How to Talk about the Boston Tragedy with Your Children

Here is a resource that we used after the 9/11/01 tragedy. I am not sure how much of it I wrote and how much I used from another source. So, I won't claim any of it as my own, but I hope it will help you talk about this and other tragedies with your children. I hope it will be an encouragement to you as parents try to talk to their children about the tragedy in Boston today:

Tuesday was a day that scarred our country and the images will scar our memories forever. There is no way to erase these memories from our minds or our children’s minds. Know that God is in control (Dan. 4:35, Is.44: 8,45:5,6,21, Pr.21:1) and He is the only one that can bring peace and security to us and our children. Philippians 4:6-7 says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Knowing that peace only comes from God, what can we as parents do to help our children and one another deal with this tragedy? Here are some suggestions that may help.

1-       Pray often. Pray before you discuss this with your children. Pray with your children about the tragedy. Pray for your children to be able to trust God through it. (1 Thessalonians 5:17)

2-       Be calm. Show your children that this is a tragedy, but that your faith in God is still strong and you are not afraid. If you are afraid, explain what you are afraid of and why. Be specific.- DZ (1 John 4:18)

3-       Be completely truthful. You don’t have to tell your children everything, but everything you tell them must be completely true. Do not conjecture about the culprits or about survivors or the response of the country. Just speak of the truth as best you know it. (Ephesians 4:25) “Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body.”

4-       Be honest but explain to children only as much as they can handle.  “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen,” Toddlers will only know that something is wrong, but no details. 4-6 year olds may understand that there was a crash and that people are hurt, but they need not know about terrorism or hate or death. Older elementary students will hear more, but certainly try to keep them as much as possible from seeing the TV images, which may give them nightmares. Junior high students and less mature high school students will understand everything and want to see the images, but will not internalize it as much. They will need to talk about it and will focus on details and information. Mature junior high students and most senior high students will need to talk about the details and about how they are feeling. Here it is good to share some of your concerns and confusion and sadness and anger. They will be having similar feelings. Allow them to express these as much as they want. They may rather express them to peers or other trusted adults. That is ok. Don’t feel shut out or try to force them to open up to you. . We must guard our speech so that we don’t say anything negative or hateful even in jest or casually in conversation that might point blame to “Arabs”, “Muslims”, “politicians” or any group as a whole.

5-      Bring them to God. Whether your children are infants or adults, they need to know that when you are stressed, you turn to Christ for strength. Do this by modeling prayer for them, searching the Scriptures instead of watching TV. Allow them to see you receiving God’s grace and then share what God is revealing to you. Show them Scriptures concerning God’s control and His unending love. (Psalm 46 and Jeremiah 31:3)

6-        Teach them that God is not taken by surprise. Then, teach them that the consequences of sin are bad. (Romans 6:21,23 “21 What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”)

7-       Then teach them that if we never saw the consequences of sin until we died, we would be more drawn into it and would see only its pleasure. If they are old enough to understand teach them not to hate, teach them about the evil of racism.

8-       Older students will also want to know what they can do to help. Find out ways that they can actively participate in helping. Donating blood, donating money, praying, helping out a local family who has lost a loved one or even serving local firefighters, policemen, and EMS workers. Show them that the response to HATE is LOVE, not revenge.

May God bless you and your family as you recover and allow God to heal you and your children from this incredibly personal and national tragedy?

Trusting God with you.

Our Educational System is Broken: A Parent's Perspective

[I am not into taking sides in a debate. Debates are usually just excuses to put others down so we can feel better about ourselves. So, I am not taking sides, pointing fingers or laying blame. It is not the teachers or unions or administrators or parents or students that are to blame. It is the system itself that is broken.]

Our educational system is designed to prepare people to make a living not a life.

We are more concerned with our children’s bank accounts than we are concerned with our children.

As my brother contemplated pursuing art as a major in college, I remember my dad telling him, “There are a lot of starving artists out there. Good ones.” My brother is a computer guy who pursues art in many forms whenever he can.

I love this photo. I think he said he used a lamp and some paper towels, maybe a paper bag.

 

My uncle never went to watch his son skateboard in any of his competitions or even just for fun. “There’s no future in skateboarding.” He later became a pro-skateboarder. He now works for Nike, I think.

How many of us have been told similar things about the passions of our hearts? How many of us have told our children similar things?

Insiders could tell you more about the inner workings of the system and what is wrong from that perspective. They could tell you about wasted hours of teaching to tests, the ridiculous nature of tenure and the insanity of bureaucrats setting teaching standards. But, as a parent here are my top ten reasons our educational system is broken:

1 – The system has become self-generating. The only people who leave school prepared for their jobs are teachers. Every other occupation without exception needs on-the-job training after they graduate. Why? Because, school is on-the-job training for teachers. How about finding what a student is passionate about and setting him up with a mentor. Finding someone who loves what they do to teach our children about their area of expertise. Yes! Absolutely!

