My children, even though the future is unknown and many
challenges await us on multiple levels, I thought this would be a good time to
take a snapshot in time for you to review and consider in years to come when
you are adults or parents. Although
there are serious political issues occurring, such as the current American government
shutdown caused by dual political party control of our representative democracy
and rumors of the President nominating a new xenophobic “tribal” leader, Janet
Yellen, to chair the Federal Reserve after Ben Bernanke, this letter will avoid
political annotations and concentrate on, and evaluate, our current educational
progress and responsibilities as a family, and my ideology as a parent, in developing
academic and intellectual development for the future. We will use the current snapshot of our
oldest daughter as the beginning example for this letter. Currently, our oldest daughter has
transitioned into 6th grade with high success and closes out her
first grading quarter with solid A’s, 93% or higher, in all courses. She holds the position of Student Council
Vice President for her allotted grade, participates in multiple academic clubs,
is committed to recreation and club volleyball teams, and has been selected to
represent her entire grade in a school district-wide conference on student
diversity. I am not vain enough to
believe that the ebbs and flow of positive and negative trends, and events,
will never wash upon our feet, but I must state that at this moment in time I
am extremely proud of the hard work and discipline that our young woman, my
daughter, has put forth. For the
younger, she sets the example to emulate.
Again, in our current case, this is simply a nine week success period
within a multi-year, long-term plan, and the planning and hard work must
continue on with no accolades except a brief review and analysis of parenting
on a small and large scale. Our family,
in no fashion, desires to hear “good job” from anyone, because by elevating
responsible parenting to a level of praise, it consciously categorizes proper
and positive parenting as something extraordinary or special. Parenting is not something extraordinary or special;
it is each parent’s responsibility and human duty to our children and society.
What planning and tools did we utilize to achieve
success during the concluded nine week window, and at the same time will
continue to use in order to strengthen and prepare for future development? The answer is the basic concept of:
F.A.M.I.L.Y (Family responsibilities, Advanced and supplemental studies,
Minimized subjection to mass programming, Involvement, Long-term team work, and
Youth supervision.)
Family responsibilities:
Responsibilities do not get less as a child grows
older and I hold it as a great parental error, and an injustice to the
developing youth, for a parent to shoulder family responsibilities alone while
children lounge, sit idle, watch television or play video games. Free time can be indulged and enjoyed when
responsibilities are completed by all members of the family, and in my opinion,
all members should be contributing members to family endeavors (depending on
level of endeavors, required skills, and age).
I do not see a point in conditioning children, especially at the ages of
10 or older, to not hold responsibilities, to be exempt of responsibilities,
and develop a disdain (or lack of awareness) for responsibilities that must be eventually
held and completed by all self-sufficient adult family members upon adulthood:
Dishes, trash, home cleaning, care of younger siblings are a few examples of many
available as each household varies by family.
Our daughter has been taught the importance of contributing to her
family and her contributions to daily family operations are quite natural to
her even at the age of eleven. This is
one of many, many areas that I must credit to my wife’s parenting and
development skills. We will continue to ensure
that our children understand the importance of responsibilities, and understand
that having responsibilities is not negative; it is contributing to family (and
later society in general).
Responsibilities and contributions also ensure that the developing youth
enhance a deep understanding of time management and prioritizing, not to
mention a deep rooted feeling of unity and collective investment and
contribution, which is vital for academic, social, family, community, and society
success.
Advanced and supplemental studies:
The format here is to encourage and enforce studies
outside of school as supplemental education to the public school system
educational process. Many people
criticize the public school systems, but these schools hold vital educational
resources which our tax dollars pay for, yet should be exposed as the churning
systematic machine with no real concern for individual children’s advancement
that it is, for better or worse. A
machine does not feel. It is not the
system’s job to educate and develop your children; it is the parent’s job to
utilize the school system in the educational process of the children. The program we have used for a few years now
is that we work ahead of the grade level curriculum and we work (study) each
day after school, weekends, and extended holidays (with days allotted sporadically
as days off for our child). The real strides
in the educational development process occur during the summer months. I do not see a reason to choose between
public schooling and home schooling when you can have the benefits of both. There are many parents that will argue
against such levels of educational progress, but we have seen quite clearly,
and from a firsthand perspective, over a few years of experience that an extra
two hours of education on school nights and four to five hours on a Saturday
(and on school holidays and summer vacation), that there is still ample time
for the student to be a youth and enjoy themselves as a child. If anything, it makes the appreciation of
accomplishments and the value of free time much greater.
