Here’s a quick tip for teaching your children about money, especially in these challenging economic times. Check out Ron Lieber’s “Money Questions From Kids,” part of the Bucks Blog at The New York Times. One of the questions kids ask is, “Do You Make More Money Than Daddy?” In our house, we’ve tried to explain a lot to the kids on this subject. We feel they should know how –rather than how much — we earn. My wife and I work multiple jobs to support an ever-widening budget (our grocery bill alone has bulged as the boys grow older). Depending on the part of the year and the deadlines, sometimes my wife works more hours and sometimes I work more hours. To balance things out when one of us is working more, the other parent spends more time doing the child care. All the work ends up supporting the entire family.
Occasionally, we’ve had the question about why, in other families, the mom or the dad does not work. Here, again, the answer for us is that parents have all kinds of jobs to do to take care of a family, ranging from preparing meals to researching extra curricular classes. Lieber offers some excellent advice in general by suggesting that a parent ”say that no matter how much money each parent makes, both contribute equally to the household when all is said and done.”
How would you answer the question? What inquiries about money are your kids posing?
A few weeks ago, my sixth-grader son needed to read a biography for a class paper. I searched my bookshelves and brought him out a selection I thought he might like, secretly hoping he would select one that meant a lot to me in particular. Sure enough, he chose They Call Me Coach, the autobiography John Wooden wrote with the help of Jack Tobin. My son took the book to school to start reading it, and when he came back he told me it had been inscribed by Wooden to me. I had totally forgotten where I had purchased it — at John Wooden Basketball Camp in 1974. It was at that camp that I met Coach, who went around to personally greet his many campers. It was at that camp that I learned about big things such as the Pyramid of Success (a philosophy of life as well as basketball) and seemingly little stuff, including how to double-knot my shoes so the laces never untie.
On June 4, John Wooden died of natural causes, just a few months shy of his 99th birthday. He leaves behind a record of 10 NCAA men’s basketball championships, but — and this is what is universally mentioned in the obituraries — a legacy of teaching others how to (as he was fond of saying) ”make each day your masterpiece.” Growing up attending UCLA games he coached, going to camps he ran, reading his books, and attending the college at which he worked and still held sway decades after his retirement, I have not only learned from this educational master but also been informed about how to teach my own children. He even has a book called Inch and Miles (again found at his official Web sit under the Bookstore tab), which puts his teachings into a picture book for kids.
As a middle schooler, I lived for a while near Coach. I had a carpool that picked me up on a corner that he often power-walked past. On days I wasn’t so shy, I would say hello as he went by and he always smiled and greeted me back. That was the way Coach was, a combination of awesome greatness with approachable folksiness.
Role models are harder and harder to find in the public world of celebrity. Thankfully, Coach will forever teach through his writings, videos, and lasting influence.
I grew up hearing the stories, reading the books, and seeing movies about the Holocaust that saw 6 million Jews and millions of Gypsies, homosexuals, the mentally disabled, and other human beings die at the hands of those who organized genocide during World War II. The world did not expect such a systematic killing of people, yet genocides have happened since and continue today in places such as Darfur in the Sudan.
So when I was given the opportunity to go on a program called March of the Living with an organization called BJE Los Angeles, I went. I went so I could see first-hand evidence of the Nazi destruction. I went to hear the personal stories of seven survivors of the Holocaust. I went to chaperone more than 160 brave teenagers (many of whom I have taught in my classrooms) who wanted to see and learn and never forget. I went to celebrate that life goes on and to solidify my belief that we must educate ourselves and teach others the imperative of respecting life for all human beings. I went for my children, who will inherit a world I must try — in whatever small ways — to make better.
Brain research, let alone centuries of history serve as testament to the many differences between men and women. However, the “battle” that has been waged can and should end. Yes, we make inroads with humor and well-studied tolerance, but we still fall into the traps of insecurity that allow us to often ignore each other’s need to be understood. We even fight over who needs more help, males or females.
So, we have work to do, especially as parents, if we want our boys and girls to be respectful and loving of each other.
One man who I believe is doing amazing work in the area of gender studies is Michael Gurian (author of, among other titles, The Wonder of Boys and The Wonder of Girls). In a recent newsletter from his Gurian Institute, he wrote:
“Clearly, both our sons and our daughters need our help. Why can’t we give them both that help, at once? A number of readers asked that question this week. I don’t know if I have the answer, but have an answer: Men and women entered a volatile divorce fifty years ago. Our civilization’s approach to gender still trembles with the pain and rage of that divorce. For some people, saying the word “men” without saying the word “women” means oppression of women. For other people, one gender (generally girls and women) get such special treatment, boys are left to fend for themselves, a condition that leads to their early death, and to a lack of physical safety for our civilization.
”I am a boys’ advocate and the father of two daughters. I am a girls’ advocate and a man who remembers being a lost boy in our American culture. I build theory and practice now as a professional in hopes of caring equally for both genders. I know this truth: gender equity is not ensured by governments, schools, and others funding girls’ and women’s programming at much higher rates than boys’ and men’s; simultaneously, gender equity is not ensured by businesses and others protecting male hierarchical systems more than they fund girls’ and women’s initiatives.
“Both genders need us to end our divorce rage. They need us to stop holding our boys and girls hostage to competition for resources. They need us to focus on the specific areas of distress in which each of our wounded children live. If we don’t grow together in this way, huge numbers of our boys and girls will not find purpose, resources, healthy relationships, and workplace success. And many boys and girls will not survive to have or care for children of their own.”