2 – The system is designed for those who can sit still for long periods of time (not for children). Get them up, moving, doing, creating, exploring.

3 – Success in school is determined by your ability to get a good grade. What isn’t measured is how much the student has learned, how much they understand and can grasp a subject? This is incredibly hard to measure with a percentile. So, our grading system adds to the dysfunction.

Instead of trying to learn, our most alert students spend the first few weeks of school figuring out how much or how little work is required. Do they really need to read the text or just take good notes in class? Is homework checked? What are the tests like? They even pass this info on to future classes.

 4 – Teachers aren’t given the freedom to teach what they love. They teach what the system requires. They teach to a test. They teach what they taught last year. So few teachers are able to fit what they love into the system. As a parent, I would rather my children have great teachers who taught what they love, than to learn a specific set of knowledge that fits within a system. Great teachers inspire a love for learning and a love for life. The system does not. It cannot.

5 – Math and English are more important than anything else all the way up through high school. Really? Is that the most important thing we can teach our children?

6 – Creativity is trained out of our children. It is rare for a child to graduate high school or college with as much creativity as he had when he began kindergarten. That’s wrong.

7 – The system thrives on comparison and competition. Students are not seen as individuals, encouraged to flourish in their way and excel at what they were created to be. They are not rewarded for how much they have grown and flourished. They are compared to a standard, a set of scores on a series of standardized tests. “My son is in the 94 percentile.” “I was valedictorian.” “I got 1600 on my SAT’s.” What does that have to do with education? And, yet, it has become synonymous with it.

8 – The system minimizes the importance of experiencing life. My friend commented, “Why do children get taught to color trees brown? They are gray. Look at a tree. It’s gray. Why can’t they show them a tree and just have them draw it?” A silly example, maybe, but why not have art class in the woods. The system teaches us to simplify things and try to capture them rather than to appreciate things in all of their complexity and multi-sensory richness. Students are taught to memorize facts and then to think that they understand. Can you grasp World War II, or MacBeth, or Impressionism. In college, they debunk many things learned in high school only to replace it with “deeper understanding” held with greater arrogance. It is more of the same. We are not able to grasp the depth of the beauty and majesty of God or any of His creation. We can only wonder. Let’s teach our kids to wonder.

9 - The measure of success for administrators is the % of students attending college after high school. We used to have dumb kids at our school. There was no stigma to it. We just seemed to appreciate the fact that we weren’t all the same. The “dumb” kids weren’t really dumb. They just didn’t get good grades in the “system” that was school.

One of those kids would be the first to get a car and would know how to take it apart and put it back together again. One guy rebuilt an old Porsche and sold it. We were all in awe. He made $5000 on it, if my memory serves me. That was big money for a high school kid. No one expected him to go to college and get an MA in Education and become the next school teacher. He pursued another career and demonstrated his intelligence in other ways.

That is just one example of the system being self-perpetuating. Success in school for students, teachers, and administrators all lies with how well the system works to perpetuate itself. Maybe it is time we rethought the entire system. Maybe homeschooling, hackschooling, and other forms of alternative education are the answer. Or maybe we haven’t even begun to see it yet. But, there must be another way.

10 –Finally, relationships. The best education usually happens in relationships. There is interplay between student and teacher. Both are learning and growing. Both challenge the way the other thinks. Mutual respect grows. Great teachers know their students and engage them in areas that interest the students as well as areas that interest the teacher. Content can be taught in a variety of ways, but the relational aspect of teaching is foundational. When teachers are required to teach to the test or overly bound to a curriculum, the relationship withers on the vine. I believe most teachers love their students and desire to do their best for them. But, the system prevents this more than encourages it.

So, what now? Do we just take our chances with our children and experiment on them with all kinds of educational models hoping we get something right? I don’t know. But, can we get a worse result than we are getting now. Math and English are the highest priority in this system, and we continue to lag behind in these areas. The system doesn’t even work at promoting its own priorities. It certainly isn’t promoting the welfare of our children or our society. Something must change, within or without the system.

“If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” – Sir Ken Robinson

(Another quote by Sir Ken Robinson, “If a man speaks his mind in a forest and no woman hears him, is he still wrong?” Now that's funny.)

Our Family Rules! and Our Family Rules.

