Babel (Jan 6-20)

1. Be a Student of What They Are Learning
What does a tower in ancient times built to reach the heavens and a cell phone have in common? A lot more than you think! The people responsible for the tower of Babel, the uh Babel-ers we’ll call them, took the technology, the tools of their day and used them in a way that elevated themselves and took God out of the picture. And the reality is that you and I have tools in our hands, the technology of our day, that we take and use in similar ways. The technology itself isn’t bad or good. It’s neutral. But like the people of Babel, how we choose to use the technology is important—it reflects the kind of relationship we have with it. And the right kind of relationship with technology will help us to do the right kinds of things with it.

[Note to parents: We know that many of you have set up guidelines for your kids about how and when they can use different pieces of technology like Facebook, texting, etc. We want you to know that we will uphold those values in our messages. We want to partner with you in creating healthy boundaries and guidance for your students in how they use the technology around them. If you have any questions about how we will be presenting this material, please feel free to ask.]

2. Be a Student of Your Student
Most people know teenagers have technology issues. Here’s an interesting article that might help you understand your teenager—and how they really feel about technology and social media—a little bit better:

http://www.dougfields.com/posts/inforgraphic-teens-wired/

We all think our students have addictions and issues with their technological devices. But if you took away an adult’s connection with the outside world—their cell phone, Facebook or Twitter accounts, texting or computer—many of us would find it hard to function too. Technology is a part of all of our lives, not just a student’s. And it’s become such a big part, that many of us aren’t even conscious of how much we check that phone or FB—even in a place you might least expect it. Here’s an article from the Fuller Youth Institute to give us a little food for thought on this idea of technology, and how it affects all of us.

THE HAPPIEST PLACE TO TEXT
By Brad Griffin

Recently I spent a day at Disneyland with my family, riding rides and battling crowds at the “Happiest place on earth.” Despite my cynicism for over-commercialized places and my frustration about marketing to kids…we had a great day and my kids had a blast.

But there was one thing that distracted me over and over throughout the day. It wasn’t all the teenagers attached to their cell phones—I actually saw most of the teenagers engaged in real-life conversations with the people around them.

It was the parents.

I couldn’t help but notice how many parents of kids of all ages were getting off rides and immediately checking their email and text inbox, ripping back responses as they floated behind their kids to the next attraction. Maybe they were bored out of their minds to be spending the day with their kids, but I doubt it. Maybe they were just distracted at that ONE time at the point I happened to see them (and I happened to catch about a hundred of them at just the right time).

Or maybe they forgot what boundaries are and how to give their kids the gift of presence.

I get a lot of things wrong in parenting. But the more I saw this behavior, the more I was determined to completely ignore my phone (and it was my birthday!) to be present to my kids. I have to wonder, though: if this is what kids see at Disneyland from the adults around them (parents or otherwise), what are we as a culture showing them day after day in our “normal” lives?

I suspect that if we want them to put their phones down every now and then, we have to go first.

Originally published at http://fulleryouthinstitute.org. Reprinted with permission from the Fuller Youth Institute.

3. Action Point
In the above article, Brad Griffin talks about “going first” in the battle to create boundaries around the technology that is present in our everyday lives. It’s not that we have to delete our Facebook account or throw our iPhones out the window for dramatic effect. But we do have the opportunity to model good technology boundaries to our kids so they can start to think critically about the technology that surrounds them everyday, and how they choose to use it.

The XP for this series encourages your student to take a break from a particular technology or social media tool for one week. You may have heard the moaning and groaning already if your student has made the choice to participate. So, in the spirit of unity and empathy, we are encouraging you to do the same. For this action point, you are going to make a list of your top 5 favorite social media/technology tools (i.e., Facebook, Twitter, texting, cell phone, phone apps, etc.). Once you have your list, prioritize each of them from one to five (one being the most important/most used and five being the easiest to live without).

