All My Children

Charity begins at home, and so does learning about aggression. A child will understand that shooting and killing people is wrong when the parent who was playfully made a target inquires who is going to pour the milk in the future or go to the store for ice cream. Such a question can convince a child of the need to keep his aggression under control in his own best interests, as no abstract description of the horrors of war could do. To be told that what we want to do—shoot the gun—is wrong annoys and frustrates us, and puts us on the defensive. But realizing things on the basis of one’s own experience and interest—that is, a parent who has been shot can no longer serve the child—makes the learning become positive. Continue Reading »

Some children keep score on their ability to exercise this type of self- control, and they know very well that the issue is the ability of their mind, or will, consciously to dominate the spontaneous reactions of their body. These games are so common that one may assert that all children, at one time or another, engage in games whose main purpose is to test themselves and their performance. I knew one six-year-old, for example, who kept score through checking off one of two columns which he had labeled “Me” and “My mind,” indicating that for him the issue was not whether he or his partner won, but how well his mind could control his body. Continue Reading »