Another favorite Thanksgiving book! While we listen to and read audios about the first Thanksgiving (an Odyssey one is playing right now as I write this!), I am one who loves whimsical, funny, clever stories, including Thanksgiving ones. That is why I love the book described below. It is incredibly creative and clever—and catches kids (and adults) off guard when Mrs. Moose simply wants to invite Turkey to lunch—not eat him for lunch!

(Please note that I am an affiliate for Amazon. I receive a small commission when you click on my links below. Thanks so much for your support of this blog!)

You can get this beloved book, written by Eve Bunting, at Amazon, among other places (including the library): 

From Publishers Weekly: “Although a paper turkey decorates Mrs. Moose’s Thanksgiving table, she longs for the real thing–so her obliging husband sets out to find her one. He is joined by his soon-to-be dinner guests: Rabbit, in his quilted down vest; poky Porcupine, in his furry earmuffs; and ravenous Mr. Goat, who devours everything in sight, including Sheep’s plaid hat. They find Turkey hiding in his nest, surrounded by signs that discourage visitors. Trying to console the terrified bird, Mr. Moose explains: “We just want you for Thanksgiving dinner,” which only confirms Turkey’s fears. Young readers will be as thrilled as Turkey to hear that Mrs. Moose wants him at her table, not on it. Together, Bunting’s ( In the Haunted House ; The Wednesday Surprise ) good-natured tale and de Groat’s ( Hi Bears, Bye Bears ) autumn-hued, richly detailed watercolors convey the animals’ warm friendship and the humor resulting from the misunderstanding. This ideal family read-aloud will awaken the holiday spirit in all.”

Use this book report form for your students to write a book report about this book!

See my book review and writing project ideas for Liberty B. Mouse here.

The post “A Turkey for Thanksgiving” Book Review (With Book Report Template for Your Students!) appeared first on Character Ink.

We had some definite advantages to raising children and homeschooling during “the stone age”! 🙂 For one thing, we didn’t have many choices of activities, so it was much easier to stay home and build good study habits, household work schedules, and family time. (Obviously, it can still be done today, but we were forced to stay home more in general.) Secondly, we were blissfully unaware of the demanding academics of today. We didn’t know that our kids needed to know everything that is now required to graduate and go to college. We didn’t do labs, advanced math, and other more strenuous academic pursuits with our first born at all. (I’m not saying this was good–I’m just saying it gave us more of a precious commodity that everyone longs for today–time.)

This “stay-at-home, do-your-work, learn-to-get-along-with-the-friends-you-have-here (siblings!)” way of living was actually pretty sweet. We had long, wonderful days together, and I will carry those warm memories with me throughout the rest of my life. (Sorry, I tend to wax nostalgic over days gone by quite often lately!)

With those long days at home came some things I am forever grateful for–in addition to the closeness of our kids and warm memories. The time and necessity of developing habits.

Time to develop them because we were often home all together doing school and household things twelve hours a day while Ray was at work. Necessity because we were often home all together doing school and household things twelve hours a day while Ray was at work. 🙂

Now that I’m all grown up and an entrepreneur working from home, helping parents, sharing health, teaching other students besides my own, and still mentoring grown children (and babysitting grandkids each week), I am so aware of the power of habits in my own life.

With seven children grown, ages 19 to 35, many still in various levels of college and post grad school as well as some with their own businesses and growing families, I am aware (and grateful) fo the time and necessity that we had to help build habits into their lives.

(Want my take on applying all of my productivity tips to homeschooling and entrepreneurship? Check out my productivity video series at Donna Reish blog.)

Below are some links to books I use and love. I am an affiliate for Amazon.com. If you click on the links below I will earn a small commission. Thank you for your support of this blog!

One of my favorite books on the topic of habit building is The Power of Habit

But for time saving purposes, I recommend an amazing TedX talk on this subject. It emphasizes the importance of teaching habit, self-control, and self-regulation to our children. I think you will benefit greatly from it whether you are a parent, homeschooler, or educator. Take a look here:

Here are some resources/posts that can help you in building habits in your children in the new year!

