tales – Lion's Whiskers

Courage Book Review: Three Little Three Little Pigs

admin — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Know how you can tell this classic is about physical courage? All the huffing and puffing! Just as The Three Billy Goats Gruff had plenty of act-out-able bits, so does every version of The Three Little Pigs. Straw, wood, bricks – these are all parts of our physical experience (as opposed to tricks or puzzles, which are part of our intellectual experience). A big bad wolf who wants to eat you up is a physical risk. Physical courage may be the most easily recognized of the six types of courage, and so it is one that features in so many tales for the very young.

The Three Little Pigs have also been a mainstay of children’s book illustrator/retellers for many years, and today I offer a few words on a few notables from the Three Little Pigs’ Pen that should be readily available in libraries or stores.

Paul Galdone’s version from 1970 is a basic, friendly start. The trim size is small, making it comfortable for little hands. The story is straightforward and the illustrations are bright and dynamic. It’s perfectly satisfactory and we move briskly from one pig’s fate to the next. From 1989 we have the beloved James Marshall offering his trio of roly poly piggies, each dressed in a distinctive costume. I particularly like the pig who builds with sticks – he wears colorful, striped shorts, and his house is decorated with flags, balloons and wind chimes. The brick-building pig in this version looks like a London banker, with waistcoat and bowler hat. In this version, as in Galdone’s, the unfortunate straw-builder and stick-builder are both gobbled up. Both books end gleefully with the provident third pig gobbling up the wolf in turn.

Steven Kellogg’s 1997 version adds a subplot of a mobile waffle business that supports the pigs financially, and and enterprising mother pig who comes to the rescue at the end. Although the art and the subplot are both full of fun and interesting details, I would only share this with kids who are already well-versed in the story, for two reasons. For one thing, the subplot slows down the cadence of the main action. As you may recall from my post on The Rule of Threes, classic stories make use of triads to carry the emotional punch. It’s useful to keep that triad clear of clutter, however, so the pattern can emerge. The echoes of “Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin,” and “I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house in,” should ideally still be in the air by the time the next round comes. The second reason I feel less than enthusiastic about this version is related to the internal v. external locus of control, which Lisa has explained so well in earlier posts. Mommy pig comes to save the day – emphasizing that forces outside of the little pigs are in control. It’s so much more satisfying to have the final pig (even if he is poignantly the last pig standing) be the one to thwart the big bad wolf and deliver revenge, as in the more traditional versions. That shows the internal locus of control that we want our kids to develop for themselves.

Finally (and yes, I realize that this makes four) we have David Wiesner’s 2001 The Three Pigs, the Caldecott Medal winner for that year. It’s a brilliant tour de force of illustration and revision, but again, I would share this with older kids who are already perfectly familiar with the traditional story. You can’t even understand this book without knowing the model it subverts. This is a book to be enjoyed by a more sophisticated audience than the one that will squeal with delight and huff and puff as ferocious wolves. This is one that demonstrates qualities of intellectual courage – flexibility, creativity, and inventiveness – rather than physical courage. Enjoy the Galdone or Marshall versions of the story with your small kids, and then once they’ve gone to bed, appreciate the Wiesner book with your wordly-wise middle schooler.

Pecos Bill

admin — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

This American tall tale – or collection of tales – comes from the great tradition of brag stories from the Wild West. Decades of cowboys sitting around the campfire trying to outdo each other with exaggerated exploits gave rise to the legend of Pecos Bill. The stories were collected and put into published form in 1932 by an East Coast writer for The Century magazine. What’s fun about these stories – about all tall tales, really – is the zany bravado that takes physical courage to the extreme.

What’s that? Never heard of Pecos Bill? How he fell out of his family’s wagon while they were heading out west, and him just a little baby? Fell right into the Pecos River and nobody in the wagon was the wiser, but he got himself rescued by a bunch of coyotes and they raised him up. Once he did get grown up he ran across some human beings at last and they convinced him (it wasn’t easy) that he was a human being too, and so he decided to give cowboying a try. Beat up a rattlesnake and used it for a whip. Beat up a mountain lion and used it for a horse. Roped a whole herd of cattle and dug the Grand Canyon, and when he saw a tornado coming he roped it and rode it until it could barely whisper. That‘s who Pecos Bill was.

