Nanny doesn't always know best
27 June, 2005
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Nanny doesn't always know best
Courier Mail
27 June 2005
Supernanny is a national parenting obsession. Across the country parents are breathing a collective sigh of relief as they sit transfixed by their TV screens.
Much of the advice provided by this Mary Poppins of the new millennium causes many early childhood professionals to curdle. But, good advice, or bad – the Supernanny is telling us that parents need help. Parenting is not an idle pastime. It is a fully fledged full-time job with no remuneration and no professional development opportunities.
Parents struggle for recognition in our child-unfriendly society and consequently there are few services dedicated specifically to supporting the development of confident and capable parents.
The passing on of child and parenting knowledge is no longer shared through intergenerational relationships.
Grandparents feel invalidated when their advice is dismissed by new mums who've read the latest parenting manuals and have the latest information at their fingertips: "No mum, babies don't sleep on their tummies any more."
It is a phenomenon that Frank Furedi, author of Paranoid Parenting, says is partly the fault of a new breed of parenting professionals who feed into parents' insecurities so that we continue to rely on professionals for advice. Parents are no longer supported to trust their own knowledge and common sense. Instead we have a book open on the change table looking for the answer on how to be the ultimate parent.
Someone needs to tell us we can't be perfects parent and that our kids don't have to be perfect either.
This is actually why we watch Supernanny. We are reassured by the extreme examples of children's behaviour and parental breakdown. We can say to ourselves, "I am nowhere near that bad".
Supernanny is parenting as celebrity. And we should be canny enough to be wary of celebrity. The focus of the show on controlling children through specific strategies certainly may meet a need, but there hasn't been enough acknowledgment that all children are individuals and that a one-approach-for-all strategy will not work for all children.
The "naughty" chair is a great example. If you had to sit on a "naughty" chair every half hour because you did something wrong (that you may not even have realised was wrong) what would you think about yourself? Especially if it was your "naughty" chair and mum and dad or your older siblings never had to sit on it.
If every household introduces a naughty chair we could be establishing a nation of children with deep-held insecurities who grow up believing they are naughty.
This isn't to say that some of the nanny's advice is not worthwhile. She is a big fan of getting down to a child's level when you speak to them – this is great advice.
Our obsession with Supernanny is a demonstration of how we, as proud parents, have been unwilling to ask for the support we need.
I'm grateful for the appearance of the Supernanny because we really need better parenting advice – so let's get serious about it.
Parenting advice should be provided through extra payment of trained childcare workers to counsel and provide education sessions for parents in an early childhood setting.
So, keep watching. But, don't take Supernanny as gospel.
This should be just the beginning of a new era of parenting, one where we are not afraid to seek advice.
Daniel Donahoo is a fellow at public policy think tank OzProspect and father of two boys.