18 Jun Summer School

“Train a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” Proverbs 22:6

As summer approaches, most of us scramble to find activities to keep our children engaged and out of our hair with an end goal of sanity and a relatively peaceful household. And while there is a lot of room for camps, summer is also the only time that we are their sole teacher

During the school year children are bogged down with homework and activities and so may not be the best time for us to teach them to knit, whip up our (or their) favorite dish or something else that is our forte.

There are many things that we and only we as parents can teach them.  A really important one is conflict resolution.  How will children know how to handle disagreements if they are always occupied with individualized activities and never have to share space, things or privileges. Loud arguments, disagreements, temper tantrums are all teachable moments that we have to seize.

We get about 12 summers before they leave for college. 12 summers to teach them life skills and how to be a sharing member of a family.  12 summers to teach them to be organized, self- motivated, independent, caring humans.

With that in mind (and also aiming for parental sanity) having the children write their goals for the summer and a daily schedule to attain those goals can help keep them more accountable and the home less chaotic.

Our 12 year old daughter came up with the idea of a checklist to make sure she is on schedule to reach her goals.

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I feel all my weaknesses surface in the summer…parenting challenges us to be better humans…to sacrifice, to have temperance, to search for the greater good. As much as it may look like a war zone, it is better to fail in the battle, apologize and try again than not to have tried at all.