The benefits of humor to relieve stress and anxiety are well known. “Laughter is the best medicine,” has been true since the first human slipped on a banana peel. When taking on a challenge, especially a physical courage challenge, a handful of Pecos Bill exaggeration can well lighten the tension. Look for the wonderful version of the Pecos Bill stories written and illustrated by Steven Kellogg or the reissued 1938 Newbery Honor Book, Pecos Bill: The Greatest Cowboy of All Time by James Cloyd Bowman. I promise you your bucakroos will be inspired.

Talking Stories with Eleanor, Part 1

admin — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Last week I had coffee with my friend, Eleanor Stanton, the associate pastor at the Presbyterian- New England Congregational Church in Saratoga Springs. She talked about stories, working with teens, about being a minister, about having cancer, and about being a minister with cancer. Throughout our conversation were implicit and explicit observations about courage. This is the first of two installments of that interview.

Jennifer: So, I have some questions for you about courage and about story. Let’s start with this. If somebody came to church on Sunday, somebody new in town, and there you are, you’re wearing your collar, your robe, and you have no hair. So they may quickly make certain assumptions about both your story, and your courage –

Eleanor: I thought you were going to say, my orientation!

Jennifer: Ha! No! So whether their assumptions are correct or not, odds are that they are going to be making them. What’s your response to just the fact that that happens? That whereas somebody else may not present a whole lot of clues, for example –

Eleanor: Well, when I first came back to church [after treatment for cancer] I wore my little bald head. For a couple of reasons I needed to deal with it in the sermon and – well, now I can’t even remember what text I was preaching on that day – but somehow it was going to get around to this. And the other part of that is that I work with the teenagers all the time trying to get them to understand that who they are right now is the manifestation of God’s perfection, of life’s design. God for me is the power of life that was, is and ever shall be, whether human beings are at the top of the heap or not. So for me to put on a wig – and I’ve got one, I just can’t seem to wear it very comfortably! – seems to try to hide what is true for me and about me right now, which is that I am bald. So one side of it was trying to be true to the message that I send to the kids, and that I feel in myself, which is that it’s an act of courage to be self-revealing.

Jennifer: Yes, there’s a nakedness. You’ve got a very naked head! It’s so shiny!

Eleanor: Yes, I glow! But the other side of that was that I realized that my very appearance would kick up in people who saw me their stories about how cancer has touched them. For some of them, it would be frightening. And I don’t want to frighten them! So I talk openly about what’s going on with me, to help give extra information that the story that I bring up in you is your story, it’s not necessarily our story that’s happening right now. And I’ve also thought about this for Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve is our big night – there might be between two and three hundred people there. And there will be people there who come on Christmas Eve and they come on Easter and they’re tangential – they’re connected to our church, and they consider our church to be their church or they just want to go to a church on Christmas Eve. But they don’t know me and my story, so the bald head will be new to them.

So I’m going, “Alright, should I try to wear something on my head and make this easier for them? This has to do again with bringing up their stories. The good part for me about going through this is that my job requires me to read and preach on the scriptures, the Bible, and for me, I believe that all of them are testimonies of faith. In the United Church of Christ we’re not doctrinal, so we see the traditions of the church – the traditional stories that come to us that are not part of the Bible but they’re part of the tradition, are testimonies of faith, they’re not tests. I don’t have to affirm that I believe in the virgin birth. I do and I don’t, in that I understand what they were trying to say, that Jesus always was a unique child of God, just as I believe each of us is a unique child of God, and it is in our uniqueness that we get closest to that [God]. So [I want] to embrace what it is about us that is unique rather than trying to plaster over those things that make us different. So being close to stories that are testimonies and I believe true expressions of what the writer was trying to get across [is meaningful to me].

The Bible gives you stories where you can say, “Oh, look at that.” But only if you wrestle with them. If you engage with them. Because if you take them literally, you miss, I believe, the true meaning of the story. It’s like, you’re on the cruise ship and you see the top of the water and you believe that what you can see from the top is the complete embodiment of all that the ocean holds. But if you sink down, you see something quite different. So if you take it literally, you’re looking for an ark on some mountain in Russia. Or you think it’s “just a story” and we have this bias against story. I think it comes from “don’t tell stories,” which means lie, or “don’t carry tales,” which means gossip. Or being a tattle-tale. So there’s a negative sense there. If we say that they are “just stories” we don’t even go looking for the ark. But if you look down and you think about “what does it mean” –

Jennifer: Or “why would somebody say that?”