Attaching Important Things To Your Schedule

Love-Hate Relationships With Homeschooling Schedules

How to Build Chores Into Your Daily Schedule

Age Appropriate Printable Chore Posters

Independent Work Lists for Junior High and High School

How to Use Independent Work Lists for Elementary Children

Video: Using Check Lists for Student’s Independent Work

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Affirmation. Words of encouragement. Words of praise. Words of confirmation. Words of affection. Words of pride. Words of belonging. These all describe that one word–affirmation.

I recently read an article about a study of hundreds of college athletes that lasted over three decades. In this article,  “What Makes a Nightmare Sports Parent and What Makes a Great One.” these college athletes described two things that are poignant for parents of all children, including non-athletes.

The first question they answered was “What is your worst memory from playing youth and high school sports?”

The majority of those surveyed said, “The ride home from games with my parents.”

(If you have read much of what we have written or heard us speak often, you know that we focus on riding with our children in the van or car as one of the key opportunities to teach, affirm, talk, love, and train. It breaks my heart that this “sacred time” is remembered as one of the most dreadful times for these hundreds of athletes.)

Of course, we can all imagine why–because there probably isn’t a parent reading this (author included) who hasn’t come down on a child on the drive home from something about his performance–teacher conferences, speech contest, debate tournament, soccer game, swim meet, even pick-up basketball games are all opportunities to “teach” our child what he did “wrong” in the aforementioned event.

My husband, who is truly the best dad I know, one who talks to his kids on the phone and in person quite literally hours every day, even does this, so I know it is hard to conquer. And it isn’t always the parent’s fault either–as I know our kids usually probe on the way home from a performance, sermon, or song. They ask us questions that make us feel like we should be “teaching” at that time.

However, we really need to resist the urge to teach at that time. My experience has been that they ask and ask, but they really don’t want a lesson. They really just want to hear the positive at that time. I have to remind myself that there will be time for teaching and lessons later–when the performance, sermon, or song isn’t so fresh.

The study went on to prove this point further by telling how the kids described their joy over grandparents attending their sporting events. It seems that grandparents are more likely to watch, cheer, and then praise–with no lessons or strings attached.

Turning from the negative and what not-to-do, to the positive, these same athletes were asked what their parents did right–what made them feel good about themselves and their performances. The majority of them said that they were filled with joy when their parents simply said six little words:

 “I love to watch you play.”

No lessons, lectures, or analyses. Just six simple words that made hundreds of college and professional athletes look back on their time following sporting events with their parents fondly.

And six little words that we can use to affirm our children all the time.

I was happy to read this article because one of my favorite buzz lines after my kids perform is

I could watch you _________________ forever.

I could watch you dance forever. I could watch you sing forever. I could watch you preach forever. I could watch you teach forever. I could watch you act forever. I could watch you direct forever. I could watch you lead forever. I could watch you play forever. I could watch you study forever.

The thing about these lines—I love to watch you…. or I could watch you ….. forever—is that our child doesn’t have to be the best to say these things. He doesn’t have to have just played a perfect game. He doesn’t have to have just scored the winning run. He doesn’t have to have given a flawless performance.

He is our child. We love to watch him grow, do, be, become. We are saying that the child is so amazing to us–without being the gold medal winner. We are saying that he is important. That we want to be with him. That we love to watch him do what he loves to do.

We are affirming. With six little words.

I love to watch you….

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“Mom, that’s not fair!”

“Why can’t I…..”

“It’s her turn!”

One of the ways that our children begin the disrespect spiral is when we let them “talk back” to us. At first, this can be simply questioning us with a slightly raised voice. But before we know it, it can become full-fledged disrespect. And the more we allow it, the more it happens.

But what is a parent to do when they want kids who are able to talk freely about things? What should we do when we want to build an open, honest relationship with constant dialogue, yet every time our child disagrees with us, it becomes a shouting match?

A couple of weeks ago, I talked about the Recipe for Rebellion ingredient of “Rules Without Response.” That is, our children become rebellious towards us when we DON’T allow them to respond to us—but when they do respond, it turns into disrespect.

