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Teachers discourage kids from becoming best friends
So, apparently teachers and child psychologists are trying to discourage kids from finding a "best friend," i.e. someone with whom they feel they can share more and relate better than with any of their other friends:
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| But increasingly, some educators and other professionals who work with children are asking a question that might surprise their parents: Should a child really have a best friend? Most children naturally seek close friends. In a survey of nearly 3,000 Americans ages 8 to 24 conducted last year by Harris Interactive, 94 percent said they had at least one close friend. But the classic best-friend bond � the two special pals who share secrets and exploits, who gravitate to each other on the playground and who head out the door together every day after school � signals potential trouble for school officials intent on discouraging anything that hints of exclusivity, in part because of concerns about cliques and bullying. �I think it is kids� preference to pair up and have that one best friend. As adults � teachers and counselors � we try to encourage them not to do that,� said Christine Laycob, director of counseling at Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School in St. Louis. �We try to talk to kids and work with them to get them to have big groups of friends and not be so possessive about friends.� �Parents sometimes say Johnny needs that one special friend,� she continued. �We say he doesn�t need a best friend.� That attitude is a blunt manifestation of a mind-set that has led adults to become ever more involved in children�s social lives in recent years. The days when children roamed the neighborhood and played with whomever they wanted to until the streetlights came on disappeared long ago, replaced by the scheduled play date. While in the past a social slight in backyard games rarely came to teachers� attention the next day, today an upsetting text message from one middle school student to another is often forwarded to school administrators, who frequently feel compelled to intervene in the relationship. (Ms. Laycob was speaking in an interview after spending much of the previous day dealing with a �really awful� text message one girl had sent another.) Indeed, much of the effort to encourage children to be friends with everyone is meant to head off bullying and other extreme consequences of social exclusion. |
Re: Teachers discourage kids from becoming best friends
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| Originally posted by MrJiveBoJingles So, apparently teachers and child psychologists are trying to discourage kids from finding a "best friend," i.e. someone with whom they feel they can share more and relate better than with any of their other friends: The rationalization behind this is interesting. Have everyone be friends with everybody, and bullying will come to an end! But what does "friendship" even mean if it's something that's given out indiscriminately? http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/17/fashion/17BFF.html |
Another step towards Utopia. Almost there!
Wouldn't discouraging friendships lead to a feeling of less worth over all for other children and their peers... I mean if no one is really close then maybe they drift the other way and children become more mean and violent towards each other...
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| Originally posted by Joss Weatherby Wouldn't discouraging friendships lead to a feeling of less worth over all for other children and their peers... I mean if no one is really close then maybe they drift the other way and children become more mean and violent towards each other... |
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| Originally posted by The17sss Another step towards Utopia. Almost there! |
Fuck not having best friends.
I have several and they are all important to me.
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| Originally posted by Boomer187 Seems like they are encouraging another kind of friendship, one where you have many friends that you are not so possessive over. Just think of when your best friend got a girlfriend...and you had nothing to do so you hated her. They are figuring if you have a large pool of friends, you will go hang out with them instead of your 1 best friend. I had both, so I would tend to encourage that. |
I create strong bonds with most of my friends. It becomes a family.
I think siblings often fill this role for kids. They just don't realize it til they aren't kids anymore.
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| Originally posted by Ania_xox I think siblings often fill this role for kids. They just don't realize it til they aren't kids anymore. |
Monogamic relationships ultimately lead to a divorce, let's encourage free love and promiscuous sex!
... until they aren't kids anymore
More and more it seems, we are living in an age where repression and guilt is no longer propagated by the church, but by the psychological establishment.
Wrong thread, Hal.
You're looking for this one...
Also, to what "psychological establishment" are you referring? Or are you merely musing on the idea that such an establishment exists as part of a pattern that is echoed by the natural thought processes of humans?
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| Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On More and more it seems, we are living in an age where repression and guilt is no longer propagated by the church, but by the psychological establishment. |
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