Now, here’s where it gets tricky. Just as your student has made a commitment to fast from a technology tool for one week, you are going to get rid of the number five on your list for the next week. (We will be challenging the students to "fast" from their decided technology during the week of Jan 6-12). We’ve tried to make it easier by giving you the option to get rid of your number five, but feel free to get serious and axe number one on your list. Sit down and show your student your list and then let them know which particular technology you are fasting from. In order to help you both stick to your fast, choose a reward—some sort of activity or special outing—that you and your student can look forward to once you both make it through the week without using your chosen technology. Encourage each other throughout the week and check in to see how things are going. At the end of the week—either during your reward outing or maybe during a mealtime or your morning drive to school—ask each other these questions:

1) Was this fast from technology easier or harder than you thought it would be?

2) What was the hardest part?

3) Were there any unexpected benefits that came from giving up this particular technology? If so, what were they?

4) Do you think you would be able to give up this particular technology long term? If not, could you use it on a more limited basis?

5) Name one way that you could use this particular technology to help others or to do something good for someone else.

Get connected to a wider community of parents at www.orangeparents.org.

Reversing Darwin (Nov 18-Dec 2)

1. Be a Student of What They are Learning
In the dog-eat-dog world of middle school and high school, survival of the fittest often seems like the law of the land. And when we’re on the bottom of the food chain, this idea of a pecking order can start to affect the way we understand God—and maybe even the way we believe God sees us. But what if we were able to reverse this idea? What if something in Scripture allowed us to turn survival of the fittest on its head? Maybe we can start to flip the idea of “only the strong survive” and live in the reality that God has a bigger purpose and a better picture in mind—and this purpose and picture involves all of us—the strong, the weak, the in, the out, those you would expect, and those you wouldn't. Maybe in an effort to reverse Darwin, we need to start by understanding who God created us to be and how to live like it matters.

2. Be a Student of Your Student
Take a moment to think back—way, way back—to those first days of middle school. Or to the moments and memories that still define your high school experience. Or, get really bold and break out an old yearbook and see what you find. Feathered bangs? Side ponytails? Maybe even a mullet? Or, maybe seeing those old pictures brings back memories of who you thought you would one day be and all the adventures you hoped to have. Maybe you envisioned getting out of your small town and attending college in a bustling urban center, or studying abroad and soaking in the European culture. But even if those hopes and dreams didn’t pan out, they probably helped you dig deeper to define who you were, sometimes by simply figuring out who you were are not.

And for many of us, this process is still an ongoing part of our lives. It may even be that we were more sure of who we were at 18 than we are now that we have children, a job, a mortgage and a “life.” But why is it that we are still working so hard at figuring this out? Sometimes it seems that in our now grown-up lives we are working harder to convince other people of who we are. Whether on our Facebook profiles (yep, our students aren’t the only ones) or through conversations with friends, family and even other parents we are often caught up in a PR battle … with ourselves. We try to define ourselves by the way we represent ourselves to the world and in the process, we end up forgetting who we really are. Throw in 24/7 parenting duties, work tasks, daily household management, church and family life and any other threads of schedules and responsibilities and we get lost in the mix altogether!

And, as you may have noticed, we usually realize the weight of figuring out who we are in times of crisis or great change. Often, we find that somewhere along the line we have “activating events” that trigger us to shatter the image of who we think we are and dig deep again to find our true selves, to rediscover who we truly are.

And for our students, these activating events happen on a daily or maybe even hourly basis. They don’t make the team. They fail a test. They get dropped by a group of friends that were once their whole world. And like us, when this happens to our students, they get to pause, reflect, pick up the pieces and walk away in their new—or maybe just dusted off—identity.

3. Action Point
Sit down with your teenager and talk about a time when something happened to you that redefined who you are. Maybe it was a divorce, or even some defining moment that occurred before they were ever born. Whatever it is, talk about how it changed you and led you to better understand yourself.

Then, ask them if anything has happened this week that has caused them to feel “less than.” What was it? How did it make them feel? Did it make them want to change something about themselves? Did it make them feel like they don’t really know who they are or where they belong?

Now speak into that place of vulnerability and insecurity. What do you see in your student that is unique? What would be lost if they changed themselves in order to fit in? Why does it matter that they strive to be just who God created them to be?

Be sure to carve out some intentional time to sit down and wrestle through these questions with your student. And remember, even if they don’t open up as much as you would hope or like, the fact that you took the time and cared enough to ask will pay huge dividends in the future. Because just knowing what they are going through means the world to your student, even if they aren’t able to show it.

