I’ve been a fan of Renee from Womanist Musings’ (@womanistmusings) work for a long time and loved having the opportunity to connect with her recently on Skype as we filmed her segment of my toddler years video. I’ve been begging her to guest post for me for a while and am happy to finally have a piece of her work to share with you. Please welcome Renee to the blog.

Teaching a Child to Refer to her Genitalia as the C Word

Every parent eventually has to make a decision regarding what to teach their children about their genitalia.  Some people simply cannot bear to give their children the correct anatomical names and instead make up cutesy nick names for them.  In doing so, what they don’t recognize, is that they are introducing the idea of shame when it comes to both the physical body and sex and sexuality.  As the years pass, it sends a strong message that certain body parts are dirty and not to be spoken of.

The unhusband and I made the decision to tell our sons that they had both a penis and testes. This should not have been a controversial decision; however, when they entered school, one teacher  asked my oldest son to refer to his genitalia as his wee wee, because his forthrightness about his body made her uncomfortable. What should seem like a straight forward decision, can at times become complex depending on the people that you and your child interact with.

I recently came across the story of a feminist dad who decided to push the envelop when it came to talking to his daughter about her genitalia.

I really never thought this would happen. I had a vision that I was going to be able to raise my kids differently than anyone ever had, that they’d grow up free of racial prejudice and television and only wearing pink and all the other bad stuff that’s wandered into the head of any other kid, ever.

Sadly, that is not always the situation. Case study #1: Language.

In college I read Inga Muscio‘s amazing book Cunt: A Declaration of Independence. (I was a feminist! I was the only guy in Womyn’s Issues Now! I could do anything!) Essentially, the point of that book was that the word “cunt” used to be an honorific term for the female ruler of a country, whereas the word “vagina” is an Old English Latin word meaning “sheath for a sword.” And, in the earliest days of changing nappies and learning how female people wipe, I was quick to teach my gurgling baby proto-feminist girl to say “cunt!” instead of “vagina” — or instead of whatever other term you’d use.

No matter what anyone else said, or how they looked at me when I said it. In fact, because of how they looked at me when I said it. (source)

I think there is a good argument to made that teaching a little girl to refer to her genitalia as only a vagina, is teaching her to refer only to a specific part of her anatomy.  It is based in the idea that the only part of our genitalia that matters, is the opening that allows penetration by a man.  I would fully support teaching a child to use vulva instead; however,  I believe that cunt is not the appropriate choice to thwart the limiting social construction of what female genitalia signifies.

There are some women who have chosen to reclaim the word cunt. This is an individual choice, and the same cannot be said for a father who actively chooses to teach his daughter this word.  I think first we must consider that we are talking about a male parent. No matter the intention of the man in question, the word cunt will always be problematic.  He may have done the research of the etymological roots, but the fact of the matter is that today the word cunt is socially understood to be a reductive word used to attack and debase women, no matter how many times you watch the Vagina Monologue and watch as Eve Ensler, encourages the men in the audience to shout out the word.  Intent does not magically alter the social understanding of a word in question.

There are several groups who have attempted to reclaim words.  Some Blacks have attempted to reclaim the slur nigger and some gay people have also done so with the word queer, but despite their efforts, these words are still actively used as a slur, and even within the communities to whom these words belong, the idea of reclamation is not necessarily universally embraced. Then there are communities like the disabled community, who are attempting to ask people to reconsider their usage of words like retard, lame, crazy, and moron, with little success I might add. Regardless of the community that you address, a large part of the issue with these problematic words is that they not only have become socially ingrained, the meaning of each of these words has developed their own unique definition.

In many ways, this mans effort reminds me of those who insist on claiming that they were only talking about a cigarette, when called on their usage of the word f#g. Part of raising socially aware children is teaching them to think for themselves.  It begins by setting a foundation in which they are taught that all people matter regardless of their race, sexuality, gender, age, or ability.  From there, the next step should be a discussion of common isms aimed at historically marginalized group, along with the concept of privilege. The final stage, and the most exciting I might add, is turning their questions around and asking them what they think and why.  This can be as simple asking themselves to picture how they would feel in the place of the marginalized person at first.

