Chapter 6

But we must remember that in guiding the child to the formation of these habits, example and practice are far more important than precepts and rules. Example is more important because the child is very imitative; one rude act on the part of some older member of the household will counteract the benefit of many verbal lessons in politeness. Practice is important because it is through constant repetition of an act that it at last becomes automatic, and is performed without thought or attention. In fact, this is the only way in which a habit can be formed. Having acquired habits about the common relations of life that do not call for new adjustment every time they are met, the mind is left free to apply itself to problems that really need special consideration. Imagine how wasteful it would be if we had to attend to every movement in dressing ourselves! You can easily see that there are a great many acts that bring us in relation to others and that should be as mechanical and automatic as dressing and undressing.

It is when we pass from the routine acts which are repeated every day that we come to the field in which the will holds sway. There is nothing more helpful in the training of the will than the frequent performance of tasks requiring application, self control, and the making of decisions. The routine of fixed duties in a large and complex household furnished to our grandparents, during their youth, just the opportunity for the formation of habits in attending to what needed to be done, without regard to the momentary impulse or mood. Many of our modern homes are so devoid of such opportunities that there is great danger that our children will have altogether too much practice in following their whims and caprices--or in doing nothing.

It is just because the modern home is so devoid of the opportunities for carrying on these character-building activities that provision must be made in that other great educational institution, the school. All the newer activities of the school, the shop work and the school garden, the domestic science and the sewing, the recreation centres, the art and the music--all these so-called "fads and frills" against which the taxpayer raises his voice in protest-- these prove to be even more important in the making of men and women out of children than the respectable and acceptable subjects of the old-fashioned school; for these activities are but organized and planned substitutes for the incidental doings of the childhood of other days. They are the formal substitutes for the activities by means of which a past generation of men and women acquired that will-training and that insight into relations which distinguished their characters.

All systematic and sustained effort, whether in organizing a game or carrying a garden through from the sowing to the harvest, whether in making a dress or a chest of drawers, has its moral value as training in application, self-control, and decision, quite distinct from its contribution to knowledge or skill.

Two or three generations ago no thought whatever was given to the child's point of view; the authority of parents was absolute, and there were many unhappy childhoods. To-day we wish to avoid these errors, and by studying the child we hope to adjust our treatment to his nature and his needs.

But we must be on our guard against the danger of going to the extreme of attributing to the child ideas and instincts which he does not possess. In former times it was considered one of the mother's chief duties to "break the child's will"; to-day, realizing the importance of a strong will, we are in danger of assuming that a child's stubbornness or wilfulness is a manifestation of a strong will, and we hesitate to interfere with it.

This is an entirely false assumption. In the first place, a child up to the age of about three years has no will; he can only have strong desires or impulses, or pet aversions. During this period the mother's will must be his will, and there can be no clash of wills. But, to be his will, the mother must guide the child in accordance with _his_ needs, _his_ instincts,--that is, in accordance with his nature, and not in accordance with her convenience or caprice. She must bear constantly in mind that the child is not merely a miniature man or woman, but that each stage in his development represents a distinct combination of instincts, impulses and capacities. If, for example, your little girl is digging in the dirt--a very _natural_ and healthful activity--and you stop her for no better reason than that she will soil her hands or clothes, you are unduly interfering with her, and if you continue in that way, you will either make a defiant, disagreeable youngster or a servile, cringing slave to arbitrary authority. On the other hand, if Johnny should wish to play with a knife or a box of matches, it manifestly devolves upon you to take these objects away from him, no matter how strong his desire to have them may be. But it also devolves upon you to see that such harmful objects are not very easy for him to obtain and to see to it that plenty of other harmless things are provided for him.

This suggests a common mistake parents and loving friends often make in meeting the uncomfortable assertions of the child's will. When the child cries for the moon, you try to get him interested in a jack-in-the-box; and when he wants a fragile piece of bric-a-brac-- you try to substitute for it a tin whistle. With a very young child, that is about all you can do. But a time comes when the child is old enough to know the difference between that upon which he has set his heart and that which you have substituted for it in his hand. At this time you must stop offering substitutes. The child is now old enough to understand that some things are _not_ to be had, and that crying for them will not bring them. To offer him a substitute is now not only an insult to his intelligence, but it is demoralizing to his will; it makes for a loose hold upon the object of his desire--and it is the firmness of this hold that is the beginning of a strong will. It does not take the child long to learn that he is not to have a knife or a lighted lamp; nor does it take him long to get into the way of scattering his desires, so that he has no will at all.