The argument against supplemental studies usually
centers on available time by parents, many of whom are single parents. This is not necessarily a strong argument
case due to the importance of what is at stake.
Parents engaging their children in advanced and supplemental home
studies need only to plan properly, and ensure cause and affect discipline
(reasonable consequences) in order to institute an extra-curricular program. Children are full of potential, strength, energy,
and endurance and easily rise to positive challenges once they are presented. Parents only need to assign the educational
studies each day and find time to review the subject matter in the evenings or
on the weekend, depending on schedules.
During the one to two hours allotted for reviewing the supplemental
educational work, academic areas that cause the individual child trouble can be
discussed, problems worked through, and re-worked until comprehension occurs. After all, the supplemental educational
process is not for permanent records or even permanent grades, the time spent aims
for true educational learning experiences, evolution of understanding and
critical thought, and valuable family time.
Many of us are tired when we get home from work, but the educational
process is about our children and we must make time to regulate and contribute
to the process, tired or otherwise.
There is no excuse for a selfish parent that places their social life
before that of a child’s educational development.
Minimized subjection to mass programming:
This is a rather simple process indeed. We already understand the damning influence
of excessive mass media, whether in the format of so-called sit-coms, movies,
video games, music, or otherwise. Any
parent that can recall the 1980s, 1990s, or even 2000s, can see the expansion
of technology and the increase of mass produced (inorganic) popular culture
with themes promoting apathy, moral degradation, desensitizing immoral behavior
to the point of social acceptability with many faucets of negative implications
for the youth (future parents and adults).
There are positive entertainment and documentaries available, but these
brief rays of social and intellectual development are lost in the deluge of
meaningless propaganda and mind numbing content that is force fed our people on
a heavy dosage rotation. This negative
influence and impact on our youth is easily minimized by keeping youth engaged
and involved in educational pursuits, active family activity, social interaction
activities, and sports. It really
doesn’t matter what the activity is, as long as it is positive, keeps the child
active, and enhances them in positive social fashion. The negative influences of mass media
technology are neutralized or minimized on an active and involved child
compared to an idle child left without mentorship, parental engagement, and
activities. Entertainment at moderate
rates, intermingled with an educated and mentored mind (young or old), is not
as damaging as excessive exposure and excessive influence on an empty and idle mind. In addition, it is highly likely that the
more educated a young mind develops, the less interest that mind will take in
idiotic and destructive mass produced so-called entertainment. Any child left unsupervised in their
so-called free time, left unguided by irresponsible parents, and consistently plugged
into mass technological devices (produced by owners of mass capital) and constantly
force fed mass-produced program waves subconsciously promoting distraction,
destruction, and apathy are clearly at a disadvantage in intellectual
development and preparation for future, and in my opinion, at risk of a
negative social outcome, or an outcome quite below their natural potential.
Involvement:
Involvement is in direct correlation to minimizing
subjection to mass programming and minimizing negative social influences. In our particular case, we have encouraged
and engaged our oldest in multiple social interactions such as year round team
sports, academic-social clubs such as Student Council, Diversity and Math, and we
continue to search out opportunities for her to expand herself as a person, to engage
in social relations with her peers on various stages, and to explore various
interests that otherwise would remain unknown to her if never experienced. I have heard parents make statements such as
‘Timmy doesn’t want to play baseball’.
In my opinion, Timmy doesn’t have to play baseball, but he must be
involved in some sort of activities (athletically, academically, or
socially). As harsh at it may sound,
abandoning a child to their own devices is not smart parenting and does no
justice to the child.
Long-term team work:
When I speak of long-term team work, I mean that the
development of a child is a family goal and requires the active participation
of all members (whether small family or large).