I disagree with this man’s approach because his first thought removes choice.  Not all women believe that the word cunt should be reclaimed, and many, myself included, find it extremely offensive. He could have chosen to thwart the common understanding of female genitalia and use the term labia and then had a discussion on why cunt might be a word for her to consider, but instead he used his adult and male privilege to decide for her.  There may well come a time when she pulls away from her father’s understanding and decides that this word is not suitable for her, but we all know that ideas when introduced at a very young age are very difficult to overcome in later years. In this instance, I believe respecting women and encouraging agency should come with the right to name and that is something that was taken from her, in his bid to be the ultimate feminist man. Every person should have the right and ability to cherish their bodies.

Any parent who engages in social justice parenting will tell you that it is an uphill battle.  There are times when your children will say the most insightful things, and you will be filled with immense pride, and others when you feel it is hopeless because they have learned and internalized such negative things from either their friends, or the media.

Renee Martin is the proud mother of two very active young boys. She resides in Niagara Falls On with her family, where she works as a freelance writer and blogger.    Her home blogs are, Womanist Musings and Fangs for the Fantasy.

Photo credit:moxieg on flickr

Today Women’s Voices for the Earth released a report called Dirty Secrets: What’s Hiding in Your Cleaning Products?  I wrote about the report over at Care2.com, but surprisingly (or not), I wasn’t very surprised by the dirty secrets in this report.

There are chemicals in makeup and personal care products. There are chemicals in baby care products. There are chemicals in storage containers and drink bottles and packaging. And yes, there are chemicals in household cleaning products.

I know.

You know.

We know.

And now we need action to get rid of those chemicals. I am pleased that the Canadian government is taking action and reviewing a large list of chemicals and I do hope to see progress in banning them. I’m happy to see companies like Johnson & Johnson making promises to get rid of carcinogens in baby shampoo (but I won’t believe it until I see it and it is verified by independent third parties).

But until the chemicals are gone, more needs to be done to educate consumers and to empower consumers. People need to know about the dangerous chemicals lurking in the everyday products that they use so that they can make educated choices. They need information from the government and non-profit organizations about the safety (or lack thereof) of these products. They also need mandated, clear, truthful ingredient lists on the products that are being sold on the market. Even people who are able to decode a long list of latin words on a package label are probably still only getting half the story.

In my Care2 article, I give people a few suggestions for action. I thought I’d pass those along here too:

• Start by protecting yourself and your family. You can get some recipes for making homemade cleaning products from Healthy Child, Healthy World or Women’s Voices for the Earth.
• Healthy Child, Healthy World also suggests contacted the companies whose cleaning products you use and like and asking them about some of the ingredients you are concerned about. Ask them to disclose all ingredients and ask them to remove dangerous toxins and allergens.
• Share this story and the report with your friends and family, so that they can protect themselves and take action.
• Finally, for those of you in the United States, let your political representatives know how you feel. You can contact your representative directly via Women’s Voices for the Earth’s website and you can sign the Care2 petition asking Congress to support the Cleaning Products Right to Know Act.

I came across a post today that I really enjoyed. On the Camp Creek Blog, Lori wrote:

There’s a billboard in my town that makes me grind my teeth into dust. It shows a kid’s hands holding, on the left, a video-game controller and, on the right, a turtle. Then it says something along the lines of “unplug”.

She continued by explaining why the billboard bothers her:

The whole either/or mentality is what gets to me. By positing the game controller against the turtle, the message is “video games: bad, playing outside: good.” Why isn’t this a good way to get kids outdoors? Because if they reject the left side of that equation, they may automatically reject the right side. This kind of shaming argument runs a serious risk of turning kids off the outdoors.

I absolutely agree. I hate campaigns that attempt to shame people for their choices or their actions. I’ve written about this before as it relates to parents’ use of technology and as it relates to breastfeeding promotion and drunk driving ads.  Simply telling people what to do without understanding why they aren’t doing those things and without providing support to help them do those things is only going to create anger and resentment.

I think it is important to give kids plenty of opportunities to play outside and to foster a love of nature by engaging in outdoor activities with them. I also think that there are a lot of kids who spend too much time in front of the television and video games. However, I don’t think that setting up this type of good/bad equation is going to make kids suddenly turn off their video games and go outside.

The same logic applies to so many other things. Put the important/healthy thing on one side and the fun/delicious thing on opposite ends of the spectrum and you’re sure to teach your child to hate the important/healthy thing because you know that they love the fun/delicious thing.

• Math vs. Recess
• Broccoli vs. Chocolate
• Reading vs. Lego
• Kale Smoothie vs. Lemonade
• Volunteering vs. Going to a Movie
• Hiking vs. Nintendo
• Carrots vs. Cupcakes

There are so many enjoyable things in life. Some may be healthier than others when looked at in isolation and held up for an objective comparison. But life isn’t about trying to pack in as much healthy as we can. Life is about living. Enjoying a variety of different things is what makes life worth living.

