Week 48; autumn term about to end

This week I've had the last lessons of the autumn term for most of my groups, and we've done our usual things as well as talked about Christmas. In my Write it down -course we've exchanged opinions on advertising around Christmas, and we've all agreed that it seems to start too early nowadays. Somebody wrote that this year she heard the first Christmas carol already in September, and those of us who have small children have noticed that different kinds of toy booklets and ads seem to be delivered in every household earlier and earlier every year.

For children these toy adverts seem to be an endless source of inspiration when Christmas wishes are concerned. They come up with all kinds of requests when they browse through the pages of these booklets. Of course, now some of you think that okay, why don't you just throw those booklets away before your kids get to see them; that will solve the problem. Maybe so, but it's not that simple. You see, children tell each other about these booklets and if someone hasn't got them, the finger starts pointing at the parents pretty quickly..

Well, of course parents don't have to take all of these wishes too seriously, and I think that it's very healthy for children to learn that you can't have everything you wish for. When I look at the lists my children have written to Santa, I just try to figure out which of these Christmas wishes are truly important, and ignore the ones I consider unsuitable, too expensive, or totally useless. I guess that's what parenting is: you try to do what's right by your children without pampering them too much or being too hard on them.

Merry Christmas, everyone!