Eleanor: Exactly! In my experience of life, there have been times when I have just been – psssh – everything I knew just got swept away. I was just having to deal with something and I didn’t know how to deal with it. And yet something held me up. For me, something that seems to be there when my strength is failing is like the water that holds up the ark. And so I can see God’s faithfulness even when other people see – well, some of the little children say God blamed the animals and God killed the animals and that was not good, and what about the dinosaurs?! And then there’s “well, every culture has a flood story.” And they do. Even African creation stories have a flood story – so people say, “well, that’s just a memory of a flood and it doesn’t mean anything.” But no. I think that our stories, if we will engage with them, if we will be a little vulnerable to them, and let them change us, we can see how they can give us clues so we can survive and thrive.

I [am fascinated by] the Bible and specifically the Gospels – I just find Jesus of Nazareth so compelling and tricky – and you know it just blows me away trying to get a handle on him. I find him just such compelling person that it’s why I am a Christian, because I cannot look away from – as Einstein called him – “that luminous figure in our Gospels.” I consider the Gospels, the story of Jesus, the way of transformation. So if you think that the stories are “just stories” because they’ve admitted we can’t get any closer than a generation or so after his death and we know that the Gospels are faith proclamations, that they are not about reporting, they are about telling something that was true for that person – if you say, well we can’t know, then you don’t realize that it’s a way. In Mark’s Gospel, which is the earliest and simplest one, the word “way” is used – hmmm, 64 times? Jesus was always saying “follow me,” and so if you look at it that way, and you look in the story, and you use what has come to be called narrative criticism or literary criticism – instead of looking at historical criticism, saying what was the culture when the story was written, we say, let’s just look at the story as story. Where’s the action, where’s the tension, who’s the main character – if you step in that way and you actually try to live that, something transformative happens for you.

So maybe we downgrade or degrade stories as a way of distancing ourselves from the challenge of: what if you took it seriously? Gandhi, once he read the Sermon on the Mount, made it a daily discipline – and he was asked, “how do you, as a Hindu, hear the Sermon on the Mount? Blessed are the poor in spirit, how do you think you hear that differently from Christians?” and Gandhi said, “Well, I think he meant it.”

Jennifer: Yes, “it’s just a story, so therefore I don’t have to read it very carefully.” That’s an interesting point. We can dismiss it [the story].

Eleanor. But children believe stories. And in many ways I think Jesus was saying, unless you become like a child, you miss the Kingdom of Heaven. Which I think he meant is here. That when you begin to live in this transformed way, everything is different. So unless you believe and then take it in…

Jennifer: So this raises an interesting twist on my thesis. What you’re proposing is that people are actually afraid to engage with stories – is that fair to say?

Eleanor: I think that some people can be afraid if they truly look at a story, there’s part of them that’s uncomfortable – some stories can make you uncomfortable, and for some people being out of their comfort zone is a very fearful place.

Jennifer: Right. So, I’ve been promoting this idea that stories will help us develop our courage –

Eleanor: Yes.

Jennifer: You have to be able to approach the story in order for it to have an effect on you. If you can’t even approach the story then there isn’t going to be the development.

Eleanor: There’s another piece: the wonder of stories. The cardinal rule for storytellers is: don’t explain the story. This is not some fable that has a summation line, or the old way where we said, “And so, dear Reader…” We don’t do that. We don’t explain a story. But stories are tricky. Stories have their own power, even when we’re afraid of that story, to wind around our ear and stick around –

Jennifer: And get in!

Eleanor: Yes! Yes, especially if as a storyteller you give enough detail that you start moving the furniture around in somebody else’s head. So if you say “and they gathered around the kitchen table” everybody sees a kitchen table. Now, mine looks different than yours does, and as long as I don’t tie it down too specifically to being a particular kind of kitchen table, you’re at the kitchen table too. So good stories can – so there’s the power of story. And many times the storyteller’s ability is only part of the delivery system, but the story has the power to stick with you.

