Respecting other parents' styles

I remember the first time I taught my kids to respect other parents' styles. My daughter was in the second grade, and hubby and I had just given her "the talk." With the help of a thorough book, we had explained to her all about the birds and the bees in an in-your-face approach. We did the same for each of our kids--each one near the end of second grade.

Now I know that's kind of on the early side for some of you, but that's exactly my point. That's just our style. So we then went on to explain to each of them how other parents may wait longer, may explain more slowly, may not explain as much detail. And they need to respect that.

So no going and spilling the whole story to your friends, okay? Parents have the right to be the first ones. Well, if you live in New Jersey that has its limits. By the end of the fifth grade, they're taught it all in school. But there's a long time between second and fifth grade.

I did give them permission, however, to correct misinformation. When kids aren't told by their parents, misinformation can creep in from other sources. Word does go around on this topic! So if they're with a friend who gets on the subject, and that kid clearly has their facts wrong, my kid may use their best judgment about correcting the facts at hand. Any parent would appreciate that.

We guard the styles of other parents with Santa Claus, too. Once each of our kids discovered the truth, we reminded them that their friends might still be "believers," and how about if we keep this to ourselves for now? It's all about respect for other people's families. Oh, and while you're at it, see if you can keep the secret from your younger siblings!

It's not that we do everything early in our family, though. My twelve-year-old daughter has a few friends whose moms give them more freedom on the computer, and more roaming slack after school. It's a fine line to walk because I want my kids to know the importance of our boundaries, but by now they are able to easily absorb this idea of respect for the choices of other kids' parents.

And so it was, that when my ten-year-old was with a friend recently, and the subject of Harry Potter came up, my kid didn't bat an eyelash when her friend announced she wasn't allowed to read Harry Potter. My kid may have had an opinion about this, but communicating respect reigns supreme when it comes to parents rules, and so she just smiled and said "oh."

I think teaching our kids this respect tends to uncomplicate the whole computer issue a bit. We can explain that some parents know more than we do, and some parents know less. Some parents have more fears than others. And very important, birth order matters. Our seven-year-old plays on The Sims because it's in the house. He's got older siblings. Parents seem to get more lenient with their younger children once theyve put their toe in the water with the first kid. If you've got a pack of kids like we do, all heck breaks loose by the fourth.

So here's what I've told my kids about the computers:

"Some of your friends are not allowed to use chat rooms at all. But it's okay, you can e-mail them. Or, heaven help us, call them on the phone. Some of your friends might not be allowed to use web-based games such as Neopets. So when you're over their house, don't introduce it. Some kids might not have parental controls on their computers. This means when you are on your friend's computer, be especially aware that yucky stuff could come up, and be ready to say, 'Let's go do something else,' or better yet, 'I think we better show this to your mom.'"

I guess what I'm saying is that we need to remember that our kids are social creatures. As with everything else, unpacking our thinking is perhaps more important than the rules themselves. They need to have conversations with us about the real world of kids' computers and kids' parents.

Lessons well learned come back to us. I think my own kids have come by roundabout way to respect my style and my rules. After all, we're parents, too.