Let Them Eat Sand! and Make Mistakes.....

Let Them Eat Sand…..Make Mistakes…..Maybe Even Fail…..


During my last decade in the classroom, one of the things that frustrated me the most was how parents, in general, took to bailing their children out of everything. Excuses abounded. It was simply unheard of for a child (and I taught 8th grade, so these were not little children!) to suffer the consequences of mistakes or bad choices or whatever. If homework got left behind (or, imagine this, not done!), mom or dad came immediately to the rescue. It was never the child’s fault. Perhaps the dog died, or the grandparents showed up unexpectedly, or basketball practice ran late, or..well, you get the idea. It got to be so rampant that our 8th grade teaching team started a new policy: if the student arrived without the homework completed, he/she stayed that night to do it, and, if transportation home was a problem, we would provide it. All parents agreed, signed a paper giving us a phone # to call if the policy need implementing, and all was well….until it was his/her child whose head was on the block. Then the excuses started all over again.

Or, if the student forgot something such as gym clothes, lunch, homework, whatever, not to worry. Daily a steady stream of parents arrived in the office bearing whatever was needed. How do you learn responsibility this way? Just before I retired from the classroom I observed parents dropping children off late with Dunkin Donuts drinks and food….obviously they’d slept in and then gone out for breakfast! One day I watched as a parent delivered McDonald’s to the young man in the lunchroom. Apparently neither a lunch from home nor the school lunch met his nutritional needs or appetite!

So when I arranged a play “date” at the beach for our youngest grandson, Jack, 14 months, and the 13 month old daughter of my former math teacher/teammate, Emerson, I didn’t know how her mother would handle all the stuff a child gets into on such occasion. She passed admirably! As you can see from the pictures, Jack and Emerson had sand in every orifice, and even shared with each other. They fell down and got back up. They slapped seaweed around and tossed it away. The frolicked in the waves and got knocked over and swept away. We never left their side as they munched on rocks and grit. But we did not stop them. We made awful faces and noises as the grains crunched in their teeth, and we brushed them off and set them aright after they face planted, but we let them do these things!

How will children experience learning from their mistakes if they are not allowed to make them? How will they know that you can “pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and start all over again” if it is not fostered? What a disservice we do when we do not urge our young ones to experiment, to step out of the safety box (and I am not talking risky behaviors here), to not be afraid to actually fail! Later on in life when something happens that is less than perfect, and there is no way an adult can rescue them from their own actions, how devastating will it be?

So I exhort all grandparents to crusade for mistakes and failure. Tell them tales of problems you’ve encountered, grand flubups, terrible decisions, and show them that you are alive and kicking. Encourage them to try new things, but to think a bit more beforehand. Talk to your own children, their parents, and try to get them to see the error of their enabling ways. Let them suffer the consequences or take their punishment or deal with the disappointment. In the long run, you will be giving them the gifts of flexibility and resiliency, desirable attributes for success in a world that doesn’t always let you skip by.

Tip: 31: Encourage mistakes and failures. Teach your grandchildren how valuable a lesson you can learn from something if you own it and then act to rectify. Share stories of your own disasters, and tell them about their parents, too. Try to keep the hyperbole to a minimum, and remember that humor usually abets any woeful tale. Better to have risked and lost than never to have risked at all!

Clueless in Grandparent Land

Clueless in Grandparent Land

There have been quite a few times in the past when we realized we were woefully behind in the whole pop culture world, but, aside from having to watch a few of the kids’ videos (Beauty and the Beast comes immediately to mind as we had no idea who Gaston was, and Grandpa received orders to portray him in our game one day), ask some questions about what the heck Yu-gi-o was, learn a bit about American Girl dolls and their “stuff”, watch them log on to register their Webkinz, and then send messages to each other, get into the jargon of the video games (never knew what an x box was, and not quite sure we get it even now) and, now that I am enumerating, a host of other things. TV land continues to be another planet, though we definitely know Hanna Montana, the Jonas Brothers, The Suite Life of Zack and Cotie, Wipeout, and AFHV.