If we act like we have to give up the things on the right in favour of the things on the left, we are going to make ourselves miserable. But if we give ourselves permission to have both the things on the left and the right and to enjoy them all, we’re more likely to be happy and successful.

Balancing shaming equations is not so fun. Doing math outdoors with chalk…now that’s awesome!

Image credit: stuartpilbrow on flickr

I remember my short maternity leave with my first born. I spent it primarily dealing with breastfeeding issues and trying to stop the crying. He didn’t always cry hysterically, but sometimes he did — like in this picture.

Some times of day were better than others and, unlike his sister, he did love the baby swing (and so we loved the baby swing too).  But there were definitely times when he would just cry and cry and nothing would help. The worst time was from about 3pm to 6pm. By the time my partner got home from work, I was drained and exhausted and ready to hand off the baby.

As a new parent, I struggled. What am I doing wrong? Is he hurt? Is he hungry? Is he not getting enough sleep? Is something in my milk upsetting his tummy? Does his diaper need to be changed again? Is he teething ALREADY? Is he sick? Does he have a fever? Is he constipated? Is he hot? Is he cold? Is the tag on his shirt bothering him? Over and over again, I would ask myself these questions and try each and every thing I could think of to calm him down. Sometimes something would seem to work, but the next day it wouldn’t be any help at all.

I had done a lot of reading to prepare for bringing my baby home and of course I’d heard of Shaken Baby Syndrome. I knew that it could be frustratingly difficult with babies sometimes and that shaking them was incredibly dangerous. I knew that when it got to be too much, it was better to put him down in a safe space and take a breather than to risk hurting him.

Most days, I was able to keep my composure despite the crying. When I couldn’t, I was more likely to lay down and cry with him than to react violently. That’s just who I am and how I react to that type of stress.

Purple Crying

I knew, at the time, that I needed to get through it. What I didn’t know, was that it was completely normal. I called it the witching hour or the fussy time, but I always assumed there must be some underlying cause that I just wasn’t seeing. I now know, that may not be the case. The Purple Crying campaign is trying to educate parents and caregivers about the period of Purple Crying.

The period of Purple Crying can start at around two weeks old and continue until about three to four months. According Marilyn Barr, the Founder and Executive Director of the National Shaken Baby Syndrome, babies going through this period can resist all attempts at soothing.

Nothing helps. Even though it helps when they are fussy or crying other times, it is different when they go through these inconsolable crying bouts. Nothing seems to sooth them.

During this phase of a baby’s life they can cry for hours and still be healthy and normal. Parents often think there must be something wrong with them or they would not be crying like this. However, even after a check-up from the doctor which shows the baby is healthy they still go home and cry for hours, night after night. “It was so discouraging,” said one dad. “Our baby giggles and seems fine during the day and almost like clock-work he starts crying about 6 pm. He is growing and healthy so why does he cry like that ?”

So what is purple crying all about? The letters of the word ‘purple’ spell out an acronym that describe some of the main characteristics that parents and caregivers should be aware of.

Coping with Purple Crying

The most important thing to do when dealing with purple crying is to try to stay calm. The website for the Period of Purple Crying has some information and tips on how to stay calm when you are frustrated and drained.

Personally, I found fresh air to be refreshing. I am lucky that we live out in the country, so it was easy to go outside and get a breather without having people stare at me and my crying baby.

I am a believer in crying in arms (versus leaving a baby to cry on their own).  I think that if I was put in the situation again of having a baby who cried that much, I would have purchased some noise cancelling headphones to at least allow me to focus on my baby without getting a headache. I think it would have allowed me to stay calm longer and not be as distressed while dealing with his needs.

Although  I don’t like the idea of a baby crying alone, it is obviously better for a parent to leave the baby alone in a safe space briefly than to do something that will injure the baby.  Ensure you have a safe space for the baby, go out of the room, take a breather and then go back in once you have collected yourself.

Cherishing the Moments of Calm

My second baby was a calm baby. I’ve often said I could have worked full-time for the first six months of her life if I hadn’t had a toddler to take care of too. She basically slept and nursed all day and all night and was pretty much content as long as she was touching me. The saying “nine months in, nine months out” applies perfectly to her. The sling was her home.