We found a solution to this nearly thirty years ago….and it has served our family well, allowed us to have super close relationships with our kids throughout their teen and young adult years, and kept communication going without allowing disrespect to seep in.

It was called “the godly appeal” when we first learned of, but I prefer to call it “the Quiet Questioning”—focusing on the fact that we let the child question us—but it is quiet (i.e. in a respectful, permitted manner).

Quiet Questioning is a non-argumentative, non-confrontational way for our children to express their disagreement with our rules for them. It opens doors of communication that would literally be slammed in our children’s faces if we just tell them to “do what I say; I don’t want to hear about it.” It gives our teens more of a sense of control in their lives—and provides multiple teaching opportunities for us (which our teens can, in turn, apply to other situations in their lives).

In Quiet Questioning if a child does not agree with something, he asks respectfully if he may question it.

I even recommend using these exact words, so that you have “key words” that indicate that the child is getting control of himself so you should listen to him: “May I quietly question?”

After the quiet question, the parent gives one of three answers: yes, no, or later. The child must then accept that answer as part of the quiet questioning process (not argue, beg, etc.).

At that time, the parent gives one of three answers: yes, no, or later. The child then must accept that answer (not argue, beg, etc.). If the answer is yes, the question is heard and considered by the parents. Sometimes this is in front of other siblings. Many times it is not, depending on the subject being questioned, who it applies to, and the intensity of the child’s questioning.

If the answer is no, the matter is dropped, though it may be brought up later, when more information is gathered or when the time is more appropriate (i.e. not in the heat of an argument or not when parents are unable to deal with it right then, etc.).

If the answer is later, the child may bring it up at another, more convenient, time. (Sometimes we even told our children that they may question tomorrow or next week when we are not traveling or not in the middle of a big project, etc.)

How to Make Quiet Questioning Successful

There are some guidelines that make quietly questioning successful:

1. If the question is disrespectful or done in anger, it is turned down immediately.

2. If the question is a series of whines and complaints, rather than a truly quiet question, it is turned down.

3. If a child begins disagreeing a lot or constantly trying to question, the question process is terminated for a period of time until that person learns to accept Mom and Dad’s rules more often than not. (More about kids being characterized by cooperation “more often than not” later.)

4. If the questioning process becomes an argument, it is ended.

5. If the person questioning is turned down, but later has more information (“new evidence”), he may re- question that topic.

6. The question is truly listened to and thought through by Mom and Dad. Do not pretend to listen to questions, but not regard your children’s pleas. This is another “Recipe for Rebellion” in itself. (Kids know if the questioning process is just a formality and you are not truly listening to them.)

7. The person questioning is not constantly interrupted by Mom and Dad with justifications. The child should not be patronized during a quiet question, but carefully listened to and respected.

8. Once the answer to the question is given, the matter must be dropped for the time being. Granted, it might need re-visited, but to continue the questioning once an answer is given is arguing, not quiet questioning.

9. Parents must agree on the answer to the question at the time. Later, behind closed doors, discussion between Mom and Dad may need to take place, but in front of the child, a united front is imperative.

Quiet Questioning is a privilege for mature children. It should not be used by children who complain and grumble all of the time. It should not be used as a “formal means” of arguing. (The words, “May I quietly question?,” should not be substituted for the child’s normal means of disagreeing as an attempt to begin “discussion and arguments.”)

A child should have godly character and be characterized by (“known by”) submission and obedience in order to utilize this relational tool. It is an avenue by which children and teens who readily accept the family’s rules may disagree respectfully and be heard.

When discussing these concepts recently with our grown son Joshua (married; thirty-four), it was interesting to us to note that he said that he did not mind our rules—even if he disagreed with them. According to him, the reason he did what we wanted him to do (outside of love—see “Rules Without Relationship” next week) during any of our less-than-rational-rule-time is because no matter what rule we made, what standard we expected, or what behavior we demanded, we always listened to him.