Get connected to a wider community of parents at www.orangeparents.org.

Fake I.D. (Oct 28-Nov 11)

 

1. Be a Student of What They are Learning

It’s an age-old problem—one that begins to plaque us around the time adolescence hits and, if we aren’t careful, follows us around the rest of our lives. It is the question of who we are—what makes up our identity, what defines us, what makes us, us. But imagine if, instead of wrestling with these questions in the complexity of adulthood, we started to tackle them in the formative teenage years? What if we took a good, long, hard look at some of the foundational questions during the years that shape us more than any others? Who am I? Where do I belong? What is my purpose? We are going to begin to scratch the surface of identity tackling the difficult to ask—and even more difficult to answer—questions that ultimately end up defining who we are.

 

2. Be a Student of Your Student

When it comes to parenting styles, everyone has an opinion. And while we could all stand to show more grace towards one another when navigating our role with our kids in this tricky stage of life, I think we can all agree there are some things we may be in the habit of doing that are good and some things that could be quite detrimental. Mickey Goodman, in a recent article (click here for article) tells stories of kids who upon arriving to college and receiving a less than satisfactory grade, had their parents call the professor to try and negotiate the score. But he doesn’t stop there. He goes on to relay the story of a parent who actually accompanied their child on a job interview. Yes, a job interview. Would you be surprised to learn this young woman did not get the job she applied for?

 

These may be fairly outrageous examples of parenting, but according to Tim Elmore, founder and president of the non-profit group Growing Leaders, they may be more disturbing than we realize because they represent a growing trend among parents. Hovering. Over-involvement. Intervening. They are evidence that a genuine attempt by parents to protect kids has evolved into something actually harming and stunting the growth and formation of a child’s identity. Which isn’t to say this is a parent’s intention. But however pure the motive, the result is not a good one. In other words, when we parent out of fear of what our kids may experience without our intervention, the actions we take as a result can have debilitating results.

 

It probably doesn’t take much prompting for you to remember the day you brought your child home from the hospital. The fear and terror combined with the overwhelming sense of joy and responsibility is enough to send anyone into an emotional tailspin. As parents, from day one, we have the engrained and prevalent instinct to protect our children—at all costs. But what more studies and psychologists are finding, the cost is actually the long-term wellbeing of our child. In an attempt to make sure our kids grow up safe, grow up protected, grow up secure and grounded in their identity, we are actually keeping them from growing up at all, leaving them ill-prepared for the actuality of the real world. So when it comes time to actually leave the nest, we are sending out kids with no real sense of who they are and no real skills on how to figure out life’s difficulties for themselves.

 

In other words we are raising kids not just sheltered from some of the harmful influences of culture, but kids sheltered from the realities of life—who don’t know disappointment and failure—and as a result don’t know how to recover from it when they do encounter it. And we are parenting this way for the sake of our own peace of mind. Tim Elmore says it this way. “We are consumed with protecting them instead of preparing them for the future. We haven’t let them fall, fail and fear.” In fact, you could say, we have done the fearing for them—allowing our personal apprehensions to dictate the way we parent, keeping our kids from learning valuable life-shaping lessons on their own.

 

And so, I wonder if we would do a better job as parents if we first dealt with our personal fears—be they well-founded or not—choosing to keep our fears from governing us and dictating the method and mode of our parenting. I wonder if we learned to take a deep breath and step back, if we just might be surprised, pleased and proud of the people—or maybe more appropriately, the adults—our teenagers are becoming—even in spite of us. And I wonder, if we learned to do this, what message it might send to our kids about the promise and hope they can find in themselves without our intervention, and if they would be more empowered and equipped to handle the world as a result.

 

3. Action Point

I think we would all admit that one of our biggest parenting faux pas come when we try to live vicariously through our children—trying to fix what was wrong circumstantially for us or in us by the way we treat and raise our offspring. The problem is, when we do this, we still don’t’ end up “fixing” ourselves and oftentimes we end up “breaking” our kids in ways we didn’t expect. So use this time with your teenager to create an honest dialogue over your own fears, personal shortcomings and hopes for them and give them the space and time to do the same.

