> >
> > People dont feel responsible if they are not caught and punished. If they are, then it's the punishers fault anyway.
> >
> > I live by a High School. One day, I was watching as a student finsihed a cup of something and tossed the cup casually to the side. Many other students were present. Many cars also, since we were waiting for a light. I honked. I yelled, words including but not limited to 'slob'. I flipped him off. He kept walking.
> >
> > I rarely act like this. Now my son knows how low I think this behavior is. When he is a teen, he will probably rebel and liter. Hopefully, with this knowledge, he will grow out of it. Too bad other people don't.
> >
> > As for kids in car seats............they throw things out the window. Mom is busy driving and can't do anything about it. We wouldn't want her to. Moms that are busy momming are more hazardous than cell phone talkers trying to check their callenders.
> >
> > The really little ones just do stuff. They don't know why they do it. When they are a little older, they get angry that Mom is unavailable. She is busy driving. Usually when they drop something, she stops to pick it up and give it back. Little kids love to be handed things. They throw stuff on the ground all the time. People pick it up, they throw it right back down. Then they are upset that it is on the ground, but if you give it to them, they throw it right back down. They continue this behavior even if mom is busy driving. They want her attention. You can't consider this to be litering because it never occurs to babies at the moment they throw it that they will not get it back, or that it will reamin there on the ground when it is out of sight. The condept of object permanence comes much later than the ability to throw.
> >
> > Babies get caught up in cause and effect. So they do stuff. And they are constantly trying to get the parents attention. It's programmed into them. "In the wild," babies who let their parents ignore them are most likely to get eaten by something or stolen or simply left somewhere. Constantly being the parents' center of attention is a survival trait. In this repect, negative attention (getting in trouble) is better than no attention.
>
> As a father, grandfather, and retired teacher, I think I am qualified to say, "Wow, you really understand kids!"
>
> A lot of what you said that applies to babies, also applies to teenagers and more than a few adults. I agree that babies don't litter in the sense that they don't look at as making a mess, but the stuff they toss out the car window is a small part of the litter problem.
>
> Some litterbugs justify their behavior by saying that picking it up provides a job for somebody. Maybe, but only slobs do it.
> Howard

I could never be a teacher. I have helped in the classroom and on field trips for K, 1st and 2nd grades. My heart bleeds for the ones who struggle. It haunts me.
I stay awake all night. I wish them courage, confidence, and English speaking caregiver, a non-violent Granny.
I wish they were allowed to be right.
I wish they were allowed to be wrong.
I wish someone would read to them because it's fun. Someone who doesn't time the required 20 minutes of reading because they have more important things to do afterward.
I wish they could go to the library and check out as many books as they can carry. Books they WANT. Even it they are joke books, or books about the paranormal, or the same book they checked out last time and the time before.

I don't wish these things for my son. I don't have to, he has them already.