According to him, even if we did not change the rule or expected result, we still let him talk and let him disagree with us (via the quiet question process). He noted that it didn’t matter if we followed his suggestions, just the fact that we were listening to him made all the difference in the world. According to him, we did not give him freedom to do as he pleased when he disagreed with something, but we did give him intellectual freedom–the freedom to think and to question us. That alone made Quiet Questioning in our home so important to us.

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This is funny….but you know this wise old mama of seven has to give advice to counteract:

(1) Tell, don’t ask. If you ask, expect and accept a no. You did ask, after all.

(2) Teach toddler to only say no to danger or people trying to harm him. Teach him to answer you yes after you’ve explained while making eye contact.

(3) Don’t use distractions (except for babies). Dressing is what humans do each day.

(4) Never permit any physical harm. He should never hit, bite, head butt, or harm another. (Getting rid of those behaviors is why we used cribs for a long time…toddlers who harm others should be separated for a bit.)

(5) Don’t give too many choices. “Today we are playing in the park so it’s play jeans and old tennies, but which play shirt do you want.”

(6) Don’t be afraid to explain things. That is how they learn and keep from getting frustrated. Just don’t let your explanation become a debate.

(7) Don’t let child run from you. Running is for playing. Again, use crib for runners.

I know it’s not easy…but it’s also not as hard as we make it. ?

The post How to Dress a Toddler appeared first on Character Ink.

Why not?

Can we change that to…..

These questions are often asked of us parents when we fail to give children the reason for our decisions and instruction.

While there it is true that our children should learn to obey us and trust that we have their best in mind (but again, that comes through lots of talking and letting them see that we have their best interest in mind!), we have determined four key ingredients that cause teens to rebel—Reishes’ Recipe for Rebellion.

Certainly each of the four of these “ingredients” is a reason to talk to our kids….including the first ingredient in the recipe—Rules Without Reasons.

Rules Without Reasons

Explaining reasons for our rules is an important time to talk to our kids! We have believed in giving our children the reasons for our requests and rules (as long as the children are not demanding them), mostly due to embracing Kevin Leman’s* writings, which we discovered early in our parenting. However, we did not realize the importance of our rules and requests being logical and understandable to our kids until after we began debate. Through our experience with teaching our children public speaking and debate (and through judging hundreds of competitions), we learned that not only should we give our children the reasons for our rules if possible, but that those reasons should be logical, scriptural, and understandable.

In other words, it is not enough to tell our kids yes or no and then add “because I told you so.” This goes back to the Proactive Parenting techniques that we have introduced earlier in this blog. One way to prevent problems before they begin is to explain the reasons behind your rules and requests to your children.

Many authoritarian parents do not believe that they should have to do this. After all, we are the parents and they are the children. While you would be hard pressed to find parents who require obedience and respect much more than my husband and I do, we do not buy into the “I am the parent, so the child should do it” mindset—without explanation and teaching concerning the rules we make.

Why? For a number of reasons:

1. That is not how God deals with us! His Word is a gold mine of reasons and explanations to us of why He wants us to do what He wants us to do. He is tender, long suffering, and patient with us. He does demand our obedience, but He does not say that it is “because I told you so.” Rather He says that it is “to help us grow in our faith,” “to keep weaker brethren from stumbling,” “to show that we love Him,” “to be a light to the world,” and on and on. One explanation after another; multiple cause and effect scenarios are presented.

2. It does not help our children “own” the lifestyle choices and rules we are making. You cannot own something of which you do not understand. When we tell our children to live this way or that because we are the parents and we demand it, we are not helping them to develop their own belief system in the future. In essence, we are not giving them learning hooks on which to hook old information, new information, and future information—to utilize when they need to make decisions for themselves.

3. It is aggravating for the child. Ephesians 6:4 says, “And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.” We as adults know how exasperating it is to work for someone who makes demands but does not give explanations. Our children often feel the same way with us. The Bible makes it clear that we have the potential to give our children life-giving truths (Proverbs tells us over and over to teach our kids God’s ways) or demanding, “aggravating” commands (without explanations).

