Archive for the ‘Child Welfare’ Category

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Issues Relating to Kids and Video Games

January 3, 2012

 

Excessive video game use and high rates of video game addiction lead to much anguish from concerned parents. Many parents never saw the addictive pull of video games as an issue when they bought consoles for their kids or allowed them to have a computer in their bedrooms. I read a very interesting piece by writer, Scott Steinberg, on the major issues relating to children and video games.

He examines some of the most common concerns parents have about video games:

– Amount of Play Time
– Age Appropriateness
– Health and Obesity
– Addiction
– Safety Concerns
– Violence, Aggression and Misbehavior

The issue of particular interest to me was the video game addiction section. Video game addiction is not a term we hear very often, but I’m afraid it will be widely familiar in the next few years.

  • Addiction– For some kids, there is a real danger of becoming too involved in playing games, or even in living too much of their lives in the virtual world of the Internet. In rare cases, true symptoms of addiction can develop, and such kids can require direct help from their parents, peers, and professionals to have a healthy, balanced life. While a change of environment and routine can sometimes be enough to break kids out of an addictive mindset, the reality is that it’s hard to prohibit kids from using technology on a regular basis, since it’s such an integral part of daily life. Many experts encourage parents to become more engaged in the addictive activity in an effort to better understand the problem and prospective solutions. They also encourage families to seek out professional help should children exhibit warning signs of addiction. Several of these warning signs, according to the Search Institute, an independent non-profit organization dedicated to creating healthy communities, and other sources, include:
  • Playing for increasing amounts of time
  • Lying to family and friends about video game usage
  • Thinking about gaming during other activities
  • Using video games to escape from real-life problems or bad feelings, as well as anxiety or depression
  • Becoming restless or irritable when attempting to stop playing video games
  • Skipping homework in order to play video games
  • Doing poorly on a school assignment or test because of time spent playing video games

I urge parents to spot the signs before the addiction gets completely out of hand. It may even be worth reading Mr. Steinberg’s book, “The Modern Parent’s Guide to Kids and Video Games,” which will be free to download at www.ParentsGuideBooks.com in February 2012.

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Posted in Child Welfare, Parenting | 3 Comments »

Parents’ Stress Damaging the Development of Their Children

December 22, 2011

Author David Code goes beyond warning parents about the effect their stress has on the lives of his children. He even blames their stress for “damaging their development and altering their DNA, because of crushing worry and anxiety.”

“Stress is highly contagious,” says David Code, an Episcopal minister and author of Kids Pick Up on Everything: How Parental Stress is Toxic to Kids. “Parental stress can weaken the development of a child’s brain or immune system, increasing the risk of allergies, obesity, or mental disorders.”

So calm down and socialize more. Resolve to start the new year with peace on hearth – it’s not only good for your health but your children’s physical and mental health too.

If you really want to make your kids happier, forgo the Xbox or iPad and invite friends over. The greatest gift you can give your children is your own, healthy relationships with other adults, Code says.

“That Xbox or iPad will placate the kids for a while, but soon they’ll demand even more. Far better to take the kids over to your friend’s house – you and your friend can relax with a drink while both sets of kids entertain each other. That means better social skills for your children, and lower stress levels for you as you ‘scratch that primal itch’ to bond, which reduces your stress,” he adds.

According to Code, research shows children can catch their parents’ stress just like they catch a virus. “Children are like little sponges, soaking up the free-floating stress in today’s anxious households until their developing nervous systems hit overload, at which point they act out, or develop symptoms of mental or physical illness.”

The mind-body connection strongly factors into almost every child’s behaviour –the parent’s mind affects their child’s body “through a kind of emotional pipeline,” Code says. The more stress a kid picks up from the parent, the more ill health – even if the parent is unaware of his or her own anxiety.

Personally I think Code goes over the top with the prognostications of DNA damage but I agree with his main contention. There is no doubt that stress from parents has effects on their offspring.