My son, however, as I described above, was a very different baby. With him, the quiet calm moments came less frequently, but it made them all that much more special. The picture below is one we’ve had on our fridge for years. It is the way that I would like to remember his baby days.

Want to help raise awareness?

Every day babies are shaken and abused because the person caring for them became overwhelmed by their crying and didn’t know what to do. In a lot of cases, the tragedies that come from those situations could have been prevented if the person knew that the crying was normal and was prepared to deal with it.

If you want to help raise awareness about the Period of Purple Crying, consider sharing this blog post or writing one of your own. Tell people your own story about your baby who wouldn’t stop crying and what you did to cope.  Or, if you know how to knit, you can take part in the Click for Babies campaign that is looking for people to knit anywhere from 5 to 50 purple coloured baby caps with baby friendly yarn and send them to the organizers in their province or state.

What was your experience like with your baby? If your baby did cry a lot, did you know about the period of purple crying?

There are apparently around 85 million moms in the United States. Maybe you are one of them.

Did you know that it only takes one mom? That could be you. You could be the one mom using your voice on behalf of the world’s poorest. But in reality there were 10 social media moms who went to Kenya as part of a “movement to promote education, engagement and activism on behalf of the world’s poorest. #ONEMOMS is an initiative of ONE, a grassroots organization cofounded by Bono and other activists that fights extreme poverty and preventable disease. ONE is backed by 2.5 million members and a series of partners.

Like #ONEMOMS, every mother counts believes that each and every mom is important. Led by Christy Turlington and a group of partners, this initiative is increasing education and awareness around maternal and child health, which includes the launch of a film called No Mother, No Cry.

But maybe one mom isn’t enough to tackle the issues of every mother. Maybe we need a million moms. Thankfully, there are many millions of moms, because it seems they have different priorities, sometimes shared, sometimes divisive.

The original (?) million moms descended on the National Mall in Washington, DC in 2000 for the Million Mom March in support of tighter gun control. This is an initiative of the Brady Campaign to prevent gun violence.

Then, the Christian American Family Association came along with its One Million Moms to fight the “filth many segments of our society, especially the entertainment media, are throwing at our children.” I may agree with them on some issues, like the objectification of women and girls in the media. But I want to distance myself as far as possible from these million moms when they start protesting the possibility of Ernie and Bert getting married on Sesame Street or objecting to Chaz Bono being on Dancing with the Stars because they might have to explain to their children what transgender means. Or when they present Sarah Palin with the Faith, Family and Courage Award.

Next, there is the Million Moms Challenge, being organized by ABC News and the UN Foundation, as well as Johnson & Johnson and BabyCenter, and an online community powered by BlogFrog. Their goal is to engage “a million Americans with millions of mothers in the developing world around issues that directly impact pregnancy, childbirth and children’s health” and to “raise awareness and funds to help women and children everywhere survive and thrive.”

Finally (I think), there is the Million Mothers March (not to be confused with the Million Moms March) being organized by Breastfeeding Mothers Unite (not to be confused with Breastfeeding Moms Unite, my friend Melodie’s great blog). The march is being planned for August 2012 in Washington, DC (at the National Mall) to fight increased incidences of harassment of breastfeeding mothers when they are nursing in public.

The one mom, every mom, and the many versions of the million moms have websites, facebook pages, twitter accounts, hash tags, campaigns, petitions, mailing lists and ambassadors. It all starts to blend together after a while. The good and the nasty. The important and the ridiculous.

My head is spinning. Is yours?

I want to be involved. I want to help. I want to look underneath these organizations to see who they are supporting and who is supporting them. But it is getting difficult. With so many initiatives and organizations and cross-pollination, yet separation, I must admit this one mom is getting lost in the shuffle.

I am a fan of videos that send a strong message. A while back, I shared the Healthy Child, Healthy World video called Wake Up! For your child’s sake.  Today, for Breast Cancer Awareness Month, I want to share another video on a similar topic. Check out the Keep a Breast Foundation‘s Non Toxic Revolution video.

Thanks to Lisa Borden from Borden Communications for sharing this video with me.

I have food on the mind lately. I’m trying to feed our family better and I’m also working on a post in my head as a follow up to the McDonald’s post. I want to talk about our food system, our relationship with it, how it impacts our lives, and what needs to change. But I still have to finish working through my train of thought.

In the meantime, in addition to sharing cookies with you yesterday, I thought I would share today’s journey of food from local farmers and our own backyard garden onto our dinner plate.

