Charlie Taylor, expert advisor to the British government on behavior, has suggested that nursery schools identify toddlers showing early signs of aggression so that they can receive specialist intervention.
The Daily Mail reported:
Taylor said nurseries should be able to spot children with behavioural issues and recommend them for specialist tuition to provide them with boundaries and social skills.
Mr Taylor said: ‘Any child can go off the rails for a bit and what we need is a system that is responsive to them and helps them to get back on the straight and narrow.’
He said it was easier to tackle poor behaviour among young children because habits were less ingrained.
”˜If you can see it coming when they are two or three or four or five, then that’s when we can intervene,’ he said.
Read: How a bad ‘un can be spotted at the age of TWO — and should be sent to ‘discipline institutes’ at five, says behaviour tsar, on DailyMail.co.uk.
When I first read this article, I thought Charlie Taylor knew what he was talking about. Many Lovefraud readers who discovered that their children had sociopathic traits have told me that they saw callous, unemotional and aggressive behavior at a very young age. Other readers who became involved with sociopaths who already had children sometimes saw the same thing—kids who were lying and manipulating almost as soon as they could talk.
What is to be done with these children? One of the most important points in Dr. Liane Leedom’s book, Just Like His Father?, is that the sooner you start working with an aggressive child to change his or her behavior, the better your chances of success.
Riots in the United Kingdom
Charlie Taylor made his comments upon publication of a report that he wrote on Britain’s alternative education system. Taylor analyzed the schools and services offered to students who were expelled from mainstream public schools, often for behavior issues.
The report was commissioned by the government in the wake of the riots that shook the country for five days in August 2011. Mobs roamed through 10 different boroughs of London and several other cities, including Bristol, Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool. Approximately 3,100 people were arrested. According to the Guardian, the rioters were overwhelmingly young, male and unemployed.
The Guardian also published a series of articles written by sociologists analyzing what happened. To summarize some of the findings, the newspaper wrote:
Many interviewees identified deprivation and inequality as root issues. Some spoke about the lack of work opportunities and access to education, as well as the educational maintenance allowance cuts. Some believed that getting an education was the key to the golden gate, but a year after graduation they were still struggling to find work. For others, also out of work, a university degree had never been on the cards.
Many of these young people may have grown up in chaotic homes, developed mental health or personality issues, failed in school, and become stuck in destructive behavior. How is society to solve these problems?
Reactions to the suggestion
The best way to address these issues is to start young—the younger the better. So I thought Charlie Taylor’s suggestions had merit. That wasn’t the view of some commentators in the UK media.
Here’s what Sonia Poulton, a columnist with MailOnline, wrote:
According to Mr. Taylor, nurseries are a fertile ground to spot and tag the troublemakers so that they may receive anger management classes before they enter formal education at primary school level.
Sometimes, in daily life, it pays just to laugh at foolishness. As I did – long and hard – when I first heard this recommendation. I can’t take it seriously and I hope other citizens of the UK will respond in the same way. Frankly, it simply does not warrant consideration on any reasonable level.
Read Anger management for two-year-olds? The State wants control from cradle to grave, on DailyMail.co.uk.
Sonia Poulton’s comments reflect the vast ignorance of many people in society about personality disorders. It’s the belief that at the core of our beings, we’re all basically the same. It’s a belief that gets us in a lot of trouble.
Some of us are radically different, even as toddlers. When children are born with a genetic predisposition towards sociopathy, or born into a terrible home environment, the best chance we have for saving them is to intervene as soon as possible. If nursery school teachers could refer troublesome toddlers for special attention, it may help them grow up to be productive members of society, rather than rioters.
My mom has a friend, who has a daughter. This daughter is with another women who has a daughter from a previous marriage.That daughter had this child and we have no idea who the dad is. I could be any of the five guys she was with in the period of time she became pregnant, while on a drug trip, I might add.
It’s a mess really. Poor little guy lives in a home with roaches, man. Roaches!!
I hope I explained that well. It’s a weird story and the whole family is insane. At risk child for sure.
Have you called child protective services?
Near ~
Many Child Protective Service departments have early childhood development workers who come to the home and work with the parent to make sure the child is progressing properly for his age.
If someone has already call child protective, maybe another call to clue them in that this may be needed.
This sounds like it may be serious, please make sure someone calls the CPS hotline, it is in the phone book.
Yes, they know. That’s why I’m so annoyed. They do nothing. One lady has been asking them more questions lately, though and checking in more. They are about to lose their home and move in to an apartment, so maybe that will attract some attention.
The baby can walk fully, so I’m happy he is on track with that. Phew. ^_^
There are extremely early screening tests now for autism; babies as young as 8 or 9 months can be evaluated and diagnosed with autism. The earlier the therapy for autism spectrum disorders can start, the greater the chance for the child to have a more normal life. So, I see hope in the idea that psychopathic pd can be detected earlier, so that treatment can begin earlier to help the child develop normal empathy and compassion, to learn that cruelty towards animals and other, smaller children isn’t OK, to learn healthy ways to express anger and frustration, and learn healthy ways to ask for attention and love.