Code offers the following advice:

Steps to raise healthier kids, according to author David Code:

• Set up a no-screens-after-5 p.m. night: Turn off all screens, big and small and socialize.

• Socialize more with other parents while your kids play together. “If I could wave my magic wand and reduce the stress of today’s parents, I would give them a glass of wine, a friend, and an Italian village square to go socialize in every evening.”

• Bring on the potluck: Once a week dine with friends. “Since you have to make dinner anyway, a weekly potluck doesn’t suck that much time away from your current schedule.”

• Exercise with your spouse. Build muscle and your marriage too. “It’s easier to discuss tough topics and get emotional when you’re side by side on the treadmill or jogging down the street. It’s easier to be emotional in motion.” Even a short evening stroll together is great marital maintenance.

• Take a vacation every three months for a complete change of pace and a healthier family.

• Practice the daily vacation – lunch hour. “Instead of building stress over eight hours, you’ll start over again after lunch and not get so wound up by quitting time.”

• Establish the one-minute instant intimacy builder with your spouse. “When you both get home from work, while changing or preparing dinner, share your highlight and ‘lowlight’ of the day. Try to focus on one moment in time,” he says, adding that sharing one specific lowlight each day builds bonds because we won’t feel so alone in our suffering.

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Scaring Our Children Senseless

November 9, 2011

It is the responsibility of parents and teachers to protect children and educate them on the dangers that exist in the ‘real world’.  However, in attempting to prepare children for incidents and scenarios that are unlikely to happen we have seemingly created a fear and paranoia that has proven quite destructive to the same children we are trying to protect.

A surge in reports of men acting suspiciously near schoolchildren has triggered urgent talks between schools and police, who fear the ‘‘stranger danger’’ message has gone into overdrive.

Police say heightened fears of children being stalked on Gold Coast streets are unfounded, and the increase in reports is the result of people jumping at shadows after a rash of incorrect media stories.

Regional Crime Coordinator Dave Hutchinson says some incidents are made up, and others are cases of children taking fright for no good reason.

I am a bit concerened at how scared and anxious our children are becoming, and teachers are slightly to blame.  Besides stranger danger and other programes that inhabit fear in students, many teachers in Australia have been scaring children with doom and gloom predictions about global warming.  No matter what your position is on this issue, it is important that teachers instruct, educate and empower children, instead of frighten or demoralise them.

There is a huge difference between helping students become perceptive, instinctive and responsible and helping them to  become fearful and paranoid.

At the end of the day, the importance of the message is lost when it inspires an irrational and overpowering fear.

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Posted in Child Welfare | 3 Comments »

Sexual Harassment Rampant in Schools

November 7, 2011

Just when you thought that respect for girls and women was on the marked improve comes yet another reminder that things are not what they seem:

During the 2010-11 school year, 48 percent of students in grades 7-12 experienced some form of sexual harassment in person or electronically via texting, email and social media, according to a major national survey being released Monday by the American Association of University Women.

 The harassers often thought they were being funny, but the consequences for their targets can be wrenching, according to the survey. Nearly a third of the victims said the harassment made them feel sick to their stomach, affected their study habits or fueled reluctance to go to school at all.

The survey, conducted in May and June, asked 1,002 girls and 963 boys from public and private schools nationwide whether they had experienced any of various forms of sexual harassment. These included having someone make unwelcome sexual comments about them, being called gay or lesbian in a negative way, being touched in an unwelcome sexual way, being shown sexual pictures they didn’t want to see, and being the subject of unwelcome sexual rumors.

The survey quoted one ninth-grade girl as saying she was called a whore “because I have many friends that are boys.” A 12th-grade boy said schoolmates circulated an image showing his face attached to an animal having sex.

In all, 56 percent of the girls and 40 percent of the boys said they had experienced at least one incident of sexual harassment during the school year.

After being harassed, half of the targeted students did nothing about it. Of the rest, some talked to parents or friends, but only 9 percent reported the incident to a teacher, guidance counselor or other adult at school, according to the survey.

