Our choruses' spring concert is tomorrow night, Saturday, April 30, at 6:30, in O. O. Emmons Auditorium.
Dates for semester examinations: Seniors: May 10, 11, 12 Eighth graders: May 16, 17 Everyone else: May 23, 24, 25 Downloadable files related to semester examinations:
By Sarah Sparks Brooks
One of the most frequent questions I hear from parents of teenagers regarding social media is how to monitor their child’s online activity.
Great questions. Tricky subject. Oh, and also? I really have no idea. I don’t know how much monitoring is too much. I don’t know what age your child is ready for what apps. I don’t know what site your child spends most of his or her time on. I think it’s a case-by-case, kid-by-kid conversation. Age plays a big role in these decisions, as does gender. I can’t give you a list of specific rules, but here’s what I do know: It’s critical for you to be involved, on some level, in their digital life. …that’s vague and highly unmotivating. Let me put it another way. There probably isn’t a single parent out there who has given his or her son a subscription to Playboy for his 12th birthday. There probably isn’t a single parent out there who has let his or her 13 year old daughter roam the city alone at night passing out headshots, asking for a 1-10 rating of her beauty. And yet. There are a whole lot of parents out there who have armed their 12 year old son or their 13 year old daughter with an unrestricted smartphone and unfiltered wifi. No game plan, no boundaries. And it can be the exact. same. scenario. Like my 14 year old friend who often retweets from sexually-charged Twitter accounts geared towards 20-somethings. Accounts that provide an exceptionally narcissistic, unrealistic view of relationships and create expectations for her future husband to look like David Beckham and spend an average of $500 a week on lingerie for her at Victoria’s Secret. (You know, for her perfectly toned size 00 body.) Or my 15 year old friend who Facetimes his girlfriend until the wee hours of the morning, a perk of keeping his phone in his room all night because he “uses it as an alarm to wake up for school”. (Good news – $2.88 + your local Walmart = a standard alarm clock. Problem solved.) Or my 13 year old friend whose parents don’t approve of the way a few primetime TV shows portray sex, yet allow her unmonitored access to Netflix. (Hello, Grey’s Anatomy and Orange is the New Black marathons. Because you teach such healthy sexual practices.) Or my 16 year old friend who is often texting and Snapchatting men she has never met, hoping their virtual love makes her feel more beautiful in real life. We’re experiencing a double standard of epic proportions. Have you wondered why today’s teens seem…sexier? More daring? More knowledgeable? I have an idea. We hesitate sending them on an out-of-state school trip with chaperones we don’t really know, yet happily let them sleep each night beside a miniature computer with unguarded access to the world. We meet the friends whose houses our kids spend time at after school, yet resist asking about the hundreds of Instagram and Twitter friends they spend hours with each week. Do you see the discrepancies? The virtual can have a severe impact on the physical. Really, our teens don’t distinguish between the two worlds. Their virtual is their physical, their physical is their virtual. It’s one in the same. It’s time to start parenting equally in both. That doesn’t mean every text needs to be read. (Please don’t.) It doesn’t mean every follow and comment and hashtag they make needs to be controlled. But it does mean parents cannot be entirely checked out of the digital world. It means that our kids cannot have free, 24/7 reign over the entire internet because we are too busy or overwhelmed or uninvested to do anything different. It means that we cannot sit by and let the interwebs teach our 14 year olds everything they never needed to know about life, love, and relationships. It means that we can feel confident in having the same conversations and asking the same questions and setting the same boundaries for their phones as we would for their physical world. It means we strive to be involved digitally to the extent we are physically – that we know generally where our kids spend their time and with whom. Anything less is a disservice to them, really. It’s time to be present in both, parents. We can do this. Our teens are counting on us. _________________________________________________________________________________ If you’re completely bumfuzzled* as to where to start, here are two of my favorite resources:
- - - - - - - Sarah Sparks Brooks is a 2005 graduate of Harding Academy and a 2009 graduate of Abilene Christian University. She and her husband have three sons. Her blog, Life as of Late, is here. by Christen Spratt http://www.foreverymom.com/im-raising-them-to-leave-me/ Last night I went to a parent teacher conference for one of my children. All in all, he is doing great and I am a proud mama. When I got home and had space to think (read: laying in bed, trying to fall asleep… it’s where I do my best deepest thinking, who needs sleep anyway?) something struck me about the conversation with that sweet teacher. You see, this particular child is doing great, especially when he applies himself. However, this kiddo can also act like a kid and rush through an assignment, get distracted, or maybe just not care as much as he should. She discussed a few tactics of how she was going to keep him on track. hallelujah! (Do you think it would be too much to ask her to convince him that he must practice these skills at home while say… cleaning his room? I mean, practice makes perfect, right?) I praised her for her efforts, I praised her for her endurance, and I praised her for sticking to her guns. She looked a bit bewildered for a moment… it was like she was waiting for the next shoe to drop. Like maybe, I was going to follow up the praise with excuses or justifications. There was moment of awkward silence. (This is becoming more and more common in my life.) Then she thanked me. The rest of the conference was