It is a long-term planning goal that consists of many short-term
objectives. A successful planning
process requires participation, communication, and involvement of all members
of the plan (family). Therefore, it is
important to engage, as a family, into the areas of development for the
youth. If I assign my daughter a book
for reading outside of the public system, I am also reading the same book. In the process she enhances her mind, and I
further enhance my mind, and together we strengthen the family bond through
shared interests. If my daughter is striving
to improve at sport, I am either contributing to the team she is playing on in
some manner or working with her to enhance her individual skills for the
benefit of the collective team and her confidence. It is vital, in my view that the village works
together toward the short-term goals (education, athletics, and school
involvement, or whatever the goal may be) and toward the long-term goal
(self-sufficient, disciplined, critical thinking, educated and moral adult and
positive contributor to society).
Working as a family is beneficial to the youth, beneficial to the family
as a group unit, and strengthens bonds and understanding for the future. A parent who refuses to sacrifice their own
idleness (television watching, game playing, social butterflying, etc.) in
order to assist and guide the daily educational process of their child is doing
an injustice to that child. I have said
many times that it is a faulty assumption that a child will enter the public
school system prior to first grade and eventually emerge as a moral,
intelligent, disciplined adult after graduation without family effort and
involvement. Youth development does not
work in such a mechanical manner.
Youth supervision:
This is probably one of the most important areas for
consideration. At some point during the
1980s, parents began to allow children a type of freedom and release from
responsibilities, and this society misnomer has grown to be widely accepted as
a social norm today. I am uncertain what
the original causes of this trend were, but some possible contributing areas
that come to mind are: increasing single parent homes, the expansion of mass
produced technology in the form of entertainment, and the reverberation of emergence
from a politically and racially charged decade such as the 1970s where themes
such as free love and drug use were promoted, and women’s rights, and racial
equality were at the forefront of often violent protests. Some rightists even blame the removal of
religion from schools, even though I am not a fan of religious indoctrination
and will refute this argument when it is presented. At any rate, a general evolution in norms
seems to have occurred over a three decade period that has resulted in our
children being allowed to dictate situations that parents should dictate,
choose to participate or not participate, and to be allowed to decide how they
choose to invest (or spend) excessive free time. In some areas of modern parenting, the
parent-child roles have become quite skewed and confused. These norms even seem to develop, especially around
the age of pre-teenager to teenager timeframe, to levels of allowing youth the
dangerous luxury of unrestricted, and unsupervised, social movement on the
internet and through physical society itself.
I view this as leaving a child vulnerable and an act of blatant neglect
guised as western liberty. Many people
will argue that the world has always be full of threats, immoral and economic
crimes, and various social dangers, and that only now, with the expansion of
news media technology, that these levels have become common knowledge to the
masses. As one that watches the daily
news wires in a majority of our American cities, I would not argue this point,
but at the same time I hold the view that the moral issues and crime trends
have vastly increased over the past three decades. At any rate, I would not turn my children
loose into a society filled with such immoral savagery, regardless of the
percentage of victim incidents per population capita. Why take chances, no matter odds, on leaving
a child vulnerable to victimization that could ultimately change a life path? There seems to be a double standard on the
treatment of teenagers. In some areas,
they are adamantly treated as children.
In other areas, such as in dress codes and behavior, they allowed adult privileges.
Youth supervision also, and importantly so, is
mandatory for educational and academic tracking and development. When we were growing up and technology was
still growing out of infancy, parents had no real connection with teachers or
schools outside of parent-teaching conferences or a phone call. Today, there should be no excuses for not
tracking a child’s educational achievements within the school system. I am almost certain that the majority of
schools today have the on-line grade trackers, which is an incredibly positive technological
tool for parents. These technological
trackers basically show you pending and past assignments, due dates, and grades
which allow the parent to encourage, remind, and, if necessary, take proactive
disciplinary action instead of reactive inaction after a below average quarter
passes resulting in terrible grades.
When these positive avenues of involvement and grade tracking are so easily
available to the parent, it is no longer possible to blame the school system or
the teacher for the poor grades of a child (even though parents often do so). This is denial of parental responsibility and
can often result in allowing a child to defer responsibility by pitting parent
against teacher. The blame falls on the
parent, and is often the result of a structural condition where the child runs
the roost and the parent has lost control as leader, provider, and protector of
the youth.
“Are you a pimp, a hustler? No I'm not.
Are you a man and can you stand alone like a man has to sometimes? Yes I can.
Are you willing to go out there and save the lives of our children even
if it means losing your own life? Yes I
am.” – Jeru the Damaja
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