“A few days ago during pickup at our little schoolhouse, a mom shows up to get her daughter, who is 3 yrs old. …”
A story about how we treat children — and how we might change things around for the benefit of us all
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About Jesse McCarthy
For 20 years, Jesse McCarthy has worked with thousands of children, parents, teachers and administrators — as a principal for infants to 8th graders, an executive with a nationwide group of private schools, an elementary & junior-high teacher, and a parent-and-teacher mentor.
Jesse received his B.A. in psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and his Montessori teacher's diploma for ages 2.5 to 6+ from Association Montessori Internationale (AMI), the organization founded by Dr. Maria Montessori.
Jesse has spoken on early education and child development at schools around the globe, from Midwest America to the Middle East, as well as at popular organizations in and outside of the Montessori community: from AMI/USA to Twitter. Jesse now heads MontessoriEducation.com and hosts The Montessori Education Podcast.
Transcript: Treat Children Like Guests (Not As Suspect)
The educator Dr. Maria Montessori once said, “The child developing harmoniously, and the adult improving himself at his side, make a very exciting and attractive picture.” Welcome to Montessori Education with me, Jesse McCarthy, where we talk raising children and educating students, while bettering ourselves right alongside them.
I'm going to share a story with you from a few days ago at our little schoolhouse here during pickup time, when a mom shows up to get her daughter who, she's three years old. I was outside with the kids at the time, and I said to this woman's daughter, who was a bit far away from me, playing with the other children, I'm like, "Hey," I'm just going to call her Sophia, "Sophia, your mom's here."
Now, I'm looking over at Sophia, who seemed a bit hesitant, you know, that kind of look on her face like, 'I don't want to go' uh, but she had some self discipline and she comes running our way. Now, as this happens, you know, her mom and I are just chatting, Sophia turns around and runs back to where all the other children are.
At this moment, my gut, which I did not question, but just acted on was like, 'Oh, she's going to try to stay.'
So I call over to her, and this time with a bit firmer voice, "Sophia, it's time to go." And then her mom joins and basically does the same thing, calling for her to come over. And this is a very chill mom, so it wasn't aggressive or anything
Now when I called to Sophia, I myself wasn't angry or upset, but I no doubt had that voice of you know, It's time to stop playing. Well I came to learn what Sophia was actually doing when I called her over to, you know, get to her mom as it's time to go: She was cleaning up.
Like, to be exact, she was picking up the toy that she had been using, um, to go put it away so that she didn't leave anything out on the playground. It was one of those badminton rackets, the kind that people use on the beach as a fun little game, you know, hitting that birdie thing back and forth to each other.
Uh, anyways, the fact is that this little girl was running back toward the other children not to go back to playing. So not to defy me or her mom. But to literally clean up. Yet my first reaction, my gut reaction, was that she was trying to stall. You know, trying to go back to playing, which she wasn't supposed to be doing, of course.
Now, I don't want to blow this out of proportion, right? This is a minor mishap on my part. Again, I wasn't angry at her. I didn't raise my voice or yell, and definitely the same with her mom. But, and as I told Mom in the moment, I reacted from gut, from this emotion, and I think this is important because I've been working with children for 20 years now, and I'm including being a dad to my own child over the last two years, and I literally head MontessoriEducation.com and speak on how we can be better with children, yet, despite this, at times my gut still is partly suspicious of children. Now, kind of getting to why that is, why so many of us parents and teachers treat children as suspect, even if just in a minor way like this, uh, that's a topic, deep topic for another day.
Today, all I want to do is give you this little anecdote from our school house and from, you know, me in particular, and I want to do it for a couple reasons.
One, just to let you know that if you find yourself in such a situation. Obviously not exactly with a badminton racket, but you get the point. That you are definitely not alone. Not even close. As Maria Montessori even once said, "I have myself, sometimes, been too severe with a child." ... For those that know Maria Montessori, they sometimes are like, Are you sure she said that? So you can check it out for yourself. It's in The Absorbent Mind. Anyhow, the idea here is not to guilt and shame ourselves when we mess up, but rather to improve. You know, the better we are, the better kids are going to be.
Um, so that's one reason I wanted to share this. Again, no reason to beat ourselves up, let's just get better the next time, keep working at it.
Uh, and the other reason I'm sharing this story is to actually give you a couple ways to to get better. Not just talk about this, but like here's some real actionable items you can do that have helped me immensely over the years. These two tips, or really ways of life, have made my interaction with children so much, so much better. And that's kind of in contrast to being confrontational with them, just being angry a lot, any of that.
So the quick of it is that, one, I observe a lot, and two, I give kids the benefit of the doubt, or as someone I really admire, the late Haim Ginott put it, I treat children like I would treat a guest in my home.
I'll get to both of these points, but I'll start on OBSERVING, which I believe is the basis of everything in working with children. I really ask myself, "What is actually happening?"
