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This month there are 2 parenting articles.

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Tips to Teach Kids to be Thankful

by: Erin McNew, Jewish Family Service Parenting Educator
November 3, 2011

The holiday season is upon us, and as I’m writing this, Thanksgiving is just a few weeks away. Spending time with our children during the holidays tends to raise issues of how we can encourage our children to appreciate all that they have, to show gratitude and to help others.

When parents teach gratitude they promote resiliency in their children. Gratitude doesn't change the events in our lives; rather, it alters the way in which we view them. As children learn to see blessings in the midst of uncertainty and hard times, they learn that problems are not insurmountable, that difficulties can be solved, and that we grow stronger from having learned valuable lessons. Furthermore, as others offer help to our families during difficult times, children learn the importance of being grateful as they are the recipients of kindness and generosity.

Unfortunately, we live in a culture that doesn’t support the concept of gratitude. It actually teaches the exact opposite. Television commercials promote the idea that we are entitled to have whatever we want, whenever we want it. They supply us with a steady stream of objects of our desire, so that we are never entirely satisfied with what we already have.

Because gratitude does not come naturally in our culture, we need to make a conscious effort to teach gratitude -- here are some tips:

1. Model positive behavior. When parents show appreciation to the people in their lives, children learn to do the same thing. Communicate a simple, sincere thanks when you catch your kids being helpful: “I appreciated you being in the car on time and ready for school without reminders this morning.” Make sure your kids see you expressing gratitude to people who are helpful to you: a sales clerk who takes extra time to give you personal attention, a neighbor who rescues your garbage can from the street, or a babysitter who obviously enjoys your children AND puts the dishes in the dishwasher!

2. Practice random acts of kindness. Ordering your kids to share has much less effect than when they see you sharing: help a stranger carry a heavy package to her car, offer the cold newspaper salesman a cup of hot coffee, or surprise a neighbor with homemade muffins. Do something for someone else, and involve your kids, just because it’s fun!

3. Have a positive attitude. Learn to state things in a positive way, even when disciplining our children. The statement “if you don’t do your homework you can’t play outside” focuses on a negative, but “when you’re finished with your work you can go play” accentuates the positive.

4. Keep most complaints and petty criticisms to yourself. If there is something wrong, figure out what changes you have the power to make. If you can do something about it, then get busy, and if you can’t, there’s no sense complaining. You can be sure that your children will pick up the habit if you do.

5. Make gratitude a regular part of your family’s routine. At our house we express gratitude at dinner. After saying a blessing, in which we express how grateful we are for the gifts of the natural world, each person tells about their day. We take turns sharing our best part, our hardest part, and what we are grateful for.

6. Make service a part of your family culture. Some of our favorite family service projects have been organizing a neighborhood canned food drive, choosing and purchasing holiday gifts for foster children, and cleaning up litter along the roads of our neighborhood. One year, my daughter asked birthday party guests to bring a five-dollar donation instead of a gift. She and her friends then chose what type of zoo animal they would “adopt” in honor of her birthday, and the money was given to an endangered species fund.

Children who receive much more than they contribute often develop a sense of entitlement and self-centeredness. Think before you give to your kids. Bigger is not always better: just because you CAN buy them the biggest and the best, doesn’t necessarily mean you SHOULD. Kids who get too much come to expect it and this is what breeds entitlement.

In the end, we do our children an enormous favor when we encourage habits of gratitude. I believe that author Melodie Beattie said it best: “Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity.... It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow.” What greater gift, then, could we give to our children?

Teaching Gratitude and Helping Our Community

November 3, 2011

by Linda Kean, director of Family Life Education

What does it take to teach our children to understand and show gratitude?

For many years I taught a program called “Active Parenting” which was created by Dr. Michael Popkin. This program provides parents with insight into children’s behavior by teaching them to understand what motivates children. Although children’s behavior and motivations are complicated, he uses a simple model called “Think-Feel-Do” to explain the process. I’d like to apply this model to demonstrate ways that parents can teach children to understand gratitude, to express it, and how to take action to show their gratitude.

Children’s (and adults’) behavior or actions are based on both conscious and unconscious thoughts and feelings. In applying the Think-Feel-Do logic, if a child tries something and is successful, he/she will be motivated to try it again.

Here is an example: Emma’s mom tells her that she shouldn’t keep asking for new toys because she has so many, and she should be grateful for what she has. Emma doesn’t yet understand. Then Emma meets a new friend in the park who is admiring a toy that Emma has brought with her. She later learns that this new friend lives in a family that doesn’t have money to buy toys because they need to spend their money only on food and clothing. The next time Emma goes to the park, she may be motivated to bring one of her toys to give to her friend. So she thinks about it, feels empathy and then is motivated to action—Think-Feel-Do. Of the many possible results, here are a few:

The friend is comfortable accepting the gift and shows appreciation to Emma
The friend accepts the gift but is somewhat embarrassed and doesn’t know how to show gratitude
The friend refuses the gift and says she doesn’t need anything, but thanks her for thinking of her (we are not sure of the reason)

Each result has its own lesson and will be motivating for Emma to try to help a friend in the future. She will most likely feel good about trying to help someone as most of us do when we help others.

When we expose our children to these types of lessons on a regular basis, the child’s thoughts and feelings of gratitude make much more sense to them. Next time Emma asks for a new toy (and of course she will), she may remember to be grateful, at least for a moment, that she has plenty of toys. Learning about gratitude in this way also helps a child understand the difference between needing something and wanting something. Taking this simple model and utilizing it consistently over time will help our children be grateful and show gratitude by taking responsibility to help others.

As Thanksgiving approaches and we take additional time with our families to thinking about gratitude and help those in need, please keep in mind the following opportunities to participate in helping others in our community.

Jewish Family Service (JFS) provides holiday gifts of clothing, books, games, shoes, etc. for families in need in the Jewish and general community who are served through a program in our agency. Instead of trying to guess what their needs are, we give them an opportunity to send a list of requests for items for their children. After the lists are gathered, our staff, board and friends choose a few things to purchase and donate. The items are wrapped and delivered by our staff, which allow the families to remain anonymous.

Similarly, the Mayerson JCC invites families to donate children’s gifts through their One Candle for Tzedakah event on December 18. The Hebrew word tzedakah means righteousness, fairness or justice, and refers to the religious obligation to perform charity and philanthropic acts. The donated gifts will be distributed to clients of Jewish Family Service and ProKids.

For more information about participating in one of the Tzedakah programs, please contact Jayme Hughes at 513-766-3303 or jhughes@jfscinti.org.