MarriageandFamily:
The Missing Dimension
more than 1,000 adults surveyed “believes that children under the ageo 13 are being ‘superbly’ or ‘pretty well’ prepared or lie emotionally,physically, spiritually, intellectually or physically.” The study urtherreported that “ewer than one out o every twenty adults believe thatAmerica’s youngsters are receiving above average preparation in all fveo those areas o lie.”The subjective perspective o adults in the above survey is proven truewhen children enter school. Psychologist Robert Evans, who also workedas a teacher, notes in his book that “more and more children arrive atschool less ready to learn—not less intelligent; less ready to be students.Teachers in all sorts o schools ace a decline in undamentals they usedto take or granted: attendance, attention, courtesy, industry, motivation,responsibility . . .“Students are more difcult to reach and teach, their concentrationand perseverance more ragile, their language and behavior moreprovocative” (
Family Matters: How Schools Can Cope With the Crisisin Childrearing,
2004, pp. xiii-xiv).Teachers report that children today oten arrive at school seeminglyincapable o ollowing directions, o listening while someone else speaks,o sharing toys. Some can’t tolerate not being the center o attention.Many adults perceive teens as disrespectul. “In survey ater survey,two-thirds o Americans, when asked what comes to mind when theythink about teenagers, choose adjectives like
rude, irresponsible,
and
wild;
or younger children they choose
lacking discipline
and
spoiled
.Forty-one percent complain that teenagers have poor work habits; nearly90 percent eel that it is rare or youth to treat people with respect”(Evans, p. 5).As students leave school, the social problems they had there otenturn into problems or society at large. Societies are unlikely to thrive orlong in conditions where people do not have the skills to cooperate andrespectully work together.The problem, o course, is not with the children themselves. Theyare not less intelligent or less capable o learning than were children adecade or two ago. The problem lies with the
parents
who deliver theirchildren to the doorsteps o the school.According to Evans, the cause or today’s crisis in child rearing“lies at home with parents, who are suering a widespread loss o confdence and competence. Its deeper causes are economic and
cul-tural—changes in the way we work and in our national values
thatundermine the developmental mission o amilies and schools alike”(p. xi, emphasis added).
Culturalchoicesaffectingchildren
Sexual immorality and economic concerns are perhaps the twogreatest actors aecting the outcomes o child rearing in Westernnations. The results o these two actors have wreaked considerabledamage on children.As we saw in previous chapters, disobedience to God’s instructionsregarding sexual conduct has led to the destruction o many marriages.In the wake o destroyed marriages, children also suer emotionally andeconomically.The tragic consequences o poor choices and decisions are beingreaped by adults, children and our societies at large. This principleo cause and eect cannot be broken or avoided. As the proverb says,“A curse without cause shall not alight” (Proverbs 26:2). And theremost defnitely is a reason or today’s suering that is related to STDs,
Our Children: Gifts of God in a Hostile Environment
W
hile parents have the opportunity tobe the greatest infuence on theirchildren’s lives, this doesn’t always happen.Consider the ollowing:When mothers take a job outside thehome, “the time they spend in primary childcare drops rom an average o 12 hoursper week to ewer than six” (Robert Evans,
Family Matters: How Schools Can Cope with the Crisis in Childrearing,
2004, p. 72).Pediatrician Berry Brazelton says that “orparents raising young children a combinedtotal o three hours per day is the minimum”amount o time a child needs rom his or herparents (ibid., p. 78).The typical amount o time a workingparent spends with his or her young childrenis about 30 minutes per day (ibid.). A typical ather will spend less than threeminutes per day alone with a child who hasreached his or her teenage years (ibid.).On average, American youth watch 1,500hours o television per year. They spend900 hours per year in class at school andless than a hundred hours per year inone-on-one activity with a parent. Theysee 20,000 commercials per year (NormanHerr, Ph.D.,
The Sourcebook for Teaching Science: Strategies, Activities, and Internet Resources,
2001, “Television & Health”).“When our kids are exposed to the sameinfuences, without much supervision, andare generally not guided to interpret theircircumstances and opportunities in light obiblical principles, it’s no wonder that theygrow up to be just as involved in gambling,adultery, divorce, cohabitation, excessivedrinking and other unbiblical behaviors aseveryone else. What we build into a child’slie prior to the age o 13 represents themoral and spiritual oundation that denesthem as individuals and directs their choicesor the remainder o their lie” (GeorgeBarna, “Parents Describe How They RaiseTheir Children,” Feb. 28, 2005).To have more infuence on your children,look or ways to spend more time withthem. Consider eating dinner together everyevening and discussing the day’s activities.Preparing the meal and cleaning up ater-wards also provide opportunities or conver-sation. I you are going to watch television,do it together so you can verbally challengeand discuss ungodly thinking or actions.
MeasuringInfuenceonOurChildren
Leave a Comment