ADVICE RATING |
 4.57 (Highly recommend) from 9 votes (36 Visits) |
Children learn about the world, and how to behave in it, what's good, what's bad, what's dangerous and what's safe by watching what the people around them do. Everyone knows that you need to set routines for babies, and that children need to be taught right from wrong and so
on but when small children are around, especially when they're being peaceful or just playing quietly by themselves, it's really easy to forget that they're there. It's easy to let your guard down and it's easy to forget that the little information sponge in nappies over there is tuned in with all senses, because they trust in you to show them how to do things.
You never realise how much a kid picks up until the first time they repeat a bad word, or display naughty behaviour that looks very familiar. Sometimes you're not even aware that you (or the people around you) do these things until your little one is mirroring them back at you. Children mimic the ones they're closest to, but they don't know which bits are OK and which bits aren't.
It doesn't even have to be naughty behaviour. A friend of mine has entertained me on a number of occasions with the story of how his best friend would come by and see his then newborn daughter, sit with the girl and say 'Bob. Bob Bob Bob Bob Bob.'. Over and over. It was a game. A joke, that the little girl's first word would not be 'Daddy', it would be 'Bob'. He never meant for anything to come of it, he knew it was just a joke, but the little girl didn't and 'Bob' was, sure enough, her first word.
I've heard similar stories in regards to other words, and other kinds of behaviour. I'm glad it happened to people older than me, and whose children are now teenagers. They see it as funny, but they've also been very careful to caution me about it happening to my own son. The lesson was made clear that children never stop learning. They never stop paying attention while they're awake, and anything new captures their interest. Parents need to be careful that their behaviour or language isn't rubbing off in the wrong place.
Gladly my son's first word was 'Mum' (I wanted 'Dad' but I settled, because at least it wasn't 'Bob' 
). Unfortunately I now realise how some of the games I played with him have given him interesting ideas on how to interact with other kids, and I'm spending time now breaking him of those habits. Nothing serious, nothing dangerous, but it's something I'm going to be much more careful about in future.
(October 2008) (