In the second place, the assumption that stubbornness is a sign of strength is false, even for older children. Stubbornness is, in fact, a sign of weakness. It indicates that the child is either incapable of adjusting himself to the appeal that is made to his judgment or feelings, or that his weakness will make it impossible for him in the presence of his immediate desire to recognize the superior judgment and authority of his elders, at home or in school. It takes much more will power to give in than to carry one's point. But we must always make sure that _we_ are not the obstinate and wilful ones. If you have a very good reason for not wanting Helen to go to the dance--even if she is too young to understand that reason--you are perfectly justified in carrying your point. If your reason is a wise one, she will come to see it in time and will honor and respect you all the more for not having given in to her impetuous and immature desire. If she gives in gracefully, because she can understand the reasons, or just out of respect for your wishes, having found your guidance wise before, hers as well as yours is the triumph. The only thing of which we must make sure is that we are right to the best of our understanding, and that we do not insist upon having our way just because,--oh, well, just because we have a right to have our way, being in authority. As G. Stanley Hall, the father of child study in this country, has so well said: "Our will should be a rock, not a wave; our requirements should be uniform, with no whim, no mood or periodicity about them." Having made sure of ourselves, we need not fear that training our wilful children will weaken their will.

We must not neglect to consider the very close relation that exists between the health of the body and the health of the spirit. A strong will, showing itself in ability to concentrate its efforts on a chosen purpose, is not to be expected in a child whose muscles are flabby and whose nerves quickly tire. Since the will expresses itself in action, it can be best cultivated in a body capable of vigorous action.

The young child is not only a bundle of bones and muscles; it is also a bundle of impulses. And some of these impulses lead to actions that are quite desirable, while others lead to actions that are indifferent, and still others to actions that are decidedly undesirable. But, so far as the child is concerned, he has no means of discriminating between one kind of impulse and another. He would just as soon carry poison to his mouth as good food; he would rather grasp at a flame than at a harmless rattle. One of the essentials then becomes suitable knowledge. As the child grows older he should gradually learn that knowledge is necessary to wise choice. It is not so much the knowledge of what is commonly called "good" or "evil" as the knowledge of relations and needs that will enable him to choose ends, and to choose effective means toward those ends. Yet we cannot begin too early to have such considerations as "It is right," or "It is best," rather than "I want it," influence the conduct of our children. But, in order to do the right, we have to _know_ the right, and the children who get these moral lessons in their homes are fortunate indeed. It is here the child should acquire his feeling of loyalty to duty, for such lessons learned in the home are the most impressive and the most enduring. We must also make certain that children all through their lives at home are given opportunity for choice and decision.

In this matter of making decisions there is a great deal of individual variation, and even distinct types of persons have been described, according to the way they reach decisions. At one extreme is the child--or the grown person--who apparently without any effort balances the reasons that may be given on the opposite sides of a problem, and makes his choice solely on the strength of the reasoned argument. Herbert Spencer tells in his Autobiography how, when a young man, he wrote down, as in a ledger, all the advantages and all the disadvantages he could think of in regard to the married state. After checking off the items on the two sides of the account, he found a balance in favor of remaining single. Later in life he had his doubts as to whether the decision was a wise one, but it was the best he could make under the circumstances, for he made use of all the knowledge at his command and stood by his reasoned decision.

At the opposite extreme is the person who resolves to do what is right (although he may have no systematic means of discovering what is right), and carries out his resolution at the cost of frequently painful effort. To such persons there is a kind of association between what is easy and what is wrong on the one hand, and between what is difficult and what is right on the other. Our early Puritans were men of this type, and there is much to admire in the sturdiness with which they crushed their impulses in the resolve to carry out their ideals of the right.

Almost complete lack of will is shown by those who reach their decisions--by not reaching them. That is, there are those doubting, hesitating souls who postpone making a decision until action is forced upon them by some accidental event. These let other persons or the course of events make their decisions for them. There is such a delicate balancing of the desires--usually because all desires are equally weak--that none stands out to dominate the choice of a line of action. George wanted to go to the circus, and had saved enough from his weekly allowance; but he was saving up to buy a rifle, and he was undecided now as to whether he would go to the circus or add to his savings and get the rifle so much the sooner. The sight of some other boys on the way to the circus made the decision for him. This decision was not a reasoned one, but an accidental one.