Share with your teenager the fears you have for them. (Think specific—not just the really “obvious” or “big” fears. Think of the every day fears that may not seem that big to anyone else but drive you and your parenting.) Can you think of anything from your own personal experience as you grew up that caused you to have this fear for your child? How has your personal fear dictated the way you parent?

 

Family psychologist John Rosemond says this about encouraging our children and their dreams. “It’s time we tell them that doing great things starts with accomplishing small goals.”

Does it seem like a scary thing to allow your child to do this? What are some of the big goals you have in mind for your child? Does the way you parent encourage or hamper their big dreams? What are some of the small, more attainable goals you can set for them—that don’t scare you to death, but also give them a proper perspective on what is required to make their dreams happen? Ask your teenager what are some of the big dreams they have for themselves—and ask them what are some smaller attainable things they can begin to accomplish now that will help them as they strive for these bigger goals. How can you help them make this happen without over stepping your bounds and doing too much?

 

Ask your teenager if there are things they see in your parenting that are really just your fears being played out. Are there areas they feel stifled by you? Are there areas where you are too controlling? (Try not to feel judged or defensive if they do have something to say.)

 

What can you do as a parent to better support them and equip them as they journey towards discovering who they are and who they want to be?

 

 

Get connected to a wider community of parents at www.orangeparents.org.

Blessed (Oct 7-21)

 

 

 

 

1. Be a Student of What They are Learning

Think about the last time you heard the word “blessed.” What came to mind? For many of us—and many of our students—the word blessed conjures up images of the coolest clothes, the newest gadgets and a worry-free life. But when we look at what God has to say about being blessed, we realize that we probably have things pretty mixed up. Because if being blessed is more about our relationships—and what we do with them—than the stuff we have, we may have some reevaluating to do in order to redefine what it means to be blessed and realize that we might already be more blessed than we originally thought.

2. Be a Student of Your Student

Entitlement seems to be creeping into our culture through every mode possible—television, magazines, music. The feeling that we have the right to something—or to many “somethings”—seems to be the new cultural norm. And while it’s easy to blame the media, culture and maybe even other families who seem to give their teenagers everything under the sun, it’s important to remember the hard truth that in reality, entitlement begins at home. What we model to our children is the true determining factor in how they view the world; what the world has to offer and what they are entitled to get from it. But the problem is, for many of us, entitlement isn’t something that our kids alone struggle with. Entitlement is our struggle too.

 

Has this thought ever crossed your mind: “If only there was more money in our family budget, we could do so much more for our children? They could be on the traveling baseball team, go on all the church trips and have all the latest gadgets.” Come on. Admit it! There has probably been at least one time in your parenting journey that you have wished for more—more money, more time … more something. And this is totally normal. It’s a struggle that we all face. So, just for fun let’s pretend: You are still you, with your spouse, your children and your extended family, but now you have everything you could ever want—every dollar, every resource, every “thing” and every need met (and most every want met too). How does it feel? Do you feel happier, healthier and more fulfilled? Do you feel more “blessed”?

 

There is an article that came out in “The Atlantic” in April 2011 entitled “The Secret Fears of the Super Rich.” And while you might expect the focus of this article to be the Dow Jones Index, the real estate market or tax reform, what emerged was something much more relatable to the rest of us. What the article uncovered was the reality that even the super rich fear for the well being of their children. As the article’s summary states: “Does great wealth bring fulfillment? An ambitious study by Boston College suggests not. For the first time, researchers prompted the very rich—people with fortunes in excess of $25 million—to speak candidly about their lives. The result is a surprising litany of anxieties: their sense of isolation, their worries about work and love, and most of all, their fears for their children.” (To read the full article, go to http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/04/secret-fears-of-the-super-rich/8419/.)

 

As one respondent of the survey confided, “Other people glorify wealth and think that it means that the wealthy are smarter, wiser, more ‘blessed’ or some other such crock … it’s hard to get other, non-wealthy people to believe it’s not more significant than that … The novelty of money has worn off.”

