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Raising children with technology is certainly a challenge. I have 5 kids, oldest 8 years old, youngest 15 months, living in a condo in LA because...you know....
by codekilla 9y ago
Raising children with technology is certainly a challenge. I have 5 kids, oldest 8 years old, youngest 15 months, living in a condo in LA because...you know......f'ing real estate prices, single family homes with 1200 square feet are 1.3 million in our district. So how do you let kids be free if they can't even go outside really?...and multiple kids in a condo without some kind of T.V. or tablet is utter insanity.
It's been very tough, but we don't have a T.V., we do let our kids use the tablet, with restricted apps and time. Our neighbors below us hate us and are moving....because you know....five kids stomping around above them, but I guess this is the new reality. The best thing we did was smooth coat all the walls with plaster and then make 2 large chalkboard walls. I am constantly surprised by how well this worked out. I think the tactility of the chalk has been an important factor, one that I overlooked, as I always used dry erase markers. I'm a convert to chalk now and my kids only use the best, Hagaromo full-touch. Working on math homework is a dream now as I can easily sketch out geometric concepts and have them trace over it with their fingers. Sure you could do it on paper, but something about standing in front of the chalkboard makes it more compelling. Aside from that setting up a folding table on the balcony and buying them a bunch of mid-grade chemistry stuff has also worked out surprisingly well. A couple days ago they created a catalytic reaction that actually gave off quite a good bit of heat. Could they have injured themselves? Probably. I'd rather have them experiment and explore.
4 of my kids are girls, and this raises special challenges. We fought a war with both sets of grandparents about not buying them dresses or pink gender defining toys. I was shocked how much resistance we got on this, but I strongly advise parents of girls to consider what the value of gender neutrality is, and whether or not it makes sense for them to try and abide by it when buying toys or clothes. If you do, be prepared to meet with a lot of resistance, both from your parents and public school. Just my two cents.
- woolvalley 9y agoWhy did you decide to have 5 kids in that kind of environment?
- codekilla 9y agoFair enough question I suppose. I am a millennial, and I think many of our generation, and especially the younger generation are afraid of having more than say two or three kids, if they plan on having kids. This is certainly reasonable given the economic challenges we face and most principal among those housing costs. Short answer: We are punks I guess, we didn't want to let any of those economic factors dictate what size family we could have. Our condo is 1400 square ft., and costs exactly half what a 1200 square ft. house costs. In general, people I think way overvalue the quintessential American home. Parks and malls are free and work great, and it's nice to get out of the house more often. We live 1.2 miles from the beach, another great resource made possible for us only because of the decision to live in a condo. For us it made sense and it works great. We wanted a bigger family and we just did it, no regrets.
- woolvalley 9y agoAre you doing something similar like the http://5kids1condo.com/ http://5kids1condo.com/ guy is? With shared bedrooms and such?
- codekilla 9y agoWow, had no idea there were others writing a blog:). Yes, shared bedrooms, before when our place was smaller we had two in the living room.
- closeparen 9y agoThat is an absolutely fascinating and perspective-altering idea, thanks for sharing the link. The inability to get a quiet room alone is my personal vision of hell, but I suppose that if I literally never had the experience of a quiet room to myself, I wouldn't miss it. I wonder if this is like language learning... much easier if you're immersed in it from birth, than trying to adapt later in life.
- tomcam 9y agoI love that you had five kids. Kids are wonderful and our population is declining. You’re doing the best thing for yourself – and the best thing for society.
- Fnoord 9y agoThe worst thing you can do for the environment isn't flying; it is having a child. Having multiple, is, well.. X times worse. Our population isn't declining either, as long as you watch it from Earth's PoV instead of whatever nation you're from. I don't want to judge a specific person on having a number of children, and being the parent of one child I can't even fathom having five (!!!) but the general notions you made in conclusion to that I disagree with.
- autogn0me 9y agoIs it? Or is he a monster who brought 5 beings into a existence of suffering? https://www.samharris.org/podcast/item/is-life-actually-worth-living https://www.samharris.org/podcast/item/is-life-actually-wort...
- dorchadas 9y agoIs it best for society, though? The earth is already massively overpopulated. Perhaps it's best if some populations decline. And is it the best for himself if, for instance, the kids grow up to hate OP because of, say, global warming forcing them to fight to survive? Or if he has to live to see them struggle with that?
- 9y ago
- watwut 9y agoWhat do you think is benefit of fighting that pink? (Full disclosure: I hate pink and was shocked too over how much of it grandparents and such forced on us and in what way. But I am still curious about your reasons. )
- codekilla 9y agoThis is a pretty charged topic, and it's difficult to make the case unequivocally. In our family, it got to the point where people were emailing research papers(academics and doctors in the family) back and forth and Christmas was ruined. I don't have time to cite all the papers on both sides of this, but for us(my wife feels even more strongly about this than I do), it came down to the realization that AT BEST all the girl's toys and clothes could do no harm to their psyche. AT WORST, it could possibly instill in them a type of inferiority with respect to boys in terms of technical ability, and a diminished sense of their place in the world with respect to boys. As a scientist, I have to consider all the evidence, and as a parent, I have to make the decisions I think will help make my children stronger. My wife and I basically came to the conclusion that "girl's toys" and "girl's clothes" were bullshit, and an unnecessary risk to their psyche. Unfortunately pink is collateral damage in this war, as it is so ubiquitously used in our culture to demarcate girl from boy. I can in no way say that we are right, not in a scientific sense, I can only say that after spending hours and hours in toy and clothes aisles, I would say as a culture it's time to rethink gender neutrality, and the way we are separating boys and girls with clothes and toys from a very young age.
- mixmastamyk 9y agoDon’t like pink or princess stuff for my daughter, but a few minor things slipped through the cracks. Should I get rid of them?
- watwut 9y agoYou might cause backslash in other direction if you are too militant. Ultimately, kids want the same as other kids have once they go to preschool. Also, the association between apparently girly and bad or dumb is not healthy if you happen to be girl.
- SQL2219 9y ago>Sure you could do it on paper, but something about standing in front of the chalkboard makes it more compelling. Yes.