I’ve been struggling with independent play since beginning to learn and implement RIE about 6 months ago.
I felt like whenever I needed to leave my son, after letting him know of course, it would be a toss up whether he would continue playing or stand and cry awaiting my return.
How can I enforce better independent play? After all, RIE speaks of growing a babies ability to play on their own into their toddler years and beyond. Independent play builds character. It builds creativity.
So why wasn’t it working every time?
If I sit in his play yard or in the same room, he will play without even glancing at me for what feels like forever. But I have to be there sitting with him.
Am I doing something wrong?
Then my RIE teacher said that for the first two years, the care giver really shouldn’t be doing anything that takes away their attention while the child plays.
Wait a second. Didn’t I write a whole post about how it is important for my child to respect my needs? Didn’t I speak to the importance of leaving them alone?
Well of course, we are human. If we need to use the restroom or even take a breather in another room, we are entitled to do so. But what my RIE teacher is referring to, is remembering that our job for the first two years is to set up a foundation. I wrote about this before. The first two years are about trying out these principles, and laying the groundwork for our children to be independent, to learn strength through struggle, to have manners while eating, and to listen to our words.
To build trust takes time. To fully build a foundation for the RIE characteristics to appear later on in our child … takes time.
This means that as the caregiver we need to entirely dedicate ourself to our child, as much as reasonably possible. When our child is awake, that is NOT the time to fold the laundry. It is NOT the time to clean the dishes. It is NOT the time to work on the computer.
Not for the first two years.
This applies to feeding as well, a topic I talk about a lot. And I talk about feeding a lot because anyone with a child knows, feeding becomes a big part of your life.
The other day I was speaking with a fellow RIE mom about how we feed our children on the floor, at their own little table, giving them all of our attention. And we both agreed that sometimes this feels weird. It feels weird because meals are often social events. In my culture, in most cultures actually, eating is a time to bond.
Therefore sometimes it feels weird that my son eats by himself on the floor. It feels weird to eat dinner with my husband while my son plays. Why not just put my son in his high chair so he can sit with my husband and I, and we can eat together as a family?
Because Desere, that’s not what I need to do for the first two years!
I am teaching my son how to eat right now. For the first two years, he needs me to focus on him. He needs me to pay attention. He needs me to make sure he is safe. He needs me to watch him pick up his glass cup full of water without dumping it on himself. He needs me to watch him use his little fork and spoon.
This is part of the sacrifice I need to make.
But only for the first two years!
When he is older, when he has learned how to eat and have manners while doing so, then OF COURSE we can sit together. We can do this because we have now laid the foundation of what it means to eat a meal.
RIE is often mistaken to only apply to the first two years of a child’s life. But this isn’t true. What RIE does is it gives parents the tools to build the character of their baby for his/her entire life. Many of these ‘tools’ take the first two years to build.
And I relate to this idea a lot because of how I used to teach. I used to think of myself as the type of teacher that was giving my students the tools to problem solve for their entire life. I didn’t care if my kids knew formulas or equations by heart, or if they could solve problems that looked like the problems I had exemplified on the white board.
What mattered to me was that when my students were facing problems in their life, when they were struggling, when they had to work with a group, that they had to tools to overcome these obstacles.