Oklahoma City family fun can set your family up for success.
Next Saturday, March 5, a workshop is taking place that's all about your family's future together.
I haven't met a parent yet who would describe parenting as an easy task. Some days are better than others, I've concluded, but there's no magic formula, even as the internet's experts, fellow parents and well-meaning forces that be try to remind us what has been proven to work best.
Best is a relative term. What works for my family might not work for yours and that's fair.
Finding out what does work, though, is every parent's task. We're all making it up as we go along to some degree but what if we took an afternoon to figure it out?
That's the principle behind the workshop.
It's three hours led by people who know about helping pointing family members in the same direction. What's the right direction? That's for you to determine.
Family-iD stands for intentional direction and although it's hosted at a church, the workshop isn't religious, it's not just for families with troubled kids or angry kids. You don't even have to have kids to attend.
I'm going to say something that you'll know about if you have preschool children. The gravity of this statement isn't lost on me because I've now been in both positions on this topic: I am the mom of the biter. You know, that kid referred to as "a friend" who bit your child, the one the teacher can't name because of privacy concerns.
We are sorry about that. Believe me, biting isn't something we do in our family. We're not aggressive, and yet, we've been that family.
We've also been the family whose child was bitten and I was none too happy about that. I get it. Helping children make sense of what we do because of who we are and what we believe in and value, though, is a process. Empathy is something we value and I want to make that known to my children.
Reinforcing what we do and don't do and why is important. Family-iD helps to define what's acceptable and what isn't within our family's values.
I can't tell you why my son bit your child and neither can he. We will be talking about it, though, to help him establish a foundation to know that action isn't in line with our family's beliefs. Whether it's at home or at school, those values shine through and a workshop like this helps to define them.
I haven't been to Family-iD yet so I can't give it a ringing endorsement but I am willing to try it. Not because of the biting directly but because of what the workshop helps to define: who we are as a family and what we believe in, together. It's about a positive framework, not just rules.
Child care is available for kids who can't yet read. Kids who can are invited to participate right alongside their parents and I like that idea too, getting buy-in from these very small people we expect to live by our values and know if their actions reflect those, all day every day. How often do we really ask kids if their behavior fits within a framework that's true to who we are? My oldest is 8 and I can't recall a single time we've asked him.
Click here for more information about Family-iD.
It's not too late to register and those three hours + $25 just might make all the difference for your family.
