One of Beijing’s former resident expatriate parenting experts, as well as WellWomen and Clothing Auction Network (CAN) founders Rebecca Archer is back in town for a special one day Respectful Parenting Workshop this weekend. Before that though, she’s got a fun little parenting challenge that starts today (Oct 23) – details at the end of the post. Jingkids International just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to speak with Archer about her recent adventures since leaving Beijing earlier this year and find out what she’s missed about the city!
JKI: Hey Rebecca! It’s good to have you back in our zipcode again! Please tell us a little about how life outside of Beijing has been for your family since you left.
Archer: After returning to New Zealand, we then moved to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam. Life is quite different, we’ve been enjoying the delicious fresh Vietnamese food, the tropical weather, and buying coconuts on the street. We’re able to swim outside most days, although the rainy season causes a lot of flooding in our neighborhood. It’s a very hectic and busy place, with swarms of motorbikes that you need to battle through every day for school pick up and drop off! We have been able to rediscover and introduce our kids to some of our old favorite pastimes like surfing, kayaking, and jumping off high rocks into fresh water. The hardest part is developing new relationships in a new place, especially when we had such great family friendships developed over 8 years in Beijing.
JKI: Could you tell us why you’ve returned to Beijing right now?
Archer: I returned to Beijing for two reasons – the first was to attend the Chinese Positive Discipline Think Tank which was held in Fengtai this weekend. It was an inspirational gathering of over 300 people doing such amazing work to create more positive and respectful relationships in schools and homes.
The second reason is to facilitate a parenting workshop for the English speaking community in Beijing. There is still a lack of resources here for parents who are looking for help with challenging behaviors in their homes. There are so many amazing parents who want to be the best parent they can be, and so many people are wanting to parent differently from the way they were bought up. Learning how to raise kids without punishments, rewards, threats, bribing, and yelling, is difficult because parents aren’t sure what to do instead. Parenting workshops equip parents with great alternatives that really work.
JKI: What have you missed most about Beijing since moving overseas?
Archer: Oh so many things! Moving away from Beijing is the hardest move I have done in my life. I miss all the awesome parks and the mountains the most. My children grew up learning to walk and climb on the Great Wall, and we have explored so many different crumbling parts of it and had so many amazing adventures in the surrounding mountains. I miss the seasons – skiing, ice- skating, building snowmen in the winter; the new life that comes in spring; and autumn was our favorite time to go camping, stay in mountain houses and enjoy watching the trees turn yellow – oh the gingko leaves!
JKI: Have you noticed any new parenting trends around the world?
Archer: Over the last few years parents are much more aware of neuroscience, the importance of emotional regulation, and research-backed parenting methods. Parents are embracing the shift away from a hierarchical family dynamic to a family where children’s voice and feelings are valued. Parents are also much more likely to respond to their children’s big emotions with empathy.
There is a real shift towards ‘gentle parenting’ which means that parents are being more gentle with their interactions with their children and therefore being gentle with the child’s heart. There is so much kindness which is absolutely beautiful and important, and it’s a much needed swing away from a more authoritarian parenting style (very strict, controlling through punishment).
Where parents are struggling now is that they are very focused on the ‘kind’, and now they are unsure about how to set and hold boundaries without punishment, because they don’t want to be seen by their children as ‘mean’. And so ‘gentle parenting’ is often seen as permissive, and it shouldn’t be.
It’s very important that children learn to respect others (including the parents) and the needs of the environment and situation. Gentle parenting is actually about teaching children these things in a way that is gentle in the response, while still being firm. We can hold boundaries and set limits, and children can (and will) be upset about those limits and that’s okay. The ‘gentle’ is in the way you connect with them in their struggles, and hold space.
The world really needs kindness and to understand what it is like to walk in the other’s shoes. Without that empathy and kindness, people will keep retaliating and fighting back out of their own hurt and pain. The big work the world needs to do starts in our homes.
Care to up your parenting game? Join Archer’s free 5 Day Parenting Connection Challenge starting today – just scan the QR code below to join. This challenge gives you a tiny glimpse into the tools that her Respectful Parenting workshop (Oct 28) can equip you with to support you on your parenting journey. More details on the workshop here.
Images: Courtesy of Rebecca Archer
KEEP READING: A Glimpse Into the Toolset of a Positive Discipline Parent
