Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Age-restricted access to common house?

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

When I got to the end of this message I said to myself. you said kids weren’t a 
problem in the CH and then you list this shocking stuff. But consider, this is 
in 17 years over 3 generations of kids in 43 households. Average number of kids 
is almost constant at 20 though the cluster ages vary.  A cluster at 3, then 
one at 9, and then teenagers. This changes the community with each bubble.

>> Currently, our code gets changed each time someone under 13 learns it.

This sounds like setting up a war. We did have one instance of an out of 
control teen giving the code to some friends who years later used it to come in 
watch TV or have sex or both. But no other problems.

All the kids old enough to know the code know it;

> Is it rare to have a separate, locked common house? Is it more common to
> have homes open into a common house/atrium space?

Approx. half our units have a separate entrance. The rest enter as if through a 
house — an elevator in the front hall next to the dining room.

We used to lock the living room to limit kids unauthorized tv time and little 
kids room was locked to keep children out unless adults had unlocked the room 
for them (and thus agreed to supervise clean up and lock up. 

We used to lock the game room when we had a number of kids 10-13. We feared for 
the equipment and like the living room's unauthorized Wii and game box playing.

We lock the office to keep the computer things from being stolen or broken. 
Community admin files are also kept there. 

The workshop is locked for safety. One community said their workshop users are 
only given key after the person supervising it does an orientation with them so 
they know where things are, understand how to use the tools, and what the 
responsibility entails.

All adults have the CH interior key and teens are usually allowed to use it 
freely.

>> Do the ten-year-olds cause mayhem and destruction (more so than residents
>> 13+?). I think I want to advocate to drop our age restriction, but I am
>> open to learning from other communities that age restrictions are helpful.

No. Never that I remember. And I would have remembered if it had. I listed the 
worst below. Personally, I’m not so worried about teenaged behavior. If it 
happens again, let’s talk. Every kid does weird things one time. If adults make 
a big fuss, kid won’t won’t do it again. They got what they wanted.

The worst came from the same household and the boys were already in treatment: 
A 16 year old boy took the DVR in the living room as a present for his girl 
friend. A 16-year-old damaged some door locks trying to get computer access. He 
was having anger issues that his father who had restricted his computer access. 
Both had identified behavioral problems that were being addressed. 

One 9 year old boy peed in a bowl on the TakeItOrLeaveIT table and didn’t 
understand why others didn’t see this as a big joke. At that age my son 
probably wouldn’t have done the peeing but would have rolled on the floor 
laughing and the kids would have talked about it for years.

If you want kids to be part of the community, they have to be part of the 
community. There isn’t any ceremony that happens at 18 to declare the child a 
cohouser. That’s too late.

Our standard for kids: use the room for the activities it's designed for. Don’t 
play in the kitchen.

Our standard is adult behavior, as in "the living room has furniture designed 
for adult behavior in meetings and watching TV. If you want to jump round and 
swing over the sofa back, go to the  game room.” Or home. Some parents 
encourage gym behavior on furniture but agree that the CH standards are 
different.

The standard incident would be nothing more than not putting away the toys, 
which looks destructive but is easily fixed.

One idea is to invite kids (all of them) to a meeting and discuss behavior in 
the CH. Do rounds — What do  you expect? Do you think everyone in this group 
could do what we expect? Kids are honest. And experience in lots of contexts 
shows children being much more restrictive with peers than adults are.

Sharon
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Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org