Good farmer’s markets know it is smart to do something to attract families. Ours often has free attractions and activities for kids. Today’s attraction was free face painting.

Our bounty from the farmer’s market! I always go around and check the organic stands first and then go back to other local vendors if I’m missing something I need. Today we got garlic scapes, cucumbers, asparagus, onions, and Japanese turnips. We also picked up some bread, some cheese, and some wild game sausages.

Here are a few odds and ends from our property and garden. I already harvested a lot yesterday, so there wasn’t much left to take today. I picked some wild strawberries that grow in different spots around our property. I found a few more peas in our garden and I picked some of the rainbow chard, which probably could have grown a bit more, but looked like it was getting attacked by some sort of pest, so I figured I’d better grab some before someone else at it all.

For dinner tonight, we fired up the BBQ to make the sausages we bought at the market. I also made an Asian-inspired vegan quinoa dish. I cooked the quinoa in a toasted sesame miso broth and also chopped up the fine part of the garlic scapes (the part that is like chives) and mixed it into the broth. I then sauteed the garlic scapes, along with some julienned carrots, and some of the onion from the farmer’s market. When it was almost done, I added some chick peas and the stalks of the swiss chard. Once that was tender, I threw in the leaves of the swiss chard, the leaves from the Japanese turnips, and one finely chopped tomato. I then mixed it with the quinoa in a bowl. At the table, I added just a touch of sesame dressing to it for extra taste. We served all of that along with chopped vegetables and hummus. The vegetables included the Japanese turnips, one of the cucumbers, the peas from our garden, and some other random veggies I had in the fridge.

This is a typical lazy Sunday for us, where I have lots of time to shop carefully, spend time in the garden, and spend time cooking a healthy, nutritious meal. Not every day is like this though. Not even close.

Note: This post is being submitted for inclusion in the Healthy Child, Healthy World Summer Garden Show and Tell.

Have you heard about the partnership between McDonald’s Canada and CityLine (a Canadian daytime television show targeted at women)?  They are working together to provide a FABULOUS opportunity for Canadian mom bloggers called McDonald’s All-Access Moms, where real moms get to “go behind the Golden Arches.”

Apparently all the cool mom bloggers in Canada got an e-mail encouraging them to apply for the program. I guess mine got lost in the mail somewhere (probably the postal strike or something). The e-mail said that the program is “designed specifically for moms who are interested in finding out the truth behind the rumours at McDonald’s.” I wonder which rumours those are? Like the rumours about which cashier is sleeping with which deep fryer operator?

It turns out this isn’t just a little conference call with a gift card attached. This opportunity, like some others I’ve written about before, involves travel and behind the scenes access:

The McDonald’s All-Access Moms program will select three Canadian mommy bloggers to go on four trips across the country.  Together, we will visit supplier facilities and restaurants and you’ll have the chance to ask all the tough questions –so you can find out for yourself, what is really in McDonald’s food.  At the same time, we would ask you to blog openly and honestly about your experience.

CityLine camera crews and parenting expert Nanny Robina will also be on the trips, capturing all the action, as there is nothing to hide!

The program will kick off with a trip to corporate headquarters in Toronto and then a visit to the Innovation Centre and test kitchen in Chicago – this July!  Please feel free to get in touch if you have any questions at all, I’d be happy to provide some more details.

There is one hitch. The program is not eligible to residents of the province of Quebec, so I can’t apply (update: apparently moms in Quebec can apply, but there is a separate French website for them). But I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to put together a little video, like the real applicants will be doing, to tell McDonald’s and CityLine why I want to be a McDonald’s All-Access Mom (if the video doesn’t display or doesn’t work for you, you can access it here on YouTube).

To those who do apply, I wish you safe travels and enjoyable doublespeak. Maybe you can keep a cheeseburger from the tour to show to your grandchildren one day.

CityLine is right about one thing: Mom Knows Best. That’s why this mom will keep teaching her kids about the dark side of companies like McDonald’s instead of lining up to be part of their multi-billion dollar marketing machine.

Today I got a press release via e-mail from the public relations person responsible for the “Moms against Cooties” campaign. Basically, the idea behind this campaign is that they want you to disinfect, disinfect, and disinfect some more and don’t forget to tell your child’s daycare to disinfect and disinfect and disinfect some more.

Since I’m a “Mom against Toxic Chemicals” who thinks that “cooties” (come on, we’re adults, let’s call them germs) are part of life and not the devil, I was naturally curious who was behind this campaign.