 

Can you imagine being able to say that? To say the novelty of money has worn off? Most of us will never be there, but it sure feels good to know that just because someone has enough money to buy anything their heart desires—for themselves or their children—it doesn’t mean that it alleviates their fears. It doesn’t mean that they are more blessed. As a matter of fact, in most cases, it actually ups the ante on the fear and anxiety level.

 

So, with that in mind, let’s turn back to the idea of entitlement and take a look at an article written by Carey Nieuwhof on the Orange Parents blog—“Five Ways to Fight Entitlement in Your Kids.”

 

3. Action Point

Take some time to read through the following article by Carey Nieuwhof—Lead Pastor at Connexus Community Church north of Toronto Canada—and discuss with your student how you can put at least 1 of the following 5 suggestions into practice.

 

Five Ways to Fight Entitlement in Your Kids

By Carey Nieuwhof

(http://www.orangeparents.org/five-ways-to-fight-entitlement-in-your-kids/)

 

Like most parents, you feel this terrible tug.

 

On the one hand, you want to provide your child with every advantage. On the other hand, sometimes it feels like when you do that, you’re feeding an incredibly unhealthy characteristic in our culture.

 

For whatever reason, we’re living in the midst of an entitlement epidemic. Probably more than any other generation before us, our generation feels as though we have a right to things that used to be defined as wants, or even privileges.

Here’s how the cycle starts:

On the day your child is born, it’s easy to decide as a parent that you need to give your child every advantage.

 

So you compete. You made sure he had bright colors in his nursery and exactly the right kind of mobile to stimulate his brain, but now it’s an all out frenzy to ensure your preschooler can swim, skate, hit a ball, paint frameable art, read, write and speak classical Greek before his fourth birthday.

 

And don’t worry, because by the time you’re done with the race to kindergarten, the culture has taken over feeding the frenzy. Your child has now seen enough advertisements and made enough friends to believe that her every desire not only can be met, but should be met. The boots that every other stylish kid is wearing are not a privilege, they are a right. Or so you’ve been told.

And then other inalienable rights emerge: the right to a phone for texting, iPod touches, Facebook and so much more.

 

Somewhere in the mix, you found yourself realizing that you are tempted to pay your kids for every “act of service” rendered in the house, from emptying the trash to picking up each sock.

And you realize something is desperately wrong. And you would be correct in that.

So, what do you do to fight entitlement in yourself and in your kids? Here are five suggestions:

 

1.  Be clear on wants and needs. I joke with my kids that we owe them shelter, food and clothes, and I would be happy to slip a pizza under the door to their cardboard house any time they wish (they are 16 and 20, don’t try this with your 5-year-old, but you get the point.) Take time to explain what is actually a need and what a want is. Culture will never explain it to them. You need to.

2.  Reclaim special occasions. There is nothing wrong with not buying wants for your kids in every day life. Save the special things for special occasions like birthdays, Christmas and the like. You don’t need to indulge for no reason. In fact, you probably shouldn’t.

3.   Set a budget and let them choose. With back to school shopping and seasonal purchases, we started setting a budget with our kids early and then let them choose how they would spend it. They become much more frugal shoppers when all of a sudden they realize that money is limited and they can get more if they shop around.

4.  Establish an allowance and expectations. An allowance is a great way for a child to learn responsibility. We’ve encouraged our kids to give 10 percent of every thing they earn, save 10 percent, and live off the rest (the formula gets more restrictive the closer they get to college). Explain what gets covered and not covered out of that allowance.

5.  Be clear about what you will never pay them for. There are some things that you do because you are a part of the family. You can decide where that lands in your home. Make a list of responsibilities that no one gets paid for that you do because you are part of a family. To help with this, why not ask your kids what a reasonable list looks like? Involving them will help them own the decision. Second, make sure you follow up. And hold them responsible for what you all agreed to do. Otherwise you will be tempted to pay for everything or just roll your eyes daily and do it yourself.

Approaches like these can help raise kids who see life as a series of privileges, who live gratefully, and realize their responsibility to others.

 

How is our entitlement culture impacting your family? And how have you learned to battle it?

Get connected to a wider community of parents at www.orangeparents.org.

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