Waving Bye-Bye
How many times have you seen a mother scoop up her baby to leave a gathering, brightly call, “Bye bye!” – and wave her child’s arm? Children generally are very stoic about this procedure – but what are they learning?
Imagine the feeling – you are suddenly moved from the floor to adult eye-level. While you are taking in the people and scenery from this new perspective, you your arm gets waved back and forth. Does this movement have anything to do with you?
Or better yet, have a friend wave your arm for you. Do you like the feeling? Does the waving spring from any kind of internal understanding or decision? Does it feel integrated or coordinated with the rest of your body and mind?
When we manipulate children’s limbs, we are basically doing what little children do when they play with their stuffed animals. It looks cute. But, for the child, it is often at best distracting, and at worst, disempowering.
Children learn by watching, listening, and imitating those around them. They are absolutely brilliant at this, and if we continued our life-long learning process at the rate of just about any baby, we would all be geniuses. If children see people wave goodbye, eventually, they will want to do it themselves. Their first attempts may not look like waving – we may not even notice! They may appear to be merely shrugs of the shoulder or random movements of the arm. But, left alone, children will figure out the internal set of muscles necessary to wave. And, as they practice, they will get better and better.
When we wave babies’ arms for them, the action is generated from the outside. The babies may have no idea of what it means. They may not even connect this thing that is happening to them as waving “bye bye.” Most importantly, the movement is not organic; it is imposed from without.
Children with good coordination – both gross and fine motor - begin their movements from the core. When a baby generates a movement on his own, he has to begin at the center of his body and then move out to the limbs. Almost all the primitive reflex movements, that universal instinctual language of the human race, begin with movements of the cores muscles, head and neck. When a young infant moves her arms, she is not really conscious that she even has arms – she is just rippling an impulse from those core muscles out through her body.
When we grab a baby’s arm or hand and make it move, we reverse that natural direction of muscle movement. From a casual outside glance, it may look like the child is waving. But when we wave for our babies, we are teaching them to override their own movement instincts. And this can lead to children who do not trust their own bodies, who move in uncoordinated ways.
So let’s let our babies discover the wonder of “Bye Bye” in their own developmental time. Let’s let go of waving for baby (“Isn’t he cute!”) and value the child’s own learning process. How much more magical it is to watch a toddler’s dawning comprehension - mommy waves when she calls, “Bye bye!” How much more exciting when we see that first wave come, at the right moment, perfectly coordinated from the core.
Comments
Hey, Rick, you upstaged me! “Helping” children keep
the beat is my NEXT blog entry! Keep posted.
And regarding cheating . . . all boils down to a basic
question of integrity and purpose. Is our purpose
to make it look as if our children are doing well,
whether or not they actually are? Or is it our purpose
to foster their sense of integrity and self-respect,
and give them tools to achieve their goals from an
inner place of strength and awareness?
But the current educational paradigm that began with No
Child Left Behind is working against the processes of
inner knowing, real questioning, integrating
information, and creative problem solving - instead
rewarding quick quantifiable answers to rote-memorized
questions. And forcing teachers to create their
curriculum around these tests, at the risk of their
jobs. But that’s a whole ‘nother blog entry.
As for tickling - I agree. Although adults may
swear up and down that their kids love to be tickled,
my guess is that this “enjoyment” can be a kind of
survival response - a way of diverting an attack, the
way a blue jay will sometimes dance to confuse the hawk
who has caught it. The adult is the protector; they
have to be right - so the child will invert his or her
own sense of rightness to fit the situation and
survive. This is the root of a lot of compulsive
negative behavior. I’ll look into the research on
tickling - it’s a fascinating question.
Thanks for some provocative thoughts!
Thanks, Eve. I wonder, too, if there isn’t something physical in tickling that causes an automatic response that looks like laughter or giggling, but that initially is not. Once started, it becomes contagious, but in an uncomfortable way.
Sorry to upstage you. Actually, let’s look at it as a transition to your next post. “The Kangaroo has a pouch to protect her kids, but humans need something more—Mutual of Omaha Insurance…” (Or maybe you are too young to remember the old Wild Kingdom shows.)
What a lot of food for thought, Eve.
While I agree with your premise that children must
learn to initiate movement for themselves, I can think
of a few instances where a parent of caring care-giver
(or violin teacher?) could gently move the child’s arm
for him or her.
The first I can think of is if a young child is touching an animal or another young (or younger) child too roughly. My instinct would be to gently take the child’s hand and guide it softly over the cat/dog/baby brother. An Alexander Technique teacher once told me that the muscle tone we have in our bodies is transmitted to those we touch. So, my home would be that a gentle (and possibly repeated) intervention in this case would be preferred to letting the child learn to touch the cat gently in his or her own time. By then, actual harm may have already occurred to the child or the cat or both. Of course, explaining the “why” behind this form of touching and moving the child’s hand/arm in a deliberate and kind way are likely key.
