology, this country is on a downward slide and unless the middle ground wake up and act it will be very hard to undo and to do so will be hurtful.
The real sadness is before this ideological lot got inveigled into place there were some really good people guiding the whole shebang.
Now it is a different ball game and the good people are outnumbered or outmaneuvered by the ideologues, who support each other.
I am not an expert just an ordinary guy, but common sense is common sense (when you have common values).
Unlike parliament I do trust the New Zealand heartland, 80+% is 80+%.
So why do we vote these wankers in?
October 17th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Greater resources to the front line, and less for the central idealogues seems a good start eh.
October 17th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
Yes maybe, but why do we vote these wankers in?