So the problem is not so much with what we do know, but what we don’t. Two days ago I was sitting on the “mini dock” out in the lake with several of the grandchildren. I was right proud of myself for donning a bathing suit, diving into the coolish, murky water, and successfully swimming with this entourage to the diving dock. Whilst we were peacefully sitting there, enjoying the warm sunshine and gentle breeze, something happened. All of a sudden, children were taking umbrage with each other, there was moaning and gnashing of teeth, sides were drawn…and I had absolutely no idea what had occurred! I hadn’t heard a thing. Granted my hearing is not quite as sharp as it used to be (I told my students that I could hear a rat pee on snow, so they’d best be careful about what they whispered in the far reaches of my classroom!), but I honestly was totally clueless not only about what had ignited the fury but also about what needed to happen to resolve it.

What saved me was that our daughter, parent of five of them, was on the shore and had observed the proceedings. She called out for Ryan, almost 5, to apologize to Megan, almost 6. He heartily protested his innocence, but his mother had his number. Apparently there is a vicious villain, a female antagonist, in a show on the Disney channel (but one that doesn’t air before 8 p.m., for a now-obvious reason!), who, if she doesn’t deem you “sufficiently cool” enough, dismisses you with some three-fingered sign language, the gist of which is “you are a major loser”. Ryan evidently had signaled this to Megan, who knew exactly what he was saying, and was very upset by his “dissing” her. I don’t think we know even now why Ryan was sending this message to the very cousin he was so excited to see when he’d arrived about an hour beforehand, but he definitely was sending this message loudly and clearly. And it was a major offense, at least in the eyes of all of the others. But this is only one small example of how we can be totally out of it when trying to negotiate through their world!

I try to get the parents to give us some idea of what is ok and what is not as far as TV shows, computer games and movies go. With Emma it is fairly easy because her mouth smiles crookedly when she is “fibbing”, and when you call her on it, she will eventually succumb to an attack of giggleitis. Most of the others, however, possess considerable expertise in this arena. That is not to say that Emma doesn’t try to get away with things; she has manipulation skills that would rival any successful U N diplomat…she just uses a different modus operandi. I have learned to ask if the parent would allow ______________________, and then to watch their eyes. Usually they cannot sustain eye contact if they know that it wouldn’t be allowed. Also, they each have an individualized way of approaching us when asking for something that is normally verboten, and after a while even the densest among us can begin to recognize the signals. It is a world, however, fraught with land mines, and because it is constantly changing, you really do not have much chance of keeping pace.

This holds true for food as well. Mostly our children let us handle the whole food thing however we choose, suspecting that we will err on the side of healthy. Still, the kids push our buttons, asking for ice cream for breakfast (rarely allowed, but sometimes…), or dessert after both lunch and dinner, or extra helpings of starch under which to bury the dreaded vegetables…and we get snookered more often than not.

If I ask, “What would mom or dad say?” I can usually tell by the hesitation or averting of eyes if I have hit upon a trouble spot. But there are so many of them that we cannot possibly keep pace.
“What do you usually do at bedtime?” “ Have some candy and go to bed….. around 9….. with a drink of soda to help me sleep….” I think not.
“Do mom and dad let you watch this show?” “Sometimes.” (translation: never!).
“Did you have dessert at lunch today?” “I had a sandwich and some grapes”.
“Ok, but did you have dessert?”
“I ate all of my sandwich”.
“And then what did you have?”
“Some grapes.”
“And then what?”
“Oh, maybe I had a cookie….or two….”

Egad.

“What rating movies do mom and dad usually let you see?”
“Oh, they let us see P-G if it is only bad language.”
“How do they know how bad the language is?”
“Well, sometimes they just figure it will be ok.”
“Really?”
“Yes, and sometimes they go see it first and then they say it is ok for us.” (I do not believe this has ever happened, or, if it did, it was on a galaxy far, far away…).