Not what I think is happening, but what is actually happening. Obviously, I failed with this whole situation with, uh, Sophia on the playground, and just imagine if I would've just stopped and, you know, I got this gut reaction, if I would've just stopped and observed to see, okay, gimme a moment, what is she actually doing? I would've seen, she's picking up the badminton racket and bringing it back and putting it away. End of story.
But instead, I reacted, not on what I was actually seeing, but what I thought I was seeing.
So, observe, observe, observe. I actually have a whole podcast episode on observation. I highly recommend you go check that out, because it basically gives you, the step by step way to go about observing, that I learned when I was being trained in Montessori, and man, it's been so helpful ever since so check that out.
The second point isn't quite as foundational as Observe, but it's it's been super helpful for me, and I know a lot of other parents, uh gain and teachers gain tremendously from this. So basically it's Treat children like guests. Again I got this from the man named Haim Ginott. If you're unfamiliar with him, he was the mentor of the women who wrote that book, How to Talk So Children Will Listen and How to Listen So Children Will Talk.
He is the he's the OG. This guy is amazing with children. Now, instead of me just blabbering on about him and his ideas about treating children like guests, I'm just going to have him speak for himself, because happily, we have a recording from a talk show he did way back in the days.
Just two notes before we hop in:
One, he was a psychologist working with children. And two, the clip begins with a woman asking him a question or kind of commenting on his views. And then we get to the good stuff. So here we go. When you have a theory, which is at least the first time I heard it, and it's now something that people have begun to accept more, Which at the time now seems so logical and at the time seemed very new and it works with husbands and wives I mean Which was that you don't blame the person.
You talked about the spilled milk. You don't say stupid, but that you're angry at the object. It's a whole, it's a whole way of arguing and of dealing with, of communicating with people. Barbara, I, I compared. What is the difference between my response to a child in psychotherapy, shall we say, and a parent's response in the same situation?
Suppose a child came into my playroom and he turned around and he turned over some, uh, a glass of, of water. My natural response, without thinking spontaneously, would be, Oh, the water spilled, here is a sponge. Now, the principle that I use is, Don't say anything to the child about himself. Do not attack his character.
Do not attack his personality. Do not attack his dignity. The principle is, Here is the problem, here is the solution. Parents, because of their own upbringing, have a native tongue of rejection. A native tongue of attack. And what we try to do now, is to give them another language. And this is a language of compassion, and a language of caring.
After all, it's as easy to say to a child, The milk spilled, here is a sponge. By the way, parents know it. Especially when guests come. Have you ever seen when a guest comes to your home and spills, shall we say, a glass of wine? Would you say to him, Listen, next time if you do it once more, you're never going to pay.
That's the last time that you are in our home. Besides, where were you brought up? In the jungle? That's where you belong, you know. Somehow, to guests, we don't talk like this. I always ask parents, what would you do if a guest came to your home and forgot, shall we say, his umbrella? Would you say to him, Every time you come to our home, you forget something.
If it's not one thing, it's another. Mrs. Smith, I want to live to see the day when you come to my home, you remember to take all your belongings with you. I'm not your slave to pick up after you. Or, would you say to him something like a comparison? Why can't you be like your younger sister? When she visits, she remembers to take all the things home.
Somehow we know how to talk to guests. My idea is that we need to talk to children the way we talk to guests, meaning protective of their feelings.
So that's Ginott. I'm not going to add much to what he said because he's, he's I love the way that man speaks. I just, he's, he's just a personal hero of mine, a mensch.
Um, if you want to know more about his work, or learn more about how to be with children, the way that he's talking about, I would definitely recommend checking out Between Parent and Child. Haim Ginott is the only other person apart from Maria Montessori that I recommend unconditionally.
So, there,, I mean, there's little things that I might disagree with either of them on, but just, they're just such strong individuals and have aided me with children over the years that I just say, run to get that man's book. And those are really the points I want to get across to you. So again, this treat children like guests and then going back to observe. Observe, observe, observe.
And realistically that ultimately came from Maria Montessori. One book I can recommend, uh, of hers, it's really a compilation of writings of hers, is called Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents. Both of these, Between Parent and Child and then Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents, they really can be read and devoured, really, hopefully, by anybody.
So teachers, parents, anyone who actually interacts with children. So, If you are not picking up what I'm putting down, I'm saying go out and get those books. I really think you will thank me for that. Okay, that is actually all I got for you. Somewhat short and sweet. Um, oh yeah, quick note. If you are listening to this episode in the month it is released, know that I will be off for July, so no podcast episode.
If you happen to be in Southern California next month, however, July 10th to be exact, you can come meet me live, as I will be giving a talk in Los Angeles. I will share that info soon, probably on the list. So if you are not on the list, go over to MontessoriEducation.com and join our email list.
It's all free and so forth. Uh, and you can always write me, Jesse, jesse@montessorieducation.com. I'm Jesse McCarthy, if you don't recall that.
And that is really it, so thanks for hopping on, it's always fun being with you guys, and adios until next time.