A while back, I wrote a piece called “Taming the Hulk Within,” in which I aired my struggle with keeping cool, especially around the kids. In talking to other parents, it seems anger management is one of the most common regrets we have. For me, it’s frequently about the feeling of not being able to control my children’s behavior, which is followed by my frustration with what’s really worth controlling in them, which is followed by the feeling that I do not want to be a wimp with my whining child. The ideal is to be calm in directing my children, but there are all these stressors that I allow to fray me. Financial restraints are probably the biggest culprits at this point. So my children hear me yell way too much. The good thing is that my kids know I love ‘em. Yet, I’m still looking for ways to put the chill in my hot-headedness.
A recent study acknowledges what I and many other parents go through. A LiveScience.com story explains that, “Having children was also associated with angry feelings and behaviors, such as yelling, particularly in women, the survey found. ‘There’s obviously a lot of joys and benefits that come with parenthood,’ but other aspects of parenting, such as having to discipline a misbehaving child, can cause feelings of anger and annoyance,’” said study researcher Scott Schieman.
It’s interesting to note what the study said regarding women and yelling because I hear more about men yelling from the dads I speak with. Whoever is doing it, we all have our work cut out for us. Especially during the holidays, when extended family, spending issues, and more time with the kids will put added weight on our emotions. These days, I’m trying to allow myself to leave the room rather than keep trying to control the situation. I also find that talking over possible upcoming stressors with my wife helps me head off some of what triggers my anger. The goal is to feel better about myself and to role model for my kids how to handle emotions. It helps, not all the time, so I keep searching for every tool I can get.
How about you all out there? What do you do to keep calm?
A few years ago, I sought the counsel of Dr. David Swanson when my wife and I needed more help with managing our parenting challenges. Swanson was down-to-earth, non-judgmental, and incredibly direct in his advice, which we use to this day. Now, any parent can access Swanson’s insights by reading his new book, Help–My Kid is Driving Me Crazy: The 17 Ways Kids Manipulate Their Parents, and What You Can Do About It. Part of what makes Swanson such a valuable resource — in addition to being a husband and father — is that he treats children, teens, and families as a whole. Even though he’s writing for parents who are beleagured by their children’s use of negotiation, self-victimization, and emotional blackmail, he’s also firmly advocating for the well-being of the children. This book can really help adults feel better and stronger in their efforts to parent their kids.
The marvelously insightful and equally clever Bruce Kluger puts a little perspective on all the news-hogging, badly behaving adults, from Congressman Joe Wilson who heckled the President to Kanye West who cruelly flashed his ego at Taylor Swift’s expense. He wonders how our kids can filter out such bad role modeling. Check out the column and let me know your own thoughts.
I found myself stuck to this enlightening video clip because of the reference to marshmallows. I admit to adoring ’smores, Rice Krispy treats (especially the ones with milk chocolate and almonds my wife makes). I’ve also won a family camp marshmallow eating contest (yes, it was disgusting).
Then I watched this piece featuring Dr. Joachim de Posada, an author, speaker, and adjunct professor at the University of Miami. He talks about an experiment in which a Stanford psychology professor put one four-year-old kid at a time into a room alone with a marshmallow and told them to not eat it. Each kid approached the puffy treat differently, with some eating it immediately, some waiting a bit, and a couple refraining altogether. What Dr. de Posada points out is that the experiment determines a child’s ability to delay gratification and may very well suggest the child’s long-term self-discipline.
I’m going to try the experiment on my kids and see what happens. Chances are, they’ll delay gratification longer than I could.
Man, it’s going to be tough for President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama to stay consistent, but I continue to be thrilled to have these two as parenting models. The Chicago Tribune reports that, among the family habits the Obamas follow are reading regularly to their daughters and having a date night for each other. They may be raised on a pedestal by some, but there is a lot of down-to-earth living going on there that makes us realize they have many of the same challenges we do.
It’s only fitting that a day celebrating the life and work of Martin Luther King, Jr., comes before the inauguration day of our first African American president. These days are made more inspiring following my biannual trip to various Southern U.S. states with a group of high school students. We made the journey, visiting numerous Civil Rights locations, including the Rosa Parks Museum and the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama, and the Ebenezer Baptist Church where Martin Luther King, Jr., preached in Atlanta, Georgia. Seeing all of these places last November, right after the nationwide election, was deeply moving for my students and I.
But no place held more significance for me than the Lorraine Motel, now housing the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee. Please forgive my sentimentality, but the place has real power, particularly on the upper floor where the room King stayed in is preserved. There, as I looked through the glass that separates visitors from the spot where King was assassinated for peacefully challenging discrimination, I felt like I was touching the bottom of a deep lake of hatred, only to spring back up on the knowledge that our country had looked beyond race to elect a person based mostly on his accomplishments and ideals.
And so, we parents have a unique two days on January 19 and 20, 2009. They are 48 hours in which we can teach our children about equality and human progress through our personal stories, great books, music, videos, and a television broadcast of the Presidential Inauguration. There are so many resources to choose from, but here are a few. If You Lived at the Time of Martin Luther King is a wonderful book for older kids and Martin’s Big Words: The Life of Martin Luther King, Jr., is great for younger ones. The latter book is also part of an inspiring video on African-American culture from Scholastic Video. Look for classic songs about the Civil Rights movement and listen to contemporary musician Will.I.Am’s Barack Obama-inspired song, “Yes We Can” in music and on video. And, of course, watch the inauguration together, live on TV, on YouTube, or recorded.
May we all enjoy this pinnacle in our nation’s march toward true equality and may it help bring us enduring peace for ourselves, our children, and all future generations
