Forget the babbling; I was once on a plane where the mother buried her nose in a magazine while she let her children play with a Simon Says toy. For those of you who don't know what that is, here's a YouTube video to show you:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJdZHJmcAQ4

Annoyed yet? That was only 56 seconds; now imagine it going on for longer until passengers started screaming at her to shut it up!

On the other hand I was on a flight once where the father kept his young son engaged the whole time to keep the youngster from being annoying or crying. It had to have been exhausting for the man; but, he was a real trooper the whole time.

A lot of folks commented to the man what a great father he was and also let him get off first. So kindness and consideration of others sometimes does pay. (I offered to switch my window seat with his aisle seat so his son could look out the window; but, he said they were good where they were. Perhaps, he didn't want to disturb others if his son needed to use the restroom)

I have mixed feeling about this.

Number one, we can't just will a child to quit wailing. People differ on what you can do to stop it. Will spanking and threats increase the sakis or make them stop? Some actions, like giving in to the child's demands, work in the short term, but increase negative behaviors long term. I remember a couple of people telling me to just give my child the damn candy while waiting in line, etc. Give in to a tantrum? Me? Never!

As to the second point, trying to control a child's repeated babbling is all but futile. Interacting with the child may redirect him or her, but trying to absolutely control a child Will lead to abuse.

While parents must do their part to socialize children (and btw, you do not know what they are dealing with - perhaps a traumatized child or one on the autism spectrum) your job is to deal with it for a short period of time. My recommendation is to repeat this mantra to yourself; I only have to put up with this for a few hours. They are going home with someone else. Thank goodness that I don't have to deal with that all the time.

We bring our kids' carseats onto planes with us. They are heavy and awkward to get through security, across the airport and down the jetway. Getting them onto the plane and appropriately buckled in and then getting our kids secured in them is a harrying process. But our kids are MUCH calmer sitting in their familiar, snug seats than in (for them) large airplane seats, and we're more comfortable knowing that they're strapped in.

Does that make us heroes? No. Do they NEVER get unhappy on planes? No. Does every child need this? No. But for neurotypical kids in okay health, there is plenty you can do to ward off unhappiness and make the plane ride more tolerable for you, your children and your fellow passengers. This is one example.

In addition to the carseats, we lug on bags of airplane goodies. Goldfish crackers and Melissa & Doug water pen coloring books don't work ALL the time, but they're amazingly effective a lot of the time. I think Amy might even agree with this use of carbs! The main point is to THINK IN ADVANCE about keeping your kids occupied on a plane. Do that and, with MOST neurotypical kids in decent health, you can minimize the disruption. Don't want to do this? Don't fly with kids.

(And yes, I put non-neurotypical kids in a different category of expectations. But no, I do not believe that every friggin' child acting up on an airplane is autistic or traumatized.)

For some kids, unfortunately, artificial diversions are not enough (but the following case is from 1948 or so, and video games were not available). It takes place on a train. Read from page 48 to page 50 - but the pages after that are worth reading too!

http://books.google.com/books?id=FR6kMKAZO-oC&pg=PA48&lpg=PA48&dq=helen+doss+%22squeezed+our+budget%22&source=bl&ots=1bY9gXI9Xw&sig=UMHruCvi11oZ8faGy0Ne38owjsk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=JrGlU-LNDqivsQSlv4DICg&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=helen%20doss%20%22squeezed%20our%20budget%22&f=false

It's from "The Family Nobody Wanted," by Helen Doss, who, with her Methodist minister husband, adopted twelve mostly mixed-race children in ten years.

Pretty amusing - if you forget that it's part of a true story!

(Donny was five at the time, so I think he should really have been better behaved.)

My mother used to say there are
two ways to travel:

1. First Class

2. with children

lenona, that's one of my favorite books! I give Helen Doss, specifically, a pass, because she and her husband, from everything I can tell, are such thoroughly good people that it makes the rest of humanity look a bit better by the law of averages. If she couldn't get Donny to behave, I'm guessing no one could -- and, to be fair, she tried! (Also, while I would NOT let my kids run wild on a train or anything, I think a train is a somewhat different scenario than a plane -- for one thing, you're relatively free to move around.)

And Amy, parents everywhere do hope that people give at least partial credit for trying, so thanks. :)

Except that her idea of being "good" included putting Donny and his "needs" over her husband. Anyone can tell you that's a great way to ruin a marriage. (Which is exactly what happened to Helen and Carl, in 1964.) Instead, after adopting Teddy, she could easily have said to Donny: "Yes, I know he's three years younger than you, like your two sisters, but please wait another five years or more before complaining again that he's not old enough for you."

It's not as if non-adoptive families take such complaints seriously, after all! (Other than to find their kids casual, same-age playmates from outside the family.)

So it's not that hard to imagine that she allowed Donny to be in control in other inappropriate ways as well. Maybe. For example, if he was "always losing shoes," despite shoes' being almost a luxury on their tight budget, why in the world didn't she keep him grounded more often and/or forbid him to wear shoes most of the time anyway, just as 19th-century rural kids often had to go shoeless to school in warm weather, to save on wear and tear? I wonder.