by Kristal Mcvicar

Created on: June 18, 2008

I am wondering who would be doing the admonishing. Would it be the parent because the child told the parent the joke, or perhaps a school official because the child was caught "in the act" at school? How old is the child? A child of five should have no way of ever encountering a smutty joke, but as we all know, teenagers have pleny of places to learn such things. If it is a child of five, surely there are parenting issues and it is still not the child's fault!

It is quite obvious to me that if the child is telling the joke to a parent, then the parent has created an environment where the child would feel comfortable telling such a joke to the parent without fear of reprisal.

I raised two boys, for some of their growing up years, alone without a strong male influence. It was my responsibility as a parent to instill a sense of trust and openness with those children and I did. I taught them about their bodies, sexuality and talked to them about drugs, smoking and other issues parents need to educate their children on.

The environment I raised those boys within was one where they felt comfortable talking to me about, or telling me anything. There were instances where they had come to me with an off colored joke or two. Some I reminded them were not for public sharing, but you can be assurred I never admonished either son for feeling comfortable enough to bring that to me.

I have observed so many parents placing judgments on their children for simply doing what children do. I've always wondered why the parent would not simply take the opportunity at the time of teaching their children what may or may not be acceptable to the genral public instead. It is little wonder kids today cannot communicate with their parents.

Open communication and trust within a parent is the single most important thing you will instill within your child. When your child is comfortable enough to come to you with anything, you have most of the battle already won.

As a result of the environment I created for my children I have never had a teacher or other adult come to me with complaints of inappropriate child to adult conversations.

We can admonish our children on every little thing we decide is inappropriate, or we can take those moments to instill within them the morals and sense of decency we want them to carry through life as we accept their childish experiments for exactly what they are........a testing of the boundaries we all test at one point or another in life.

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