The story of the Lion’s Whiskers – I told that story at church at our last talent show, and I told it at a ministers’ retreat to a group of ministers because we were talking about story. And the ministers loved that story because of course it’s the Gospel story. The only way to get to the other side of this problem, or to fix it, is if I go in thinking I know what fixing it looks like, and I am transformed by trying to live the thing. The woman has to get the whisker from the live lion, and then she’s given new eyes to see that her child is like the lion, and she lives into a new reality. So the ministers have different ears and they hear yes, it’s the way.

to be continued… in the next installment we continue discussing the power of narrative to carry us through dark times

About Stories

admin — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

“The protagonist of folk tale is always, and intensely, a young person moving through ordeals into adult life. When adult state and a suitable partner is achieved the tale is over. Adults as such are of no interest – they exist only as helpers, enemies, or rivals of the protagonist. And this is why there are no wicked stepchildren in the tales. Stepmothers’ feelings and problems are of no account – they are grown-ups and can work it out for themselves.”

~ Jill Paton Walsh

Surviving the Lion AND the Fox!

admin — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

I found a very interesting story the other day that highlights moral courage in an unusual way. Animal fables typically offer the lion and the fox as examples of physical courage and intellectual courage, brawn vs. brains. Here we have a story from the very old Gypsy tradition, a story which demonstrates a different way an outcast group manages to survive. I found The Lion, the Fox, and the Bird in The Fish Bride and Other Gypsy Tales, retold by Jean Russel Larson. This is book well worth reading if you can find it. I’ll just summarize this story briefly.

In this story, a new bird arrives in a part of the forest that is home to a lion and a fox. Not being a fast flyer, the bird is warned by everyone to leave. “I’ll have to get the lion and the fox to leave,” the bird replies. “It’s really too dangerous to have them here.” While the lion and the fox are both contemplating the nice meal they’ll make of the bird, the bird turns the tables on them both by appealing for help. The bird asks the lion to perform an act of physical strength (moving some fallen trees to reveal the berry bushes) and the fox to figure out how to get reeds from the pond for building a nest (he tells the herons that the fishing will be better if they pull out the reeds). Both lion and fox are stymied by this appeal to their generosity, as they cannot eat someone they’ve helped, and they must help when someone weaker asks for assistance. Once they have taken responsibility for the bird by helping, they must do the right thing and leave it be. Hungry, and rather baffled at having chosen not to eat the bird, the lion and the fox leave that part of the forest and search for somebody else to eat.

I find this fable fascinating for its insight into the tenuous social status of the nomadic Gypsies, or Rom, as they call themselves. Always being an outsider who is greeted with suspicion means that they must get others to do the right thing themselves, rather than trick them (like a fox) or overpower them (like a lion). Next time the Rom pass this way they don’t want to find revenge or bitterness waiting for them. If instead they find people who have already chosen not to hurt them, that’s the best outcome!

Moral courage, as we have said on Lion’s Whiskers, entails discerning and doing the right thing. It speaks to the character traits of responsibility, accountability, and integrity, among others. Sometimes doing the right thing means finding a way to encourage others to do the right thing, especially when their own moral courage is on the wane. People who hold power (bosses, political leaders, corporate stakeholders, etc.) are likely to bristle when we hold them accountable for the things they are busy rationalizing or justifying; and when our children hold us accountable we may feel that bristling in ourselves. I know I do! Integrity and accountability aren’t always very comfortable in the moment, but they usually result in a better night’s sleep.

Courage Question of the Day

admin — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

“Typically, the hero of the fairy tale achieves a domestic, microcosmic triumph, and the hero of myth a world-historical, macrocosmic triumph. Whereas the former—the youngest or despised child who becomes the master of extraordinary powers—prevails over his personal oppressors, the latter brings back from his adventure the means for the regeneration of his society as a whole.”

~ Joseph Campbell: The Hero With a Thousand Faces

Reflecting on the above distinction, have you found yourself or your kids more drawn to fairy tales or to myths?

Jean Labadie’s Big Black Dog and Shivering in the Bath

admin — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Here is an old Quebecois story I ran across recently in Kevin Crossley Holland’s The Young Oxford Book of Folk Tales. It’s an easy story to tell with your own details, and it is just begging for exaggeration. This is my retelling, but you can easily put it into your own words.

