Managing little people in public

On Tuesday I posted this Facebook status: “Getting inspiration from the mom in the coffee shop to write a post about when/how to start teaching kids how to behave in public places …”  It was met with a flurry of comments, public and private, from people on both sides of the highchair.  Should people with children just stay out of public places like restaurants and church services until their kids are old enough to “know better?”

I’m going to take a few days to chat about that here, because my answer is a hearty, “No way!”  I speak from the perspective of a mom who knows the challenges of wrangling a tired toddler while meeting pastors at restaurants, meeting ladies for coffee, or just getting out for pizza after a long day. I also speak from the perspective of a woman who has been seated with and next to the tired toddler, and sometimes tired mama, struggling to navigate public places. It IS possible and necessary to take children out in public, and I want to help both groups understand how and why.

Tomorrow on The MOM Initiative, watch for my post called a Survival guide for taking kids to restaurants. But to have children behave appropriately in public, we really need to order an “appetizer” in the discussion first.

Two questions a GROWN UP has to ask:

1. Do I know how to behave appropriately in a variety of public settings?
2. If I’m a mom, have I started training for public while I’m still in private?

Grown ups often judge little people with principles they don’t practice. We even say things on Facebook to our hundreds of “friends” that would land a child in timeout for launching it as a verbal bomb to their one playmate. We tell our children “Be careful, don’t bump that lady,” but we aren’t sensitive to the physical space of others ourselves. We scold for showing a heart’s frown on the outside, but we fail to check our own grouchy expression when a restaurant table is dirty or a child cries near us. We use the loudest volume in the restaurant, but we dismiss it as our “family laugh” or our “free spirit,” but fail to note no one else is at that noise level. Before we can teach children how to have a considerate, polite, respectful manner in public places like church or a cafe, we have to assess our own level of social savvy.

Did I make you nervous? Are you worried you’re really a social nincompoop and don’t know it?  You might be.  Sometimes grown ups are. For example:  the man who set UP AGAINST me at the coffee shop … or the woman who broadcast her boyfriend’s foibles at Panera … or the husband who THREW a piece of trash at his wife as they passed me.  I’m not making this up.

Rude adults ABOUND, so we shouldn’t be surprised that children do too.

If you wonder how rude you are, do this to find out:

1. Stop and watch people to see what habits fit the context you’re in. Follow their lead, filtered through God’s truth.
2. Stop and listen to the people in the context. How loud and boisterous are they? God’s word talks about these qualities.
3. Stop and ask a friend is they consider you considerate to others in public and how you can improve.

We set appropriate public boundaries while in private, but we practice in public. Big life skills like obeying quickly, responding respectfully, and thinking about others are embedded in the laboratory of home and then applied in the world. To make it work, a mom needs to have a plan, guts, and discernment.

1. A plan she’s developed by considering her own needs, her child’s needs, and the needs of people in public.
2. The guts (aka perseverance) to follow through on the expectations she sets.
3. The discernment to know when to leave her latte, shopping cart or church bag and “get back to private” for reinforcement and more training. Kids don’t believe you’ll leave their Happy Meal there on the table, until you do it … once.

If she hasn’t already started training her kids at home, the coffee shop is not the place for a mom to start.

Next week, I’m going to help “non-kid-toting grown ups” understand why moms NEED to take kids out and how THEY can actually help it go better … for the good of all.  I’ll also tell you why painting with butter is a good idea sometimes, and how grace can meet godliness over a kids meal. Today’s kids are counting on us to get this right. I hope you won’t miss it. You really can’t afford to, because the next time you’re at a coffee shop, you’re either going to be asking for a high chair or sitting by someone who does.