How Families Change in Centuries

Children In the Middle Ages:
The children were supposed to act like they were an adult. They were seen as mini adults. Their clothes and their body proportions were just like the adults. The children did not get special protection and treatment, however the children could be punished. When kids would get sick there was a good chance of them dying because there was no medication to fix the illness. They had expected them to die because of how bad the medical system was. Times were alot tougher back then and they had needed the help from the children so it was just expected that they worked extremely hard. They didn't have time to raise the children properly so they had to grow up quickly and mature fast.

The 18th & 19th:
Childhood was starting to change by now they were slowly beginning to give protection to their children. However in the 1800's child labor was commonly practiced and the children had accept it. Part of the 19th century, most workers were under the age of 11. They worked as hard and as long as the adults/parents. The kids quite often had the worst job because of their size, they were often given the dangerous jobs. The children were forced to work to help bring in the money, however that is not right because the children were suppose to be protected from family and they shouldn't of had the dangerous jobs they were given. They should of had the jobs that would be easy for them and non-harmless. Many of the poor urban families, and parents forced their children to engage in scavenging and street peddling. Only by the 19th century did the first child protection organizations emerge. Children were a crucial source of labor in the family economy, and a source of financial support. Child protection should have been emerged much sooner then the mid 19th century. The children should have had their lives alot easier then they were. They shouldn't have had to bring in money for the family, that should of been the parents job.


The 20th Century:
Children are no longer workers for the family! Mainly the worker of the family should be the father/man, and now it is starting to be that way. Paople started seeing children as "useless" and thought they were costly. They weren't workers for the family because the parents were able to bring in enough money for the family. They thought of them as useless becuase the kids used to work just as hard as the man in the family or harder. The children for adoption today is usually new borns. People like adopting the children at a young age so there not to big and they can watch them grow into an adult.