tangentalizingly delicious

Tuesday January 20, 2009

Only a week or so ago, Harvey gained an important and significant understanding of a vocabulary word I never though I would love so dearly: “Yes”

Much of the discussion of Terrible Twos that I have seen in popular culture revolves around the insistent and repetitive use of the word “no” but the reality (in our case at least, perhaps we are unknowingly lucky… so far) isn’t so much that every request is met with a no, but that the first deep understanding of behavioural direction kids have is about what not to do.

I don’t know, I am no child psychologist and I don’t even play on one TV. Maybe we are terrible parents raising our child in a world of negativity but the simple fact of the matter is that as soon as kids start gaining some amount of motor control parents start teaching them what sorts of things are not okay to do. I can’t see the opposite method making sense – the possible number of prohibited activities is vastly inferior to the possible number of allowable and even encouraged activities.

So kids learn very quickly that it is not okay to do certain things, and that the word “no” is how that is indicated. Very early in life they have a deep understanding that rejection is performed by saying no, which means that very quickly in life they are able to start expressing their self by identifying that which they do not want – by saying no.

Parents, or at least Jen and I, take advantage of a child’s knowledge of this concept of refusal by presenting a variety of options to children, or at least Harvey, who in turn responds with either “no” or, in Harvey’s case for a long time, no response at all. Lack of rejection was a positive response.

Harvey has learned that there is an explicit positive response, the opposite of rejection, and has started using it. He nods his head, he says “yes!” when asked certain things, and as far as I am concerned life is markedly better as a result. That positive (and frequently enthusiastic) response is so absolutely charming and endearing that I want to offer him things I know he’ll like just so he can be excited and positive about them.

I am absolutely open to the fact that, rather than me learning something about Harvey’s development, he has learned something about causing me to engage in the actions he prefers.