There is a movie out called “We Need To Talk About Kevin.” It was mentioned on the Fishhead FB page. From what I’ve read, it’s a really good movie that addresses the problem child’s background leading up to a catestrophic, Columbine-type of event. I’m hoping it leads to more insight into the nature of these types of children.
I’d like to add what I know about my P sister and her daugher, who was eventually diagnosed with borderline personality disorder after she reached adulthood.
When my niece was born, even though my sister had 12 weeks maternity leave, she told my mother that she wanted to go back to work after 4 weeks because she “had cleaned her closets.” Baby? What baby? She was more interested in pursuing her career.
We had a cousin who died from AIDS. His funeral was the same day as my niece’s third birthday. She was acting out at the funeral and at the family gathering afterwards. My brother made a derogatory comment about having problems with the way that a certain three-year-old was acting.
By this time, my sister and her first husband were going through a bad divorce. My sister was one of those women who ran her husband down to anybody who would listen, including unfortunately a three-year-old who was a captive audience.
Her husband wasn’t above getting his shots in where he could. He is a college chemistry professor. He got away from my sister by staying at the school helping students (and guess what happened between him and one of the female students? Which he flaunted by kissing the student in the middle of the day in a public park.)
My niece had no stability in her life. My sister never bonded with her. My brother-in-law tried to make the marriage work, but I saw her shoot him down every chance she could. She treated him like an idiot (shades of how my mother treated my father) and it seemed that she made a point of doing so in front of other people. When he tried to do things with my niece, my sister was there telling him what he was doing wrong so he gave up and left my niece to my sister.
The bottom line for my niece was she was regulated to “puppy-hood.” Really, she was treated like a household pet. She was supposed to stay out of sight and mind, unless they were in the mood for her, and be entertaining when she was around. The child was emotionally abandonded the day she was born.
I also remember that when my sister was married to her second husband, she told me how every morning she liked to have a conversation with him over breakfast. Then, she wanted to read the paper before she left for work. However, his son (the nerve of this kid) tried to have a conversation with her after his father left. She was furious. “WTF, can’t he see that I am reading?” I answered, “Can’t you see he wants a relationship with you?” “I married his father, not him.” “He’s under the impression that this is his family now and you’re part of it.” If looks could kill.
Husband #2 told me one day that my niece had been bounced from caretaker to caretaker. Nobody could stand her because of how she acted. My sister only wanted to go to work. She couldn’t find a caretaker who would take my niece for any length of time. Did Ms. MBA figure out that the kid needed help and that she might need to spend more time making sure that my niece got it? What? Interrupt her career?
My sister told me that she had decided to have a baby to save her first marriage. The kid was obligated before she was even conceived.
When my brother made his putdown comment about my niece at our cousin’s funeral, my comeback was, “And I have a problem with a 38-year-old man who can’t see that a little girl is only acting out because negative attention is better than no attention at all. How else do you expect a two-year-old or three-year-old to comment on what is going on around her? Look at what her parents are engaged in with each other. That kid is crying for help.”
Getting back to the article that led this discussion, before the focus is on “what’s wrong with the child,” I hope the first investigation would be on, “What’s happening at home? What are the parents giving or not giving the child?”
Husband #2 also told me that they met at a group for parents who abuse their children. Her version was that they met at a group for parents who had a mutual interest in perhaps improving some of their parenting techniques.
I am very reluctant to see a P or S under every rock or tree. I’m sure that they’re there, but first, let’s eliminate all other possibilities – ESPECIALLY THE HOME ENVIRONMENT AND PARENTS – before pouncing on the kids and declaring them whatever. Stop labeling the kids unless the parents are proven not contributing to or causing the child’s behavior.
When my niece was little, every once in a while, my P sister would comment that my niece’s behavior reminded my P sister of how I acted when I was little. Really? Could that have been because you and our S mother were so much alike?
The difference was I had a father present who cared about me and provided support. My niece didn’t have that. Also, my parents stayed together and the home remained stable in that we didn’t move whereas my sister changed men and homes often. She even ended up living with and marrying the brother of husband #1, which makes her on her third marriage. In between marriages, there were other men because according to my sister, she “had the right to get laid.”
I’m always puzzled by statements like, “These kids probably come from troubled environments so let’s fix the kids.”
Hello? How about eliminating or fixing the sources of the trouble and making the environments better? Wouldn’t then, by default, the kids end up being better as well?
Of course, that’s not realistic because the schools can’t go around telling the parents what to do.
I wanted to add that looking to fix the toddlers, before addressing what is at home, is like looking at somebody who has broken out in a rash and deciding that the kid has bubonic plague while overlooking the possibility that kid might have the measles, allergies to something (meds or food,) chicken pox, or played in poison ivy the day before.
Then, it seems to me that the “experts/professionals” concentrate on the bubonic plague outbreak completely ignoring the more mundane and common possibilities for how the child is behaving.
MiLo,
What is the case load of child protective services? Off the wall given how strapped most states are for programs.
How effective can they be? How much real knowledge do they have before making any conclusions or recommendations?
When you hear hoof beats, think horses, not zebras.