In my view there are two main reasons for this disturbing set of figures:

1.  Schools have become hamstrung when it comes to access to appropriate and effective consequences for infringements such as bullying and harassment.  Call the parents?  No big deal.  They gave up long ago.  Suspensions?  Nowadays you get a suspension for talking out of turn.  Suspensions have lost their impact because they are metered out out too readily.  In the end, no punishment given seems to come close to matching the crime.

2.  Schools have been notorious at turning a blind eye to incidents.  I am not talking about all schools, yet in truth, plenty goes under this category.  Teachers have been taught not to get emotionally involved with their students.  The result being, an emotional distance which inhibits the teachers capacity to pick up on these things,  Teachers must have enough of a connection with their students (within the obvious professional parameters of course), as to notice when things are not right with their them.  They are intrusted to look after their students and must do so by being proactive.  Kids are told from an early age not to dob on a classmate.  If teachers wait around for things to get reported to them, they will miss the opportunity to intervene and change a potentially abusive situation.

We must expect schools to be proactive with harassment.  They must be able to use tough and uncompromising punishments and show enough of an interest in students as to detect a problem before it gets completely out of hand.

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Posted in Child Welfare | 3 Comments »

Meet the Parents Who Named Their Kids “Adolph Hitler” and “Aryan Nation”

October 27, 2011

How sick and utterly selfish do you have to be to name your beautiful children “Adolph Hitler” and “Aryan Nation”?  What an absolute disgrace!  These parents can’t understand why their children were taken away from them.  It’s  a shame that they haven’t as yet worked out that by naming their children after despicable tyrants and murderous regimes they are in fact scarring their children for life.

Is this not a clear case of child abuse?

A COUPLE who named one of their children after Adolf Hitler should not regain custody of their three children, an appeals court has ruled.

Heath and Deborah Campbell’s three small children were removed from their home in Phillipsburg, New Jersey, by the state in January 2009, myFOXphilly.com reported.

The family drew world-wide attention after a store refused to decorate a birthday cake for their son, Adolf Hitler Campbell.

Adolf and siblings JoyceLynn Aryan Nation and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie have been in foster care since then.

The appeals court ruled last week that sufficient evidence of abuse or neglect existed because of domestic violence in the home. The court sent the case back to family court for further reconsideration.

A gag order remains in place and the parties refused to discuss the decision.

In January 2009, the Campbells told myFOXphilly.com that Adolf Hitler Campbell was just like any other three-year-old boy.

“It’s not like he’s growing up to be a killer or nothing like that,” said mother Deborah Campbell.

How dare they do this to their beautiful children!  Sure, it is claimed that the children have been taken out of their parents’ custody because of domestic abuse and not because of their names, but what if there was no other reasons?  Should the names be enough to warrant a claim of child abuse.

If these people want to continue rearing their precious children they better smarten their act.  This includes thinking of more appropriate names for their kids … quick smart!

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Posted in Child Welfare | 5 Comments »

Protecting Kids From Living Freely

October 10, 2011

I am an over-protective father and proud of it.  I am hesitant when my daughter takes any risks and hate to see her in discomfort.  Yet, at the same time, I realise that cuts and grazes are part of life and growing up.  You can’t shadow your child in the playground to prevent them from tripping and you can’t ban them from low-risk activities on the off-chance that something might occur.

That is why I am so opposed to the persistent interference by Governments and local councils in banning everyday activities.  It is not their place to decide what toy my child should play with.  They may choose to advise me about the risks and encourage me to supervise my child with graet care, but the constant banning is taking things too far.

It is such a shame that we live in an age where children are being banned from blowing balloons and playing with whistles:

The EU toy safety directive, agreed and implemented by Government, states that balloons must not be blown up by unsupervised children under the age of eight, in case they accidentally swallow them and choke.

Despite having been popular favourites for generations of children, party games including whistles and magnetic fishing games are to be banned because their small parts or chemicals used in making them are decreed to be too risky.

Apparently harmless toys that children have enjoyed for decades are now regarded by EU regulators as posing an unacceptable safety risk.