Tip #30: Do the best you can to acquaint yourselves with some of the major pop culture icons, games, programs, heroes, music, and fads of children of different ages, particularly those of the same age as your grandchild/children. You do not have to submerge yourself in it, but try to keep abreast of some of it. Talk to your own children frequently, and try to figure out what is allowed and what is not. For ex., in one of our children’s families, the word “stupid” is not allowed. It has been used in such a pejorative way that the only thing the parents could do was ban it completely. Body part terminology (aka the “potty mouth syndrome”) also needs clarification. How many times can the child say “bum, or butt, or buttocks” before being called on it? This week they had a new one: derriere! The massive giggle attack that followed its use every time was a dead giveaway. They also love “poop”, “boobs”, “sexy”, “penis”, etc. How you respond will determine how often they will continue to try to insinuate these words into their conversation. Just as our own children did, they are trying to learn how to push our buttons. Mostly they succeed! Good luck. You are going to need it!

Gathering the Extended Family

Gathering the Extended Family

If you can manage to have one member of the family install a pool, you have a natural gathering place. They start out in a little wading pool and gradually progress to the larger pool, initially accompanied by an adult, and then with floaties and vests and tubes, and, eventually, solo! Nothing entertains quite like water can, and it is delightful to watch them splishin’ and a splashin’!

We have a wonderful time when we all gather at our daughter’s above ground pool, as you can see by the pictures. The younger ones aspire to be doing the things the older ones can. There are any number of water games to play, and, as grandparents, we felt it our responsibility to teach them several of them. “Lady (or Gentleman) Overboard” is a made-up game from going up to the uncles’ camp on a lake in Maine. The player sits on the ladder or platform (depending on his/her level of dare deviltry) and the mc poses a question that the child is apt to know the answer to, such as “What is the capital of the U.S?” and “Where do rivers begin?”, choosing the level of difficult appropriate to the age and education of the child. If answered correctly, ask another. If answered incorrectly, the child must jump into the water. Now, as simple as this may appear, they will play this for hours, as long as there is not a long waiting time while you think up the questions! And you must be sure that they are not too easy or too hard; kids have a natural instinct and sense when you are fooling with them. I cannot explain the durability of this game, but I am happy to play it with them, though I often run out of questions before they lose interest. You can choose from many categories, much like Jeopardy, but remember that you have to know the answers!

Because we go to one sibling’s house, we try to chip in for things like paper goods, condiments, drinks, etc. No one should bear the cost alone. These things placed in a basket or big tub that can be filled with ice and used to keep drinks cold outside make great Christmas and birthday gifts, depending on when the birthdays are in the year. We call and tell what each will bring, from hot dogs, chicken, steak and burgers to pasta salad, tossed salad, fruit salad, pickles, chips, rolls, and, of course, dessert. If everyone does his/her part, we end up with a tasty meal whose cost has been shared equally. We try to keep a constant supply of graham crackers, Hershey squares and marshmallows to make s’mores. During corn season we can do away with a lot of the extras and relish the delicious summer treat. I bough little corn holders that go into the end of the cob on both sides and the children can then hold the ears without the heat causing them to drop them onto the ground, deck or water!

When the children come out of the water, they also need things to do, and this is a good place to let them use their creativity. Ryan used the croquet mallets to make goggles, and then tried roller-skating on the deck. They love to swing in the hammock, play catch or volleyball or swing. Running around in the back yard uses up tons of energy and causes them to fade early and stay asleep longer.

Be sure to have tons of sun block and bug spray available. Even if the container claims that it is a waterproof sunscreen, liberally reapply it often. Be wary of ticks and mosquitoes. If possible, have the children wear hats. And don’t forget to cover yourself as well.