Similar in its weakness is the will that reaches no decisions except as the balance is upset by later impulses from within. The girl or boy who allows a slight headache or a tired feeling to make important decisions cannot be said to have much strength of character. On Saturday Mabel was to have gone on a steamboat excursion--or on a visit to a friend, to stay over night. When she went to sleep Friday night she had not yet made up her mind; but she finally went to visit her friend because she had over-slept and was too late to join the excursion party.

Children that have not acquired habits of making definite decisions will find themselves badly adrift when they reach the adolescent period, with its rapid changes of mood and the masses of frequently conflicting impulses. To be able to restrain each impulse to action as it arises, and to hold it in abeyance until all the alternatives have been canvassed, is a power that comes only after years of thought and practice.

However, it is not enough to be able to refrain from doing what one is impelled to do. Many mothers think that they are training the child's will when they prohibit the taking or handling of various things about the house. It is true that the child should learn when quite young to avoid certain objects. But if the prohibitions are too general the child will be frequently tempted to break the rules, and then he will fall in his own esteem; or he will observe the rule and have too little outlet for his activity and initiative. The will does not thrive on what the child is _prevented_ from doing, but on what the child _actually does do_.

The child's need is for practice in doing and in choosing what he will do. When activities or games are suggested to a younger child, it is best to give him a choice of two or three. When the children are older they can be consulted about the purchase of their clothes, and they ought gradually to assume their share--a small one at first--of the responsibility of the household. As early as possible they should have their own money to spend, as in no other way can they learn the use of judgment and decision in the spending of money. In the households wherein children do not have such opportunities, but in which the parents rule everything with a high hand, the children grow up very inefficient in managing their time and their money; they have become accustomed to being ruled and flounder helplessly when called upon to decide for themselves.

The will, which is at the heart of moral conduct and which is so much in need of training, cannot, as we have seen, be trained as a thing by itself. All training and all education must contribute to the training of the will. Still, there are some definite points that we can profitably keep in mind when we are concerned with the child's will:

First of all comes sound bodily health.

Then there must be sound habits for most of the everyday activities, that the will may not be dissipated upon trivial matters, and that the common duties and virtues may be assured.

There must be constant practice in sustained effort and concentration upon useful tasks, in order to fix the habit of holding the attention upon the chosen purpose.

We must not confuse wilfulness with strength of will; and, finally,

There must be constant opportunity for making decisions that the child may feel responsibility in making of decisions as the highest type of conduct.

VIII.

HOW CHILDREN REASON

"Those children will not listen to reason," said a friend whom I discovered in an agitated state of mind one afternoon, when I came to make a call; and she was by no means the first to make this observation. Indeed, it is one of the characteristics of children that they will not listen to reason,--that is, _our_ reason. Which is not, however, saying anything against the children's good sense, for people with much more experience have refused to listen to reason--the children's reason.

Margaret told me her troubles. Her sister had rented a farm near the city for the summer and had offered to let Walter spend his vacation with her in exchange for such bits of help as he was able to render. But Walter had made up his mind to go to work in an office that summer, and, although he loved the country and had always wanted to drive a horse and go fishing, his mother's attempts to convince him of the wisdom of her choice were without avail. He would not listen to her reasons. She pointed to the health argument, to the opportunities for play, the free time, the driving, the fishing, and the fruit without limit. Knowing Walter as I did, I could not understand why it was so hard to convince him.

But every story has at least two sides to it, and of this story I had heard only one. The mother was so concerned with giving her son her good reasons for going to the country that she never even thought of finding out his equally good reasons for going to the office. Presently, however, Walter came in, and my first leading question brought out the true secret of the disagreement.

"What is there about working in an office," I asked the boy, "that you care so much about?"

"Oh, it isn't working in an office that I care about; I just want to earn some money. I never did make any money myself, and now I have a good chance and mother won't let me."

This was really too simple; here two sane persons had spent several days on the problem without coming to any solution. By placing Walter's services on the farm on a financial basis and making him pay for his board he managed to spend his vacation, healthfully and happily and profitably in every sense; and everybody was satisfied.

