Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Manners Matter on the Path from Child to Adult

Just a quick note this morning to alert you to a great article in this morning's New York Times.

Entitled: Making Room for Miss Manners is a Parenting Basic, the article is written by Dr. Perri Klass, one of the best-known writer/physicians in the country.

Here's an exerpt that I particularly enjoy:

"I like Miss Manners’ approach because it lets a parent respect a child’s intellectual and emotional privacy: I’m not telling you to like your teacher; I’m telling you to treat her with courtesy. I’m not telling you that you can’t hate Tommy; I’m telling you that you can’t hit Tommy. Your feelings are your own private business; your behavior is public.

"But that first big counterintuitive lesson — that there are other people out there whose feelings must be considered — affects a child’s most basic moral development. For a child, as for an adult, manners represent a strategy for getting along in life, but also a successful intellectual engagement with the business of being human."

3 comments:

Paulo A. Pereira said...

Wow thats interesting it can go hand in hand with the article from menstyle- Are You Raising a Douchebag? (please excuse the graphic title)

http://men.style.com/details/blogs/details/2007/11/are-you-raising.html

Alexandra said...

It's the most-emailed article on the NYTimes web site today! Must be lots of unruly little ones out there. The lesson is good one for any aspect life though.

Peter Hopkins said...

Yes, Alexandra. I saw that this morning. The timing of the article was perfect, with the memories of the kids home for the extended winter holiday fresh in parents' minds.