Whistle blowers, that scroll out into a long coloured paper tongue when sounded – a party favourite at family Christmas meals – are now classed as unsafe for all children under 14.

As well as new rules for balloons and party whistles, the EU legislation will impose restrictions on how noisy toys, including rattles or musical instruments, are allowed to be.

All teddy bears meant for children under the age of three will now have to be fully washable because EU regulators are concerned that dirty cuddly toys could spread disease and infection.

The EU and other Government bodies will continue to come up with irrational and overbearing legislation, but no matter how hard they try they will never be my child’s parent.

 

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Laws That Seek To Protect Our KIds Fail Them

October 9, 2011

The same laws that seek to protect children are being severely undermined by a total lack of common sense.

Australia has a sexual offender registry which was designed to assist the government authorities to keep track of the residence and activities of sex offenders.  You don’t have to be Einstein to realise that being on that list is detrimental to that person’s ability to get a job, loan, sense of freedom and quality of life.

The registry is a vital tool in dealing with pedophiles.  That is why I was astounded to read that children caught ‘sexting’ photos of themselves or friends have been put on this very list:

HUNDREDS of teenagers have been charged over producing or distributing child pornography amid growing concern that “sexting” has reached epidemic levels.

In the past three years, more than 450 child pornography charges have been laid against youths between the ages of 10 and 17, including 113 charges of “making child exploitation material”.

More than 160 charges were laid in 2010 alone – 26 more than in 2008.

Parents and communities continue to grapple with the issue of “sexting”, where sexual images are exchanged via SMS.

Teens who engage in sexting not only risk child pornography charges, but can also be listed alongside serial pedophiles and rapists on sexual offender lists.

Police confirmed that some juvenile offenders appear on Queensland’s sex offender registry.

Child psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg said “a lack of parental supervision” was a key factor.

“They’re ignorant of the law and no one’s ever sat them down and said ‘When you take a picture of yourself and send it, that’s child pornography’,” he said.

Dr Carr-Gregg said a conviction would have a “catastrophic” effect on a teenager’s future.

“If a young person is put on the sex offenders registry, they have to notify police every time they change their hair colour and wouldn’t easily get visas to places overseas, and it’s going to make employment difficult,” he said.

Don’t get me wrong, I am totally against the practice of “sexting”.  I don’t like it one bit.  But these kids are not sex offenders.  One of the reasons children shouldn’t be ‘sexting’ in the first place is to make sure those images don’t get in the hands of a real sex offender.

The application of this law does 2 very serious things.

1.  It paints children wrongly as sex offenders.  This may have dire consequences down the track; and

2. Having ‘phony’ sex offenders on a sex offender registry completely undermines the registry in the first place.  This is a very serious list, dedicated to sick and evil people.  It shouldn’t be undermined by including silly kids who made poor choices.

It is time the Government stepped in and amended the law so common sense can be restored.

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Turning a Blind-Eye to Terrible Teachers

September 28, 2011

One seldom reads an article about an inspirational teacher, because such things are not considered newsworthy.  You do, however, read about the incompetent teachers who abuse the trust bestowed on them.  Today I read of one such teacher.  A teacher so destructive and irresponsible, one wonders why it took so long to get rid of her:

Roslyn Holloway, who taught at the Lord Silkin Trust Secondary School in Telford, Shrops, threatened to use the bizarre ritual to drown the unnamed student if he didn’t stop misbehaving in class.

In a series of other incidents, the special educational needs teacher tore the hair out of a pupil’s skull after he did not stop talking in class while she also engaged in sexual-based conversation with another.

A General Teaching Council panel was told that she struck another different boy on the forehead with the heel of her hand in the school corridor, referred to him as an “idiot” in front of his classmates and threatened to bang his head on the table.

She was formally cautioned by police for battery, for the hair pulling incident involving one of her students in November 2009, but failed to notify her employers, which breached her employment conditions, even though they were aware of caution.

The assult left the student with a red mark and a lump on his head.