Over and over again we are impressed with the fact that most disagreements between people--whether between adults or between children, or between children and adults--are due to misunderstandings. As soon as parents resolve not to treat their children arbitrarily,-- that is, on the basis of their superior strength and authority,--they adopt a plan of "reasoning" with them. This plan might work very well, if the parents only understood the children's way of reasoning, if they but realized that the child does not reason as do adults, that he reasons differently in each stage of his development.

Our manner of reasoning depends very closely upon our language. But every significant word that we use has a distinct meaning in the mind of the individual, depending altogether upon his experience. As the experience of the child is very meagre, compared to that of the grown-up person, it is no wonder that our everyday remarks are constant sources of misunderstanding to children.

The little girl who had been frequently reproved for not using her _right_ hand came to have a positive dislike for her other hand, which she naturally understood to be _wrong_ hand, and she did not wish to have anything wrong about her person. A boy was trying to tell his sister the meaning of "homesick." "You know how it feels to be seasick, don't you? Well, it's the same way, only it's at home."

Children are apt to attach to a word the first meaning that they learn in connection with it. Only with the increase of experience can a word come to have more than one meaning. Moreover, the child will apply what he hears with fatal exactness and literalness.

Two little girls were at a party and the older one found occasion to slap her sister's hand. The hostess reproved her for this, whereupon the little girl asked, "Isn't she my own sister?" The hostess had to admit that she was. "Well, I heard papa say that he can do what he likes with his own."

Doing what we like with our own meant to the child exactly what the words said, without those qualifications which we naturally put in because of our greater experience.

Children learn with wonder that mother was once a baby, and that father was once a baby, and so on. Dr. Sully tells of the little girl who asked her mother, "When everybody was a baby, then who could be the nurse if they were all babies?" Thus shows real reasoning power; it was not the child's fault that she had no historical perspective, and so could not see the babyhoods of different people in their proper relations in time.

A little boy who was beginning to read deciphered a sign in a grocery store, "Families supplied." He asked his mother whether they could not get a new baby there.

When Herbert was passing through the scissors stage he cut a hole in his father's coat. The father scolded him for spoiling his suit; Herbert calmly replied, "I did not cut your suit; I only cut the coat." He resented this accusation, which in his mind was not merely an exaggeration, but entirely false, since a suit is a suit and a coat is a coat.

A little girl, while out with her nurse and brother, got lost by separating herself from the nurse's side. When she was at last found she was reprimanded for running away from the nurse. She felt that she was being unjustly treated, for she said, "I did not run away; I only _stood_ away," meaning, she had stepped around the corner to look in a window. If she had been scolded for getting out of sight of the nurse, she would have felt justly reproved; but, accused of doing something she never did and never thought of doing,--that is, running away,--she naturally resented this.

Those who have to deal with children in an intimate way cannot be too scrupulous about how they use their words.

The logic of children often appears to us all wrong until we take the trouble to see how they come to their queer conclusions.

The story is told of a boy who was sent to the circus in the neighboring town by his uncle, who gave him an additional quarter "so you can ride back in case it rains." Well, it did rain, and Howard came back riding on the top seat, next to the driver, wet to the skin. Now, any grown-up person knows why he was to ride back "in case it rains"; but to Howard the association of ideas was directly between raining and riding, and not between riding and coming home dry.

This illustrates a very common difference between the reasoning of children and that of adults. We _select_ ideas from a situation and combine them and come to conclusions. The child combines ideas, but he does not make any selection, and the simple explanation for this lies in the fact that the child has not enough experience to enable him to select what is significant. Thus a little girl, who had been too boisterous in her play, was called in by her mother and made to sit quietly in a chair for about ten minutes. At the end of this time her mother asked her whether she would "be good now." The child promised that she would, and was told that she might then go out to play again. As she arose she affectionately turned to the chair and said, "Thank you, dear chair, for making me so good." Having been declared "good" after sitting in the chair, she attributed the beneficent change in her behavior to the chair; and, being a polite little girl, she thanked the chair.

Very often these simple types of reasoning have their humorous aspects and we do not take them seriously. One winter a little boy who had always gone to bed regularly (he was four and a half years old then) began to call for some one to come to him after he was supposed to be asleep. He wanted to sit up and play, he wanted to get dressed, and he wanted something more to eat. This continued for several evenings, and it seemed impossible to get him back into his good habits. At last he was asked, "_Why_ do you want to get up now?" and he answered at once, "Because it is winter now."

"Yes, it is winter now, but it is time for you to be asleep," he was told.