great but while I was trying to sleep last night, I just kept replaying that one particular piece of the conversation. She. Thanked. Me. Then it hit me… teachers are not given the freedom to teach these days, their hands are often tied, and parents are constantly breathing down their necks. We need to get out of the way and let teachers teach. Now don’t get me wrong.. of course, as parents it is our job to protect our kids from harm and injustice. I am, by no means, suggesting that you stop doing that. (Be warned…I will show you a whole new level of cray cray if you are harming my child.) But what about all the uncomfortable stuff for your kid? What about having to redo an assignment? What about having to miss a recess, sit in a time out? What about when the teacher doesn’t have mercy on them for their late assignment and they get a zero? What are we teaching our kids if we swoop in to save the day every time things don’t go their way? I’ll tell you what you are teaching them… You are teaching them they can’t do this thing called life on their own. You are teaching them mom and dad have more power than all other authority figures. You are teaching them if you whine a little you will get your way. Those are all lies. Being their heroic protector now is only putting a bandaid on the issue which will continue to fester and become a gaping wound in their adult life. When our kids venture out into the big bad world… we will not be able to email a college professor to “discuss” the latest issues, we will not be able to storm a college campus to reprimand an unfair grade, we will not be able to scorn their boss to help them get their way, and let’s hope we don’t think we will be able to get all up in their marriage. We have to teach our kids how to handle life. We have to let them fail and then teach them how to recover. Sometimes this is hard to watch, painful even… but it is truly forming the character of that future adult. I want to raise our kids to be prepared to work hard and own up to their own mistakes. I want them to be equipped to persevere the trials and tribulations that life will undoubtedly throw at them. I truly believe it is better for them to progressively learn these lessons while they are under our roof. Little people, little problems… bigger people, bigger problems. It is our job to walk beside or behind them in these struggles. It is not our job to go before them. We have to raise them to NOT need us. We have to raise them to leave us. (it’s ok to cry now)
[Originally appeared in my book How to Raise an Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success (Henry Holt & Co., 2015)] by Julie Lythcott-Haims 1. An 18-year-old must be able to talk to strangers--faculty, deans, advisers, landlords, store clerks, human resource managers, coworkers, bank tellers, health care providers, bus drivers, mechanics--in the real world. The crutch: We teach kids not to talk to strangers instead of teaching the more nuanced skill of how to discern the few bad strangers from the mostly good ones. Thus, kids end up not knowing how to approach strangers--respectfully and with eye contact--for the help, guidance, and direction they will need out in the world. 2. An 18-year-old must be able to find his way around a campus, the town in which her summer internship is located, or the city where he is working or studying abroad. The crutch: We drive or accompany our children everywhere, even when a bus, their bicycle, or their own feet could get them there; thus, kids don't know the route for getting from here to there, how to cope with transportation options and snafus, when and how to fill the car with gas, or how to make and execute transportation plans. 3. An eighteen-year-old must be able to manage his assignments, workload, and deadlines. The crutch: We remind kids when their homework is due and when to do it--sometimes helping them do it, sometimes doing it for them; thus, kids don't know how to prioritize tasks, manage workload, or meet deadlines, without regular reminders. 4. An 18-year-old must be able to contribute to the running of a house hold. The crutch: We don't ask them to help much around the house because the checklisted childhood leaves little time in the day for anything aside from academic and extracurricular work; thus, kids don't know how to look after their own needs, respect the needs of others, or do their fair share for the good of the whole. 5. An 18-year-old must be able to handle interpersonal problems. The crutch: We step in to solve misunderstandings and soothe hurt feelings for them; thus, kids don't know how to cope with and resolve conflicts without our intervention. 6. An 18-year-old must be able to cope with ups and downs of courses and workloads, college- level work, competition, tough teachers, bosses, and others. The crutch: We step in when things get hard, finish the task, extend the deadline, and talk to the adults; thus, kids don't know that in the normal course of life things won't always go their way, and that they'll be okay regardless. 7. An 18-year-old must be able to earn and manage money. The crutch: They don't hold part-time jobs; they receive money from us for what ever they want or need; thus, kids don't develop a sense of responsibility for completing job tasks, accountability to a boss who doesn't inherently love them, or an appreciation for the cost of things and how to manage money. 8. An 18-year-old must be able to take risks. The crutch: We've laid out their entire path for them and have avoided all pitfalls or prevented all stumbles for them; thus, kids don't develop the wise understanding that success comes only after trying and failing and trying again (a.k.a. "grit") or the thick skin (a.k.a. "resilience") that comes from coping when things have gone wrong. Remember: our kids must be able to do all of these things without resorting to calling a parent on the phone. If they're calling us to ask how, they do not have the life skill.
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Mrs. SemoreHead of Upper School Archives
May 2016
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