"Our Family Rules!" My oldest daughter, Anna, said the other day that she has the best family ever. This is especially encouraging since this has been a tough year and a half for us. In the past 18 months, I secluded myself for an extra few hundred hours (on top of regular work hours) while I was writing my doctoral dissertation, I graduated with my doctorate of ministry degree, I lost my job, our family left the only church any of of us have ever really known, we started a home church and our children changed schools majorly disrupting their social lives. Only a few of those friendships have withstood this upheaval, so they are still in the transition time of building new friendships.

I'm glad that she feels our family has been the rock that it needed to be to offer her the security and confidence to go through this difficult time.

But, that's not what I am writing about today. Today, I want to tell you about our family rules. As in The 10 Commandments of the Zirilli family.

It was suggested that it might help bring some sanity to our home to have some set of basic rules, guidelines for our lives. A reminder to us as parents and to our children what life in the Zirilli home is all about. So I decided that we should have a family meeting to discuss what our family rules should be.

As you might imagine, I was really excited about the awesome potential!

I explained that if we had a set of rules that was constant, it would be easier for everyone to follow the rules and discipline would be more cut and dry. "Sounds great doesn't it!"

Our kids hated the idea and immediately shot it down. Katie, my very practical 14 year old declared, "It will just give us more random stuff to get in trouble for. No thank you."

I was taken aback. I guess I approached that subject all wrong! So, I dropped it and tried to figure out what God was saying and if my enthusiasm was off or my delivery.

Then, I found these pictures online and decided to try again, with a more positive spin.

 

Traditional Porch design by Chicago Interior Designer Your Favorite Room By Cathy Zaeske

Contemporary Living Room design by Los Angeles Interior Designer Jill Wolff Interior Design

"What do you think about doing something like this."

Katie pipes up, "Can we paint on the wall? ... Then, I'm in!"

"But what do you think about the idea?" Not satisfied with their enthusiastic response, I wanted to put a damper on it right away. (Why do I do that?!?)

So now, we just need some time to think it over and keep throwing out ideas and mulling them over. In a couple of months, we will hopefully have our list, our design layout, and then we can paint.

I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

Does anyone else have Family Rules? What do you wish were your family rules? Katie's first suggestion was, "We do whatever we want."

Adventures in Nonversation

Adventures in Nonversation

Nonversations happen almost every day of our lives. Whether it is at work or school, on the phone or in person. We engage in these pseudo-conversations where one or more of the participants has no interest in being in the conversation at all. You know the kind that I mean.

Nonversations with our children can happen at any age. Whether it is your toddler pulling on your pant leg and you replying, "Uh huh ... uh huh. OK, sweetie." Only to finally look down and see them handing you their full diaper which they have somehow managed to pull of.

Or your school age child saying, "Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy." in the grocery store. Checking your list and coupons and giving the baby a cracker so he won't eat the cart handle, "What?!" "I want to study animals in the Amazon rainforest!"

Or our teenage child's non-responses, "How was your day?" "Uhh." "How was your test in Biology?" "Fine." "Do you have much homework?" "No."

Sometimes it can seem like when they are ready to talk, we aren't, and when we are ready, they aren't.

There is one other type of nonversation that kills communication with our children: parent centered instead of youth centered conversations.

How do these affect our relationship with our teens?

Dollahite and Thatcher, social scientists who did research with 74 highly religious families, used the term “parent centered” conversations in their research. I call them nonversations. Nonversations are lecture-style. Parents are transmitters and not receivers. They ask their children questions because they want to give them answers. They emphasize the power imbalance in the family. Parents have power and authority and teens don’t.

This is an extension of the idea that children should be seen and not heard.

We don’t usually set out to relate to our children this way. We genuinely want to have a relationship with our kids, but we are human and we love our children so much that things get confusing.

Our fear and insecurities motivate us to try to keep our teens safe. We are afraid that either they will do something to hurt themselves or someone else will do something to them.

And, we know some of those hurts leave scars. We are afraid for them now and we are afraid for their future. “What if…” begins to be our motto. And, we choose safety and security over relationship with our child.

It can sound like this, “I would rather have my child hate me because I’m overprotective, then love me and wind up in a ditch somewhere or worse yet, dead.”

That fear gives rise to a desire to control our children. Even in the highly religious families that were studied, which tend to stress hierarchical relationships based on the natural disparity of power between the child and the adult, they are still able to have youth centered conversations. So the content of the conversations, the worldview which you hold, and the guidance that you offer do not determine whether or not a conversation is youth centered or parent centered.

The tone of the conversation, the parents’ motivations, and the relational openness of the parents determine whether conversations are youth centered or parent centered nonversations.

