Parents: Follow Your Heart!

Selene wrote our first entry on chapter 14, and she's
pictured here with her sister and her niece. She and her sister
have helped care for her niece each summer, so feel very
close to her. Selene said that, now that she lives far from
her niece, she often calls her, and her niece always asks
when she is going to "sleep over."

Baby talk, cuddling, and picking up a crying baby might seem like ordinary things one does and doesn’t really pay much attention to, but can you imagine what a baby would say about those things?  If babies could talk to their parents they could be telling them that baby talking to them is helping them with their language development, that cuddling with them is showing that parents will always be there for the child no matter what, and that by picking them up when they are crying that they are being listened to.  Parents are a big influence in a child’s life and the bond they form in the early years will either help or hurt the child as they grow up.  As Gordon puts it, “A child’s passage from helpless newborn to confident adult is profoundly influenced by his parents, who are his first love and his first and most powerful teachers” (p. 217). 

What chapter 14 of Roots of Empathy is trying to show is that the home is where children become who they are.  The more love and engagement parents show towards their child, the better they will do socially and emotionally.  This relationship is also beneficial when it comes to the school setting.  The nurture a child gets at home will set him up for learning at school, and the more nurture, the better.  For example, if a child gets to read with parents at home, it is more likely that he will have more confidence and love for learning because that is what was modeled at home.  The same goes for language, in that the earlier and more often the parents talk to their child, the better it will be when it comes to school because the child has been exposed to it already and has an idea of sounds and words.  When it comes to developing empathy, parents play a big role in this as well, and the more warm and responsive they are towards their children, the more self-confident, empathic, and socially competent their children will be.  The school will build from the foundation set at home and help develop a child that will be a caring and capable person, adult, and parent. 

I believe that my parents set us, my brother, sister, and me, up with an overall good foundation as we grew up.  Pictures show how my brother cared for me when I was a baby, and then when my sister was born, how we both cared for her.  This wouldn’t have been possible without the help of both our father and mother showing those caring characteristics to us to pass on.  From what I’ve been told, both my parents were always aware of our emotions and tried to figure us out.  There were a lot of hugging and bonding moments at our home and when we went out.  I have to say that the simplest things were the best for me because it was time that I got to spend with my parents.  We didn’t have money to go out to amusement parks or anything of that nature; instead, we would enjoy being in our backyard playing games or going to the park and playing on the playground.  As we got ready to go into school, my parents did their part and we started learning things at home.  They would buy books for us to read with them and when we got into school, they would help us and encourage us to do our best.

I remember my first day of kindergarten and how I didn’t cry when my mom left because I knew she was going to come back.  That was not the case for a couple of kids that started crying when their parents were leaving.  I remember feeling bad for the kids because they were crying.  I also remember when I was in first grade how eager I was to read because of what my parents were doing at home.  I never felt like I didn’t know how to do anything.  The same was true when I was learning how to count to big numbers; I found it so fascinating when I was learning and I just wanted to learn more.

Unfortunately this is not the case for many children whose parents aren’t as nurturing and caring, but with this Roots of Empathy program, hopefully that won’t be the case for kids anymore.  The overall goal that the program wants to meet is that they want to make sure that if a child is being neglected at home and not getting the warm, responsive, loving relationship with the parent, then the child has the option of experiencing a working model of it in the school setting.  Everyone has the responsibility to make sure that all children have a safe and healthy environment to grow in in order for them to blossom into confident adults.  Parents need to stop worrying about what the “experts” say and follow their hearts in deciding what is right or wrong with their child because who knows a child better than their own parents.  I believe that this program is something great that should be offered at more schools so everyone can have that opportunity.  Nonetheless, parents should still do their part and develop that bond with their children that will benefit them as they get older. “What children carry in their hearts is not events but relationships. It is the giving of ourselves that matters” (Gordon, p. 210), so we should give it our all!