Children Should have the Best of their Mothers.



Home Education 

Training and Educating Children Under Nine

Pg. 17 & 18 

Children should have the best of their Mothers. 

--- Suppose that a mother may offend her child, how is it possible that she should despise him?  

"Despise: to have a low opinion of, to undervalue" -- 

thus the dictionary; and, as a matter of fact, however much we may delight in them, we grown-up people have far too low an opinion of children. If the mother did not undervalue her child, would she leave him to the society of an ignorant nursemaid during the early years when his whole nature is, like the photographer's sensitive plate, receiving momently indelible impressions? Not but that his nurse is good for the child. Very likely it would not answer for educated people to have their children always about them. The constant society of his parents might be too stimulating for the child; and frequent change of thought the fresher for her children. But they should have the best of their mother, her freshest, brigtest hours while, at the same time, she is careful to choose the nurses wisely, train them carefully, and keep a vigilant eye upon all that goes on in the nursery. 


Read this passage and more here on Ambleside Online

Obviously in my home my children do not have nurses or nannies, but we do occasionally trust our children with someone else to watch for short times. 

This is one area I feel like I am already pretty spot on. I've always been very particular about who I allow to watch my children for various reasons, safety & the character of the person are two of the biggest reasons for me. 

But throughout the last decade of raising my children I have given much thought to if these individuals are helping in the training of my children or hurting it.

When my son & daughter were born, due to financial reasons, I worked outside of the home full time and therefore had to trust others to care for my children. This was the biggest struggle in training our children, the people that were the option often did not stick to our rules and therefore we had bad habits take root, a few examples are 

1. No strict bedtimes or routines.
2. Not brushing their teeth properly, which caused cavities. 
3. Not being responsible to pick up their things. 

You don't realize until years later how much of an impact this has had on the foundation of your children's training. Habits require a firm foundation simply because it's training your brain in a pattern that it can fall back on and it is also training your will to do as you ought not just as you want. And when bad habits have taken route then it is a chore as a mother to then replace those bad habits with good ones and does, in fact, that much longer. 

Is this something you've been careful of? What are your thoughts? 

God Bless,
Julie

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