In a culture that highly values individualism, youth centered conversations demonstrate an increased willingness to allow autonomy and freedom to initiate and fully participate in religious/spiritual conversations. This fosters spiritual growth and gives you an opportunity to shape some of the faith choices your child makes.[1]

Find ways to listen to your child without correcting them or judging their responses. Just listen and learn and wait until they ask for your help or advice. Enjoy them and maybe dream with them about going to the Amazon rainforest. Who knows, they might end up there someday!

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[1] David C. Dollahite and Jennifer Y. Thatcher, “Talking About Religion,” Journal of Adolescent Research 23, no. 5 (2008): 638.

Part 5: We Need to Start Over, The Last Step

Franklin Graham, the son of internationally famous Billy Graham, was running away from being a Graham. He spent time doing all the things that he had been told not to do. Until at 22 years of age, he broke down. While reading the Gospel of John in a hotel in Jerusalem, he confessed his sin and embraced the Savior that he had resisted for so long.

As parents, we long for the best for our children. But, often we feel powerless to make it happen. When we try too hard, we often make things worse through manipulation or emotional enmeshment.

The reality is that our children have just as much right to choose their own path as we do to choose ours. They have been given the ability to choose.

God gave them that ability.

If we try to override their choices, we are fighting against our children.

And we are fighting against God.

Not a fight worth fighting.

Not a fight we can win.

But, there is hope. If you have tracking through these steps and chosen to repent, rethink, and redo, then the final two steps come together. First we respond to our child and then we restart the relationship.

Respond:

The time may come to respond. See what signs your child is giving you. Wait for something positive, anything positive. Any sign that they haven’t completely given up on their relationship with you. Pour God’s grace into that situation or comment.

Be honest and open, trusting God to protect your heart.

Be patient and kind.

Be long suffering.

Love your child.

Be courageous and be extravagant!

As they continue to respond positively to your love and grace, pour out more love and more grace.

Be extravagant in expressing your love. Don’t hold anything back. Be completely honest about how much you love your child. Tell them that your love has no bounds.

Read and study the parables of the Lost Son, the Lost Coin and the Lost Sheep from Luke 15.

Picture your child as the one you have lost.

You cannot rescue them from the consequences of their choices, but as soon as they are ready to return and face those consequences, be ready to open your heart to them again.

Picture yourself celebrating when the lost one is found. Tell them how much restoring your relationship would mean to you.

CAUTION: Don’t respond too early. First, if you respond to their negativity, you may push them further away. Second, if you speak about extravagant love before you repent and have a plan, it will sound like empty words coming from the latest book you’ve read.

"There is a time for risky love. There is a time for extravagant gestures. There is a time to pour out your affections on one you love. And when the time comes - seize it, don't miss it.” ~Max Lucado^[1]

Restart:

If and when your teen begins to desire a relationship with you that is built on mutual love and respect, it is time to restart. When it is time, I believe that you will know it.

WARNING: I also strongly believe that until that time, you will always wonder and hope that the time has come for this step. Remain. Restarting must be the last step, because it is necessarily the first step of a new era in your relationship.

A restart is when the cocoon that your child has hidden in breaks open and a butterfly is released. It is when the old relationship dies, like a seed planted in the ground, and a new relationship emerges, full of life and hope.

This comes after your child accepts your apology and offers you forgiveness. It comes after your child acknowledges their own sin and asks for your forgiveness. If this concept is new to them, it may not be as simple and direct as that sentence makes it appear. Know your child, listen to their change of tone, watch their body language and observe what changes they have made.

They may need your help and patience. They may even need you to verbalize what they are thinking. They may not have the vocabulary to ask for forgiveness. You may need to take the first step for them. They may come in and interrupt you, but not know what to say. Don’t jump the gun, don’t interrupt their thoughts, but be sensitive to the Spirit of God.

You may have to ask, “Are you feeling sad?” If yes, “Are you feeling lots of confusing emotions?” Draw them out. Try to get them to say what they can. And, if the time is right, say, “I want you to know that I forgive you. I am not sure if you are feeling this way because you feel bad about things that you have said and done to me in the past. But, I want you to know that I forgive you for all of it, for everything. I won’t let any of that come between us. And, I really hope that you won’t either.” If your child seems responsive to this. Ask if they have asked God for forgiveness yet. Then, ask if you can pray with them. Lead them. Teach them by example.

Discernment is key. Remain ... until the opportunity to restart arises. If you try to respond and restart too early, you could derail whatever progress has been made. God is at work in your child’s life, partner with Him and wait.

Please comment if this series has been helpful to you. The more specific you can be, the more helpful your post can be to others who are looking for encouragement on the journey.

Please repost these if you think someone would benefit from them

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[1] Max Lucado. And The Angels Were Silent. (Nashville: Multnomah Books, 1995), 183.