Mr Alex lives life to the full, and up until the arrival of Mr Patrick, he pretty much had free reign and access all areas within our house. A newborn does revise the use of a busy household somewhat, and changes how things are done.
Consequences
An awareness that ones acts or omissions have a direct or indirect effect on others.
Chaos Theorists explain the rippling effect of consequences by stating that if a butterfly beats its wings in blah, it can cause an earthquake in bluh. This is an anology that that shows potential of ones acts, but uses a little poetic licence. Shame. (No butterflys were harmed in the research of this definition).
This reorganisation of the household has lead to a series of interesting conversations with Alex about the impact of choices. For example – “If you choose to take Patrick’s toy he will cry and we will have to stop this game” –or- “If you continue to stomp about being a T-Rex during Patrick’s nap time, we will have to ..” you get the idea.
Consequences (Mr Alex)
Pardon? Excuse me? If you don’t mind, I am kind of busy developing a diplomatic quagmire here.
Good news though. We have had a number of quick wins over the last week.
Quick Win 1
Enjoying a Saturday morning painting session, Father and Alex (who have fairly comparable artistic skills) create a series of pictures. Alex who maintained artistic control throughout, insisted that a meteor be present in each picture. Father and Patrick were then both featured in seperate pictures, about to meet their maker at the hands of said meteors. Picture 3 featured Dr Ruari – and father assuming a meteor was required painted one in the corner only for a “OH NO! RUN DR RUARI!” to shatter the relative tranquility.
Quick Win 2
Whilst visiting Nana and Papa, a visit to the toilet was required and Father’s attendance was requested. Sparing the detail – we do not have aiming of the hose down quite yet – and a little puddle formed on the floor, and “Aw Nana’s floor” was offered.
I was impressed that in both of these situations, that progress appeared to being made. However they should be tempered with the following:
Consequences (Smallprint)
An awareness that one’s act or omissions have a direct or indirect effect on others that ‘matter’. Those that ‘matter’ are set apart on a mentally held select list, which is refreshed approximately every fifteen minutes. This leads to situations that would appear to be a matter of life and death at one point, being met with complete ambivalence moments later.
I did say they were quick wins.
Oh and one more thing – it appears that Father and Mr Patrick do make the select list occasionally – but generally only when we have gone out somewhere else!
6 Comments
14/08/2009 at 14:18
My son is starting to understand the idea of consequences. Generally he tries to play with something he shouldn’t be and when thing invariably go awry, he’ll look at me and say “boom”. But since boom can mean spoon, book or boom I’m not quite sure about what he’s learned yet.
14/08/2009 at 20:44
What are consequences? I may need to give you a call when it comes time to teach my son.
15/08/2009 at 13:11
Be careful where you stand when accompanying you son to the bathroom.
15/08/2009 at 23:51
We are learning about consequences in the same manner at our house including the consequences of waking the baby, throwing food, dumping water on the floor- yeah, some naughty things.
16/08/2009 at 15:34
I think it was the hardest teaching Little Man consequences. With such a large gap between him and his brothers, he never really saw the need for consequences. That is, until he started school.
17/08/2009 at 22:57
When Lewis has his hit or miss sessions in the toilet he often takes matters into his own ands and tries to do the cleaning up himself. Bit like the ever spreading ‘pink spot’ in ‘The Cat in the Hat Comes Back’. Just a bit smellier and a bit more unpleasant.