Parenting etiquette question.

[rivka]

After story hour at the library, the librarian brings out a bunch of toys and the kids have free play. They're almost all of them under two years old (this is, officially, "story hour for non-walkers," although probably half the group can walk), so there's a fair amount of toy-grabbing that goes on. It's developmentally expected, but parents do tend to intervene if they're trying to work on sharing or if it seems like the robbed kid cares. (Often, at this age, they're just as happy to pick up something else.)

This morning, Alex got hold of a cool toy - a long clear plastic tube with a bunch of jingle bells inside. As she played with it intently, a 17-month-old grabbed it out of her hands. She started to cry.

The other kid's mother and I were both sitting less than two feet away. I waited a minute to see if she would respond, and then I said to the kid, in a friendly and conversational voice, "I think the baby was still playing with that toy. See, she looks sad. Can you give it back to her, please?" I put my hand on the toy and he relinquished it without any kind of struggle or negative reaction. (I wouldn't have taken it from him by force.) I gave it back to Alex, who immediately stopped crying, and the kid wandered off to play with something else.

But his mother seemed offended. "He's just a few months older than she is, you know," she said in an abrupt tone of voice. "He doesn't know not to take things."

"Oh, of course not," I said. "Alex takes other kids' toys all the time. Sometimes kids don't even mind, but if they're upset..."

"Is she your first?" she asked, in what seemed like a wow-are-you-inexperienced tone. I said that she was. She asked how old Alex was, and then said, "so he's... eight months older than she is." That was the end of our conversation. (So much for "only a few months older," anyway.)

My question is, was I wrong to speak directly to her kid about returning the toy? I would never discipline someone else's child, but this seemed more like saying for Alex what she's too young to say for herself. I just kind of expect that, in a group of very young kids, adults will step in to help negotiate social mishaps. I don't expect kids of that age to spontaneously refrain from taking toys from each other. But maybe she felt criticized as a parent? Should I have asked her to intervene, instead?

Comments

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Well, I'd say two things about that:

(1) That level of community intervention is dependent on there being a high level of community agreement about how children should behave and how they should be disciplined. That's nothing you can rely on in a more diverse society. Should kids be reprimanded for a potty accident? For eating candy? For playing with "wrong-gender" toys? For showing off? For excluding another kid from their games? For swearing? I know my answers, but I'm pretty sure that not every parent on my block has the same set of answers.

(2) Philosophically, I don't think that Alex should have to obey any adult simply by virtue of that person's adulthood. Every adult does not have command authority over every child. That's not to say that she doesn't have to obey anyone but her parents - the librarian has authority at the library, the teachers have authority at school, her friends' parents have authority at their houses or when they are taking Alex on an outing.

But if J. Random Neighbor tells her that she shouldn't eat candy because it will rot her teeth, or that she needs to pick up someone else's trash on the sidewalk because "you kids are making a mess of the whole neighborhood, or that children should let adults get served first in a store, then Alex is as free to disregard J. Random Neighbor's opinion as I am.

[kightp.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I get your points. As I remember it, the Moms Brigade interventions were limited to keeping us from damaging each other (breaking up fights) and ourselves (stopping us from running into the street, jumping off garage roofs and similar acts of recklessness. Lesser "misdeeds" might get a "do you want me to tell your mother?"

But you're right - it was a different time and a different place, and there was a pretty high level of agreement on how we should behave.

[journeywoman.livejournal.com]

then Alex is as free to disregard J. Random Neighbor's opinion as I am.

I think it would be difficult to teach judgment like that to a young child, though my eventual goal for Evan is for him to have that kind of judgment. How do you teach a kid which adults to blow off and which ones to obey? Maybe they do develop a sense early of which neighbors are crazy and should be avoided--we didn't have any nosy meddlesome types in the neighborhood where I grew up, and offhand I can't recall how I reacted when I did come across people like that as a kid.

As a tangent, I watched Mystic River and got paranoid about the response to adult authority thing (a boy gets abducted by men posing as police officers). While it is important to me that Evan grow up being respectful to adults (I find kids who talk back to adults extremely annoying), he must also learn a proper wariness of strangers.

[erbie.livejournal.com]

There's a great book that addresses a lot of these issues. Protecting the Gift: Keeping Kids Safe and Parents Sane by Gavin de Becker. He's a security consultant who consults with celebrities and government agencies. There's so much in this book that just makes sense. He addresses all the questions in your post. He even talks about questions to ask your child's school. I *highly* recommend it to every parent. (Be warned though, there are very real examples in there, and it's uncomfortable to read in parts. But I think the bluntness and real-life examples are really necessary.)

[journeywoman.livejournal.com]

That sounds like just what I'm looking for. Thanks!