Child Observation Report

I work at a restaurant, and I am well accustomed to seeing children misbehaving and throwing tantrums. Most of the time the kids are well behaved, but there were this one family in particular during the week that stood out. I have seen plenty of kids who lash out at their parents, acting like they run the show, but this child suffered absolutely no punishment and appeared to have zero discipline.

This boy, who I will name Child A, was around 6 years old, and he had quite an ego. Both of his parents were completely permissive, and it showed the moment they walked through the door. The boy approached me and began shoving his toys onto the board of where I keep track of tables before his parents were even through the door. I politely asked him

During this observation I focused on how the parents responded to the boy’s problematic behavior, and I found that the parents put no real effort into controlling their son. He yelled, screamed, and was constantly arguing with his mother. She continued to beg her son to behave and of course he did not listen. While that was happening, the father was trying to control the daughter, who picked up on Child A’s behavior and began mimicking him in a similar fashion. It was difficult to watch the parents struggle, and it frustrated me that there was no discipline or punishment whatsoever; every one of the parents’ responses were passive. I thought it was very interesting to see how Child A’s sister was calm when she first came in with the parents, but as soon as they sat down and Child A began getting rowdy, she followed his every move. Unless the parents change their way of teaching, Child A would not be a great role model for his sister to follow. His loud and disruptive behavior is a definite example of the external behavior, and it would not surprise me if the child grew up to be very aggressive and possibly violent. As I watched the family, it reminded me greatly of that clip you linked in our module about the Supernanny. Child A reminded me of the youngest boy in the clip except he was not physically violent with his mother, rather just loud and