So I clicked through to the Moms against Cooties website and discovered in the small print at the bottom that “Moms Against Cooties is brought to you by the Water Quality and Health Council.” Sounds like an interesting organization, but I wasn’t sure what they would have against cooties. Since they don’t link to the Water Quality and Health Council from the cooties website, I Googled it.

The main page of the Water Quality and Health website doesn’t give any hint about who is behind it. But I clicked on the “About Us” page and found out that [emphasis mine]:

The Water Quality and Health Council is an independent, multidisciplinary group sponsored by the Chlorine Chemistry Division of the American Chemistry Council, an industry trade association.  The group comprises scientific experts, health professionals and consumer advocates who serve as advisors to the Chlorine Chemistry Division of the American Chemistry Council.

Interesting. I wonder why they didn’t plaster that on the front page of the “Moms Against Cooties” website? I wonder why they didn’t mention it in the press release?

This is what the baby drinks!

What does the baby drink? Can you point?

That is the question that my friend @AureliaCotta‘s three year old son was asked during an IQ test known as the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence. His choices:

• A giant bottle filled with bright red juice that looked like Kool-Aid
• A pacifier
• A big jug of red juice
• A toy truck

How about “none of the above”? My friend’s son was breastfed and graduated from the breast to a sippy cup (not a bottle). She is also a stay-at-home mom, and while they go to play groups and other activities, he wouldn’t have been exposed daily to numerous babies being given bottles. Even if he was, I doubt they would have been drinking bright red juice…from the bottle or from the jug.

This is not the first time I’ve heard about problems with tests like these. As a child, I was unable to associate an iron with an ironing board in a similar test. My mom didn’t iron in front of the kids out of fear that one of us would pull the hot and heavy iron down off the ironing table (a fear based on experience). My kids wouldn’t be able to either, not because they inherited my psychological issues (although that is probably true too), but because I don’t buy clothing that needs to be ironed or, if I do, it rarely gets worn because I’m too lazy to iron.

These types of tests, according to Dr. Brian MacDonald, an Ottawa-based child psychologist and one of the hosts of the Family Anatomy podcast, “are designed to be as ‘culture-free’ as possible.” However, he explains, “it’s impossible to be totally culture-free. Australian children might not be familiar with all of the same vocabulary that Canadian kids are, even though they both speak English.” He further explained that if kids have trouble with a few items that it wouldn’t have a significant impact on their overall test scores. He said: “This is why training is required to conduct assessments, and why we don’t have computer software that can do assessments for us. Psychologists take into account background information and other factors (such as test anxiety, to name a common issue) when we interpret the results.”

I understand the need to have standardized tests for children and I understand that most children probably have sufficient mainstream socialization to do well on the test. However, I still worry about the conclusions that may be drawn from them for two reasons.

First, I worry that the tests are out of date. Breastfeeding is normal. Certainly a lot of babies also get bottles, but in Canada most mothers do choose to breastfeed and many of them also opt to take the one year of maternity and parental leave that is available to them. That means that there is a significant cohort of babies who may not ever drink from a bottle and may not see a lot of other babies drinking from bottles since most daycare age children would be using sippy cups. The tests may include other out of date items too, antiques like alarm clocks and radios and calculators, which are quickly being replaced by iphones.

Second, I worry that the tests reflect mainstream choices and may penalize a child whose family has made different choices. While I don’t have a copy of the tests in front of me, I could see a variety of things like gender roles, food choices, parenting styles and lifestyle choices playing into the relevance of the questions and supposedly correct answers to any given child.  The less mainstream a family is, the lower the child’s score is likely to be.

Where does this leave the children being tested? My guess is that an intelligent and well socialized child from a mainstream family will do very well. An extremely intelligent child from a non-mainstream family with less socialization may have some trouble, but it may be evident that this is based on “other factors”. However, I worry that a child who is struggling a bit with some of the questions and who also doesn’t recognize certain items because they are out of date or because the family hasn’t made mainstream choices, could end up getting a lower score than appropriate.

This highlights the need for the psychologist who is administering the test to get to know the family and to ask questions about their background that may impact the relevance of the test. However, that won’t solve everything without some serious revisions and updates to the tests. A bottle with red juice? I don’t know anyone whose baby was drinking anything like that (except the Germans who give their babies a reddish tea). It almost seems like it is a trick question to identify the parents who nourished their babies with Kool-Aid.

Image credit: M J M on flickr