Little tables help the smaller ones sit down and eat their meal. So often today life is lived on the run, and families do not have as many opportunities to break bread together. Children need this experience on a regular basis. They need to practice the art of “dining”, even if it is with finger foods and in bathing suits. Talking with others at the table, asking for things to be passed, excusing oneself to leave the table, cleaning up after you are done, and waiting until everyone has finished the main meal before getting dessert are all a part of dining etiquette which children will not learn if they do not get to actually practice these table arts. It is also an ideal time to teach about recycling and composting.
And most of all, join in with them and just relax, chat them up, and have a jolly good time. You will remember these halcyon days for years and years, especially if you take pictures in the same settings over several years. How they love to see themselves progress!

Tip #29: Try to find a place to gather for summer outings where the extended family can be together. Playing with cousins and having aunts and uncles around to share in the eating, game playing and even discipline create lasting bonds and fond memories. Children feel a part of something larger when the group expands to include other relatives. Teach them polite manners and respect while they are having a good time playing and eating. Shared responsibility only reinforces that “it takes a whole village to raise a child”, only in this case the village is the extended family, led by you, the wise and wonderful grandparents!

Teaching How to Help Others

Teaching How to Help Others

As adults, it is our responsibility to teach/model that we all need to help each other, and that we are all capable of doing so. The size and nature of the contributions do not matter nearly as much as the effort and intent. Children can help each other, but it is up to the adults to provide the means and motivation for them to do so.

Our daughter, Maribeth, and her co-worker, Kathi, along with the assistance of their husbands, Sean and Mike, recently co-facilitated the first in town PMC (Pan Mass Challenge) Kids Ride. It was an enormous undertaking and the two very green co-chairs did an amazing job of orchestrating, conducting and following through with this event. As a family, we helped in small ways, recruiting volunteers and riders, spreading the word, and being as supportive as we could from the sidelines.

Ari was away at camp, but the other 8 grandkids participated in the ride. Our son manned the medical tent, and our other daughter and her husband provided raffle items, hands-on assistance, and a lot of know-how. A dear family friend, a professional photographer, took the pictures. Many past and present staff members and former students from my school spent their free Sunday morning filling in registrations, decorating bikes, face painting, and most of all, cheering on the riders. We felt so blessed to have so many friends and extended family members enthusiastically join in the undertaking, and help to make it such a tremendous success.

The riders understood that the money being raised was going to be used to help fund research for kids with cancer. They rode with vigor and youthful joy, spurred on by the d.j. calling out their names over the pa system, and the adult volunteers yelling wildly on the sidelines. They had an official water station, but most barely slowed down long enough for a drink. They had a mission, and were determined to ride for the full hour to help children in need. It was not a race, so there was no competitive edge…..simply kids helping kids.

Afterwards, while munching on all the pizza they could possibly eat, it was unanimous: they would all return next year, and bring friends. They’d had such a good time, and the giant posters of the Cancer Institute’s pedal partners helped them put faces to the children they were helping. The sheer joy of the morning cannot be captured in words. The adult volunteers expressed gratitude for being included. And yes, there were moments……when our granddaughter, Emma, battling a stubborn brain tumor for the last five years, took the microphone and said, “ I am glad to all who are here to support me. Thank you!”, and then took a bow, there was hardly a dry eye on the street. Even the NH State Police bag pipers looked a bit misty. Some of the children riding had issues of their own, which they were able to surmount in order to take part in the ride. It was so incredibly heartwarming/breaking, and the end result is that these children all now how good it feels to be able to help others.

We are so very proud of our family for joining forces and finding so many different ways to try to help. Teaching their children to think of others, and to be willing to work towards helping them, show us all how to be better people. I think everyone left last Sunday feeling optimistic and inspired. I know I did. Thank you to all who joined us. Maybe someday soon a cure will be discovered……and other families will not have to live with the nightmare that is pediatric cancer.

Tip #28: You have to teach the children that they have the responsibility and capability of helping others, especially other children. You have to believe it, model it, and genuinely share in the joy that comes from giving. If you want the world to be a better place, you have to be part of the solution.....and our grandchildren will be the architects of our future!