So take the time to TALK…to give the reasons—especially when you are implementing a new rule, schedule, approach, or lifestyle choice for your family.

Explain it to the children thoroughly—and give them opportunities to respond (see next post!). Because avoiding the Rules Without Reasons is important enough to talk about it.

Learn more about the Recipe for Rebellion with our parenting packet here.

Recipe for Rebellion

Rules Without Reasons
Rules Without Response
Rules Without Repetition
Rules Without Relationship

Learn more about the Recipe for Rebellion with Donna’s Wondering Wednesday podcast episode here.

* Leman, Kevin. Making Children Mind Without Losing Yours. New York: Dell Publishing Company, 1987.

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The scene was the same for our three girls and Mom and Dad—time to gather in the living room with calendars in hand, ready to go over the upcoming weeks and months to be sure we have everything down on the schedule—and to be sure that we have plenty of time set aside for each other and our family. What wasn’t the same was the addition of our future son-in-law—a sweet, amazing young man who has no need for meetings, sitting for long periods of time listening to three teenage/young adult girls and their parents gab. His response to our “calendar meeting” was hilarious as he put a pillow over his head and kept coming up periodically to ask if it was almost over!

As our kids turned sixteen to eighteen (depending on gender, maturity, and where they were in their education), their involvement in outside activities increased exponentially—from doing school at home with Mom and Dad full time and spending most free time with family and close friends to college, more ministry activities, etc. It was extremely important to me and Ray that we stay close to our young adults. Calendar meetings helped make that happen.

If you have kids who are not yet teens, do not believe the falsehoods about how older teens and young adults do not need their parents. It has been our experience that they still need us greatly—but the roles change drastically. They still need our continual input in their lives—but in the role of counselor, mentor, help, and sounding board. But they still need us! And calendar meetings helped make all of that talking, time together, and counseling more of a reality in our young adults’ lives.

Calendar meetings helped us have another talk time built into our schedule. They helped our kids know that spending time talking with them was a priority to use. And they helped us be sure that we had those talk times set aside.

The post 52 Weeks of Talking To Our Kids: Calendar Meetings appeared first on Character Ink.

When our “little boys” were tweens, we wanted them to learn about/hear about sensitive things from their daddy—not from Sunday school teachers, youth leaders, movies, television, or peers! It was about that time that we instituted “daddy talks”—times in which the boys (one at a time or in pairs since they were close in age) would sit down and talk with Ray about these types of things.

We called these times “daddy talks”—and they knew that if they ever had questions or heard things, etc., they could call a “daddy talk” and Ray would be available. (Have I mentioned here or in our blog how crucial our availability for our kids really is??)

I can remember that we started going to a different church about the time one of our boys was eleven and going into sixth grade. At this particular church, there was a special class that took place for that age kids—boys went into one and girls went into another for a couple of weeks to learn about “the birds and the bees” and purity. A boy at church told Josiah that he had to go to the “sixth grade” class—that all kids at church had to if they wanted to go to Royal Rangers. Josiah puffed his chest up, marched right up to that boy, and said, “I don’t have to go to that class. I have “daddy talks”! Too cute!

Sweet stories aside, there was (and continues to be) something powerful in a young boy’s life when he has “daddy talks.” Something about those talks and that availability keep that boy from straying too far—keep his heart in check and his activities and motives pure.

When our boys know that Dad will be following up—that Dad will question them on their eyes, thoughts, and hearts—it makes a difference in how they go about their day. When someone is always there, always cares, and always questions, it makes a young boy think twice before acting, viewing, or speaking.

It also makes him feel safe and secure. These feelings, these thoughts, all of these things swirling in my heart, mind, and body—and in the outside world—are okay because Dad is going to walk me through them.

And that is what Daddy Talks is all about.

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When I had several young children, I assigned each child “a day” each week. I first got this idea when I was in teacher’s college, and it was suggested that we teachers pick a different student each day to focus on. It was recommended that we write that child’s name on the calendar for that day (to keep record of who got which day and to ensure that each child got a day) and that we try to praise, help, make more contact with, etc. that particular student on that day. This approach would keep the “non-sqeaky wheels” from getting overlooked.