My other instance has to do with when I teach violin. For beginning violin students, it can be quite frustrating to not play the violin until after several weeks of lessons. While I do my best to fill the lessons with many activities that will eventually lead to playing with ease and comfort, the day the bow and the string meet for the first time is always exciting for us all (parent, child and me). Before this time, the child has practiced landing the bow on the string, holding the bow in different game contexts, singing (lots of singing!), getting the violin on and off the shoulder, manipulating the violin carefully, more singing and various rhythm games involving different parts of the body and the voice. When the bow finally plays on the string, I help the child by supporting the scroll of the violin (the child is often so focused on the bow, the violin may droop slightly, which will make it harder for the bow to stay on the string, so I help with this, unobtrusively, so the child doesn’t have 50 things to think about! The child holds the bow and lands it on the E string. Then, I say, very rhythmically: “My turn, list-en:” and I move the bow (from the stick—not touching the child’s hand or arm) with the 4 16ths followed by 2 8ths rhythm. Then, I say: “Your turn, ready go:” and I let go of the stick and let the child try. Most of the time, the bow will slip, or the rhythm will be off, or both or more than that, but, we just continue like that, back and forth—usually the number of times of the child’s age. I also do this with the parent and the parent does it with me, and then, the parent does it with the child while I watch. Now, some (perhaps the author or readers of this wonderful blog) may find my approach restrictive. And, maybe in some ways, it is. Then again, I also incorporate improvisation and folk music into the lessons as well. My main concern, is that my students have the technique they need to play any thing they want to.
Thank you for the thought-provoking post. I should add that when I’m doing this exercise with my students, I make sure that their muscles are working with me. I would never force a child’s arm to move up and down if they fought me. In that case, no one wins…
Thanks so much, Laura, for your thoughts, and for
giving me a chance to clarify some things:
1. When safety is at issue - that is a different
matter! So if a child is handling an animal too
roughly, that is definitely a time to intervene.
Or if a child is reaching for something hot, or running
toward the street, and so forth. But this is
preventive intervention - not the same as when we
initiate a child’s movement for them.
2. By the time a child is ready to play an instrument,
they are already way old enough to wave Bye Bye on
their own! The kind of gentle guidance you
describe when you teach sounds just right. When I teach
piano, I often will put the child’s hand on mine, and
let them go for a “ride” - so that they can feel the
motion from underneath, without having to initiate it
for themselves, and get the “big picture” of how to
move. There are many times when appropriate touch
is the appropriate way to teach. Your observation
about “never forcing” is the key. This is as true
when we handle babies as when we work with children of
any age.
Not to upstage Eve again, Laura, but there is yet other difference that she does not address. What Eve describes is typically with very young children who are mentally engaged in something other than the clapping or waving at the moment. Forced physical movements at that time are often met with muscle tension as the child is somewhat confused by the parents’ actions.
In contrast, a violin student is actually expecting the teacher’s guidance, and the parent with the animal is usually preparing the child for the petting. “Oh, Bobby… Can we pet the doggy gently like this”? In both instances, we hope that the parent or teacher demonstrates and engages the focus of the child in ways that will avoid tension. Tension is the problem.
Eve, your blog Waving Good-bye brought back vivid memories of my mother insisting I hug my Aunt Tillie hello. I didn’t want to hug Aunt Tillie. She was a large, unsmiling woman living in a big house with too many things I wasn’t supposed to touch. And my reluctant brother didn’t want to shake Uncle Ben’s hand. He didn’t like Uncle Ben any more than I liked Aunt Tillie.
My mother caused me to make movements I resisted but had to perform. Can demanding a child hug, shake hands or kiss someone be as negative as physically lifting an arm to wave? Is this something a parent should be aware of also?
I read in one of Jane Healey’s books that when we move limbs for children under six months we’re helping connect neurons, but after that age, the children have to move their limbs themselves for there to be any neuronal effects.
Having said that, I was told by an OT once that if a child needs assistance moving their arms, we should support from underneath. That way they still feel they are in control; we are just assisting. I tell parents that in my music classes: if their child is trying to play an instrument like a resonator bar and doesn’t seem to have the motor control, they can help by placing a hand under their arm. All they should be doing is providing a little extra lift, the child should still be in control of the movement. I also tell the parents that mostly they should just sit back and let their child explore the instrument however the child chooses (as long as it’s not destructive, of course!).
Excellent advice!
Linda Townsend Watertown Jan 22, 2011
... and shall we add “taking hold of a child’s hands or arms to “keep the beat” during music classes? These are such natural responses for parents who want a child to exhibit “proper” responses. It begins here, and often still takes place after a child goes to college (A new phenomenon is parental cheating on behalf of their children, in an effort to “protect their investment.”) and beyond.
Thank you for your clear explanation.
May I add another culturally accepted “no-no” to the list?
Tickling. I have never understood why something that, in many cases, does not bring pleasure, usually elicits a laughing or giggling response.