Holloway, who taught students aged 13 at the school from September 2003 until her suspension in January last year, also racially abused other pupils by calling them “black boy”, “Pepsi Max” and “ginge” during class.

I am sympathetic to some of the teachers condemned by the media.  I understand that teaching can be very difficult and I am aware that it is hard to keep ones emotions in check when chaos in the classroom ensues.

But I have no sympathy for this woman if the allegations against her are indeed true.  What I do have, is a very important question:

Why did it take so long for a teacher who transgressed in so many blatant ways to be deregistered?

It is unbelievable how meek the initial response was:

After the parents of two children complained that they had been left “distressed”, she was counselled by her bosses to change her methods, which she failed to heed.

So when you get a spokesperson saying the officials place “the safety, health and welfare of its students first”, I don’t believe them for one second.

As far as I’m concerned, this story isn’t merely about a volatile and unprofessional teacher, it’s about a system that takes too long to respond to serious incidents.  The “blind eye” approach might work in the general workplace, but we are talking about young children here!

More needs to be done to detect such teachers before the damage is insurmountable.

 

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Posted in Child Welfare | 1 Comment »

Big Tobacco Funding Primary Schools

September 23, 2011

In today’s age, knowing what we know about the risks of smoking, how is it possible that tobacco companies have access to schools?  As important as it is to take into account cultural differences, China has no excuse in allowing tobacco companies to make their pitch to impressionable young children.  The cost of a quality education is not worth it if it comes with lung cancer, heart disease and emphysema.

MORE than 100 primary schools in China are sponsored by tobacco companies in a move described by anti-smoking campaigners as hunting for the next generation of smokers.

The schools often have the names of Chinese cigarette brands, such as Zhongnanhai or Liqun, over their gates and in some cases have promotional slogans in the playground.

”Talent comes from hard work – Tobacco helps you become talented,” says one slogan, in foot-high gilt letters, on the front of the Sichuan Tobacco Hope Primary School.

Tobacco helps you become talented?  No China, tobacco helps you die well and truly before your time!
Unfortunately, the message is successfully getting through to China’s underage demographic:
There are 16 million smokers under the age of 15 in China, 6.3 per cent of the youth population, according to the Chinese government.

For a country that is reknown for its strict regulations, it is mistifying that there is no regulations prohibiting tobacco from parading their brands in schools.

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Should Teachers Visit Their Students’ Homes?

August 19, 2011

I think in certain circumstances it would be a most valuable experience for teachers to visit the homes of their students.  By doing this they will get a clearer picture about the environment in which that child lives in and unique aspects of their lifestyle.

The new chief of the Chicago public schools, Jean-Claude Brizard, suggested recently that teachers visit the homes of their students. Many people reacted to that badly, as math teacher Jason Kamras’s principal did when Kamras dropped in on his students’ apartments near Sousa Middle School in Southeast Washington.

The Sousa principal feared for his young teacher’s safety in a high-crime area. Kamras, however, found the visits invaluable. He understood his students better. Parents were more supportive. Now a D.C. schools official, Kamras is one of many educators who think unannounced visits can be worth the risk.

In the District, officials are looking at the possibility of home visits for elementary school students. The nonprofit Concentric Educational Solutions has been knocking on the doors of persistent truants for the past year. The group’s executive director and co-founder, David L. Heiber, said the visits would be even more effective if they occurred before students got into trouble. “Home visits by themselves do not correlate into academic achievement,” he said. “However, if done with academic goals and targets as the objectives, they do work.”

I commend Mr. Brizard for his brave and innovative suggestion and I’m disappointed it got so much backlash:

That thought is dismissed in many schools. Administrators such as Kamras’s principal see danger in some neighborhoods, and don’t think their staffs have the time or the energy for such after-school and weekend enterprises. “Teachers are overworked already,” Heiber said he has been told. He said administrators say that “our social workers only see our special needs students” or that “we are short staffed as it is.”

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Posted in Child Welfare, Dealing with Parents | 3 Comments »

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