I applied that to my family, assigning each child a day (Monday was Cami’s day; Tuesday was Kayla’s; Wednesday was Joshua’s; etc.). On that day, that particular child got many advantages and privileges, as well as some extra jobs.

Here are some of the perks that I instituted for the child on his day throughout the years:

(1) Special focus—I tried to praise, affirm, spend more time with, tie heart strings more, etc. for that child on that day—without the child actually knowing it!

(2) Sitting in the front seat if we went anywhere (Because we only went places one or two days a week during the day during the week when my older children were little, we had to alternate whose day it was each week because otherwise, for example, the Monday or Tuesday child would seldom get to sit in the front seat since we seldom went anywhere early in the week.)

(3) Sitting closest to Mom during morning read aloud and afternoon story time

(4) Saying the prayer during breakfast and lunch

(5) Getting to choose two stories instead of one at story time (and getting their stories read first and last)

(6) Getting to have a longer talk time (Malachi time) with Dad that night before bed

(7) Helping Mom cook dinner that day (before they could cook meals entirely by themselves)

(8) Doing an extra job from the job jar

(9) Taking a morning or afternoon “twalk” (talk and walk) with Mom

My kids loved having their special day. It meant more responsibility and work, but it also meant more heart-affecting time—and they were keenly aware of that.

Links:

52 Ways to Say “Triff!” Afrimation Cards for Families
[Podcast] Ten Tips for Staying Close During Intense Training Times
52 Weeks: The Non-Squeaky Wheel Child

The post 52 Weeks of Talking to Our Kids: “My Day” appeared first on Character Ink.

With the addition of another child every other year or so, we knew it was important to spend time with the older children. (We were taught by our early mentors to put as much time and energy into our first two kids as we possibly could, knowing that the “trickle down effect” of teaching would come into play.)

Note: This is another reason we have felt so strongly about not letting an eight month old, eighteen month old, or twenty-eight month old determine the entire family’s schedule [i.e. have a “toddler run home”]—it never felt right to let a toddler’s “wants” override a teen’s needs. Anyway, because of the advice we received to invest significantly in our older kids for the “trickle down effect” (which majorly works, I might add), we always looked for ways to spend more time with Joshua (now 29) and Kayla (now 26). One of the ways I did this was to implement “Terrific Tuesday” or “Wonderful Wednesday.”

One afternoon a week (either Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on our schedule) a different “older” child got to have Mom to himself or herself for a few hours. We tweaked our afternoon schedule (which usually involved Mom teaching/story time/lesson planning), so that right after lunch, somebody else did story time with the littles and got them to bed for their naps (one of the olders not having her “Terrific Tuesday” that day), and I gave my undivided attention to one of the other olders.

The child got to choose what we did for our afternoon together (though it couldn’t be expensive—just a few dollars at the most). I spent many a Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon at the public library, reading a chapter book aloud at Dairy Queen, playing ping pong in the basement, or challenging a tween to a Scrabble or Rummikub match. And then, of course, as the title of this series suggests, in addition to being a “terrific Tuesday,” it also became another ‘terrific time to talk.”

When kids get their parents’ undivided attention, something happens within their hearts. There is a softening that takes place that doesn’t just happen when you are gathered around the game table or watching a movie as a family. Kids (especially tweens and teens) are very astute when it comes to their parents’ priorities. Showing our kids that they are truly our priorities causes a special bond that doesn’t just happen when we only make time for their sporting events, debates, or concerts.

And yes, it was a sacrifice for me. I used to (and continue to do so today with my writing work) have to work later in the evenings and often after the kids were in bed in order to get all of the work done that is required in raising a large family and homeschooling several children. Our special times with our kids were not just “extra” time that we had waiting to be used. They took conscious efforts and sacrifices to make them happen. But now that our seven children are nearly eighteen to thirty-three, I can tell you unequivocally—it is worth it all to find as many “terrific times to talk” as you can.

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