So, this farmer, Jean Labadie, he had his suspicions about his neighbor, Pierre Martin. Yes, two weeks running Jean was missing chickens, and he was pretty sure Pierre was stealing them. Weasels would have left a path of destruction, but no, this was just one chicken at a time. But he could not bring himself to say, “Hey Pierre Martin are you stealing my chickens one by one?” With this on his mind he was helping Pierre Martin pull some stumps and he said, “Something has been stealing my chickens, sure, so I went to the Huron village and got me a big black dog. See him? – there he is at just over there.”

Pierre Martin squinted up his eyes to look across the field. “Where?”

“That big black dog, with his red tongue dripping, and those big black paws, you see him there?”

“Oh!” Pierre Martin went back to work.

Sure enough, no more chickens went missing from Jean’s yard. But one day he ran into Pierre Martin in town. “Hey, Jean, you should chain up your big black dog, he chased me down the road,” said Pierre.

“No, he’s at my farm guarding the chickens,” Jean replied, very surprised.

“Looked like the same dog,” Pierre said. “Big black paws, red dripping tongue. Keep him on a chain.”

A few days later, Jean again met Pierre in the town, and this time Madame Sasson was with him. “Was that your big black dog chasing my sheep?” she demanded to know. “That dog is dangerous.”

Jean Labadie raised both hands. This was getting complicated. “No, no, my dog is chained up in my yard. That is a different dog chasing your sheep.”

“No, your dog broke the chain,” Pierre Martin said. “You should take him back to the Huron village. That’s a mean dog.”

Well, for sure this was getting to be ridiculous, but the next day Jean Labadie hitched up his wagon and drove past Pierre Martin’s house, shouting, “I’m taking this dog back!” And he made a pretense of patting something down inside the wagon until he was out of sight. He spent the day with his Huron friends, and then came home.

Pierre Martin was waiting for him. “Your crazy dog came back! Chased some children and scared them right into church. You can’t keep a dangerous dog like that! You should shoot him!”

Now what could Jean Labadie do? He could not at this point admit he had made up the dog, and although he was sure Pierre Martin was raking him over the coals, he was sure stuck. “I’ll shoot him,” Jean Labadie replied. “Satisfied?”

There was a little small smile on Pierre Martin’s face when he said, “Oh, I suppose I am.”

At home, Jean Labadie got out shotgun and whistled loud. “Here you, dog!” he shouted. Then he fired into the ground, and then dug a grave and filled it back in. And he hoped that would be last he heard about his big black dog.

I don’t know about you, but usually when I’ve been afraid to ask a question, say what I think, or speak up, the problem only gets worse. I have a personal story that I’ve told many times to the Lovely K. with much laughter. This story features me in the bathtub while answering a phone call from a new business acquaintance. There was a moment at the start of the call that would have been the appropriate time to say, “This is not a good time to speak – I know it’s 11 a.m. on a business day but I was thrown from a horse this morning and now I’m soaking in the tub, so can I call you later?” That moment slipped by, and I found myself trying to avoid any splishy, splashy, watery sounds that would give me away (So unprofessional! I was very concerned at that stage of my career about seeming very very professional!) The call went on and on much longer than I expected, while the water cooled and I began to shiver. Somehow I couldn’t summon the social courage to say, “You know, all this time we’ve been talking I’ve been in the bath.” And when this editor began giving me information to write down (clearly assuming I was sitting fully dressed at a desk) I pretended to write, making suitable “mmhmms” to indicate I was ready for the next bit of dictation. My daughter howls at this last bit as I pantomime writing with a wet finger on the rim on the bathtub, nodding and shivering, wondering how I would explain this to my agent.

Now, at the age of 50, I have long since let go (I think) a majority of the social fears that kept me quiet. I don’t like shivering in the tub, and I don’t want to shoot any imaginary dogs.

Truth to Power

admin — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 00:00:00 +0000

On this blog we’ve been discussing moral courage quite a lot lately. One sign of a lack of moral courage is hypocrisy. A story the Lovely K. has enjoyed hearing is from the Jewish tradition of midrash, or tales that fill in some of the sketched outlines of Bible stories with more detail. This is one of the more famous of the traditional midrashim, Abraham the Idol Smasher.

