Adulthood gives parents the benefit of being able to look back over decades of life and see patterns. It may seem like a repetitious cycle: wake up, eat, go to work, eat, come home, eat, tuck the kids into bed, go to sleep. Rinse and repeat tomorrow. Just so with the rhythms of life that are the school year. Whenever change comes, we plunk it into a place in the overall pattern as best we can and move along.
A Kid’s
Perspective:
My
kids are all in elementary School. To
young kids who have only a few years of experience, transitions can be a
challenge. They haven’t had many chances
to settle into a pattern. All they know
is one morning they are at home in their jammies playing Nintendo, and the next
morning Mom and Dad are harping on them, “Get up. Now!
Yes, NOW! Eat your cereal, brush
your teeth; how many times do I have to tell you to get your lunch out of the
fridge?”
How
do I, as an aspiring Good Dad, help my kids handle the change from starting the
day whenever it feels good to getting back into a precision routine without
acting like a Marine Drill Sergeant?
Taking it
Slowly
My
wife and I use gradual transitions whenever possible with our kids. They tend to be less messy and noisy, and
there are fewer chances for short-tempers to blow up. We’ve already started moving out kids’
bedtime to earlier, from the lazy mid-summer time of 9:30-ish back to 9:15, then
9:00, and now 8:45-9:00. Next week
school begins on August 15th, and by that time we ought to be back
to our traditional 8:30 bedtime. It
sounds cliché, but tired kids aren’t as prepared to manage change as
well-rested ones.
Focus on
Friendship
One
thing we have on our side is the kids looking forward to seeing school friends
again. When I was younger, I tried to
stay in touch with some of my friends over the summer, but since I was at the
mercy of wherever the bus routes would take me I was confined to only seeing two
or three of them on a regular basis.
We’re trying to get our kids thinking about their school friends whom they
haven’t seen in almost three months.
After all, in elementary school your friends are one of the most
important reasons you go to school.
Subjects like math and language are just there to provide an excuse for
getting together. I’m joking a little,
but not much. As much fun as I had
learning, the real reason I enjoyed school was getting to be with friends. We start offering tastes of those good times
again by meeting up with friends at a park or a pool in early August so the
kids can start looking forward to seeing their school friend again.
Being Part of
the Process
Oddly
enough, my kids enjoy shopping for school supplies. I don’t understand this at all because when I
was growing up it was pure torture. I
think it’s because my Mom made me try on two dozen pairs of jeans, and I never
was into fashion. But my kids like to be
involved in the process. Whether it’s
the latest style in Magic Markers or a new pair of shoes, they get a thrill out
of picking out the materials needed for a successful school year. We embrace this and give the kids a chance to
participate. Letting them chose a
stylish yet inexpensive pack of pens earns a lot of goodwill.
Hunt the Good
Stuff
Our
lives revolve around routines. Even as
adults, transitions can be hard, which is why my wife and I believe it is
critical to teach our children at an early age how to approach changes with a
positive attitude. A phrase I borrowed
from military resiliency training is learning to “hunt for the good stuff”
whenever something disrupts our routine.
A new grade, a new classroom, new friends, and new subjects: we win when
we find the good things that fit into the rhythm of our lives.
Sid Whiting is the father of three and the husband of one. He lives with his wife Gail and their children in Springfield, Missouri. He also enjoys real estate investing, serving in the 135th Army Band as a percussionist and bass guitarist, and plays in the Praise Band "Soul Purpose" and the "Hallelujah Bells" hand bell choir. He can be reached for comment or question at sid.whiting75@gmail.com or on Facebook (www.facebook.com/WiseSteward).
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