How to be a 'New Old-fashioned Parent'

For the third time in a week, my attempts at a vaguely peaceful coffee out are being thwarted by small children running around noisily, irritating everyone else. Everyone except their parents, who seem oblivious to anything beyond their lattes and chat.

Watching, listening to and indeed being elbowed in the thigh by these little tornado-like beings highlights to me again how very far we’ve come from the days of children being “seen and not heard”.

I’m no “youth of today” whinger, nor do I sport rose-tinted spectacles about the strictures of childhoods past, but what happened to there being a time and a place to hurtle about squealing? The park or soft-play centre, the confines of your own (hopefully reasonably soundproofed) home: yes. Restaurants, busy railway stations and shops: surely not?

There’s something broader happening here than me grumbling about not being able to enjoy a quiet-ish coffee. The nature of childhood has changed remarkably over just a generation.

Plenty of our young remain well-balanced and generally delightful, but ask any teacher or lecturer – as I did when I started researching my book, New Old-fashioned Parenting – and they may well tell you about the increasing numbers of children with behavioural problems (that aren’t due to an underlying condition), or an inbuilt sense of entitlement, and the many more who seem to have never outgrown that mini-narcissist stage. The latter might be natural for toddlers but becomes problematic when you’re still saying “me, me, me” at 21.

At the heart of this, I believe, is a seismic shift in society and families: it’s now so much more “all about the kids”. As parents, our lives revolve around our offspring far more than previous generations’ did as we scramble, struggle and strive to make their childhoods as blissful as possible. We’ve got diaries crammed with their many activities and homes brimming with their toys; even our choices of holidays and meals are about pleasing them – or at least appeasing their fussiness – more than ourselves. It’s exhausting and expensive and our own needs too often get overlooked.

It was all so starkly different back in the Seventies to early Nineties, when the majority of the current crop of parents were in single digits and short pants. Typically, what mum and dad said, went, and what they wanted to do, happened. If father fancied going to the pub, you were stationed outside with some ready salted crisps and a bottle of pop. Now he’d be too busy taxiing between the children’s weekend sport commitments, tutoring sessions and parties to even dream of a lunchtime pint (although — heaven knows — he needs one).

If you were lucky back then, you were allowed to choose the order of the day and dinner on your birthday. Complain about your lot being dull and you’d get, at best, an “only boring people get bored” retort, or at worst a slap. Sure, childhood wasn’t joyless and we certainly enjoyed more freedom, but it was on the grown-ups’ terms.

With discipline, the adults ruled too, not necessarily wielding a Victorian-style rod, but they were firmly in charge. It wasn’t only parents and teachers – the man on the bus or that neighbour from across the road would tell you off without reservation. They’d probably be too scared to do so now.

And yes, if you were taken to the Eighties predecessors of Costa or Starbucks, you were expected to sit at the table and either converse or occupy yourself, minus the iPad or smartphones that weren’t even a twinkle in Steve Jobs’s eye at that stage.

Fast forward to 21st-century parenting and by striving for the very best for our children, to make their upbringings perfect, ironically we might be doing as much harm as the intended good.

Doesn’t this “it’s all about the kids” treatment, the modern reluctance to say no (among some parents at least) and the need we feel to make life fantastic fun every minute of every day just create unrealistic expectations? I’m not suggesting for a moment that we actively make their lives unhappy, but I would argue that there’s room to tone things down a shade, so childhood is a better preparation for adult life. A bit more like things used to be.

Of course, parenting wasn’t perfect back then either – smacking has thankfully been discredited as ineffective (it sets a bad example and doesn’t teach what they should do instead) and there was more dismissal of children’s genuine anxieties and fears, rather than addressing them.

In a bid to find a middle way, I started researching, interviewing children, parents and experts on specific aspects of family life, and the idea of New Old-fashioned Parenting was born. It isn’t about turning the clock back 20 or 30 years – this would be neither possible nor desirable. It is about revisiting our parents’ ways, as well as those that are prevalent now, and picking the best of both approaches while taking into account the world we live in and current thinking about child development.

It’s also most definitely about cutting through the noise of the many commercial messages saying that to be good parents we need to buy this toy, or go on that costly day out. We need to have the confidence to step away from the guilt of being a busy parent these days.

New Old-fashioned Parenting is also about asking ourselves what’s really best for our children in the long term and not being afraid to do it, even if it’s harder for us all, or makes them annoyed with us. It doesn’t mean having no fun or being a shouty dragon – we can be consultative to a point but without the hour-long discussions of every issue, large and small.

With this mix of modern parenting and thinking that has stood the test of time, perhaps we can give our offspring the best chance of being prepared for t adult life — and a happy childhood along the way. And if yours or mine aren’t the ones being “that child” at school or indeed in my local coffee shop, all the better. Mother and father really did know best, and we still do.

How to be a New Old-fashioned Parent

Have higher but more realistic expectations of behaviour – most kids used to manage sitting for more than five minutes. However, three-hour concertos or whole days traipsing round Cistercian monasteries might be a bit much and is where the NOFP draws the line.

Invest effort to teach life skills like cooking and cleaning – it’s quicker not to but they’ll need to look after themselves one day, plus it means extra pairs of hands around the house.

Children do deserve to be heard and air views but you have decades more life experience; have confidence to make a final call when it matters.

Teach manners and consideration – kids aren’t born with these and, again, it’s easier not to bother but worth it for everyone’s sake, including theirs.

Parenting isn’t a popularity contest – sometimes the right way to go won’t make them like you but is in their best interests.

Watch out for the “easier life pitfall” – it’s simpler to say yes or ignore bad behaviour in the short term but stores up trouble for later on.

Stop organising every minute of their lives – there won’t be a full programme of Kumon to karate when they leave home. Some unstructured playtime is as beneficial, if not more so, as all those extra-curricular activities. Plus it’s free.

Don’t turn into too much of a servant, short-order cook or full-time chauffeur – a more balanced family life is less exhausting for you and more alert parents make for a happier family.

New Old-fashioned Parenting by Liat Hughes Joshi (Summersdale, £10.99) is available to order from Telegraph Books at £8.99 + £1.99 p&p. Call 08448711515 or visit books.telegraph.co.uk