In his youth, Abraham lived in Babylon, in Iraq, and his father was among the elite favored by the king. Abraham had the habit of turning a studious gaze on power, and he had plenty of opportunity for doing just that. His father was a prominent idol merchant, who manufactured statues of this god, that god, any god his wealthy customers asked for. “How old are you?” Abraham might ask a customer, over his father’s protests. “Sixty,” might be the reply. “Strange, how a man of sixty will bow before a stone statue carved yesterday,” Abraham would point out. (This was not so good for business!) One day, Abraham’s father reluctantly left his son to watch the store while he made an out-of-town delivery, and woman came in with an offering of grain to leave before one of the statues. “I’ll take care of it,” Abraham assured her as she left.

When she had gone, he put the grain before one of the statues. And nothing happened. Then he put it in front of a different statue, and again, nothing happened. Certainly there was no argument from the first god who’d been offered it! Abraham then picked up a hammer and methodically smashed all the statues except one, and left the hammer in front of that idol.

Upon his return, Abraham’s father was horrified to see the mess in the shop. “What in all gods’ names have you done!” he cried out to his son. “Me?” said Abraham. “This idol here did it,” he continued, pointing to the one unbroken statue. “What are you talking about, that stone has no power!” the father roared. Abraham nodded. “Exactly my point.”

My daughter laughs at this story (okay, I use funny gestures and expressions as I tell it; it’s not especially hilarious on its own). This one is always food for conversation about how often we see people say one thing but then turn around and say or do the opposite. We sometimes discuss why that might happen, and I try to keep the speculation compassionate – I don’t want either of us to become sanctimonious or self-righteous about it, after all. From people with no power, saying one thing and doing another may be a matter of survival. But it is important to know what speaking truth to power requires, and it’s always worth shining a spotlight of attention on doublespeak and hypocrisy from people in authority. I do include parents in that group, in the context of the family. Our children are always watching us, and noticing if our deeds and our words are in alignment. So I tell my daughter this story, and I ask myself privately, what idols am I paying lip service to that she may one day smash?

Courage Book Review – Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave

admin — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Imagine putting Cinderella in a blender with Hansel and Gretel, and then adding some voodoo. You will end up with something approaching Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave, a retelling by Marianna Mayer of one of Russia’s most beloved folktales. There have been many retellings of this tale over the years, most often called Vasilisa the Beautiful; sadly, not many are in print at the moment. Fortunately, this one is beautifully done, with magnificent artwork by K. Y. Craft.

First, a word about Baba Yaga, who appears in many many Russian tales. Much has been written over the years about witches and wicked stepmothers and fairy godmothers in folklore. Metaphorically splitting the “great mother” into a good/benevolent character and an evil/malevolent character simplifies things in tales and may help kids manage their conflicting feelings. Ambiguity and ambivalence tend to muddy the waters. That’s why Baba Yaga is a fascinating figure. She is almost always represented as a horrible, cannibalistic witch living in a house of human bones – but she still does good deeds from time to time, or takes righteous vengeance on behalf of the protagonist. In this book you will find all the duality of the “great mother” inhabiting Baba Yaga – a powerful, dangerous figure who commands powerful natural forces and sends Vasilisa home to her wicked stepmother and stepsisters with a reward. For this reason, this story (fairly lengthy and complex, and hard to summarize) is best suited to independent reading by older children who can manage the ambiguity. My 12-year-old daughter was fascinated by it.

What may be most memorable about Vasilisa is her little doll, given to her by her dying mother. The (secret) doll goes everywhere with Vasilisa, hidden in her apron. When given food and drink, it comes to life to give comfort, advice and aid to the sad and lonesome girl. This source of spiritual courage is easily recognized as Vasilisa’s dead mother, referred to obliquely as “my mother’s blessing” or “my mother’s love,” the source of her fortitude. Vasilisa does much more than Cinderella ever had to do to earn her triumph at the end, and keeping her composure around Baba Yaga, as well as performing the difficult chores set to test her, are part of that.

For kids looking for a good creepy scare this Halloween season, the artwork in this book will not disappoint. Full of Russian costumes, folkmotifs and intricate detail, the pictures offer much to examine – even if some inspire a hasty page-turn!

Raising a Good Citizen of the World

admin — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0000

“I’ve learned that courage and compassion are two sides of the same coin, and that every warrior, every humanitarian, every citizen is built to live with both. In fact, to win a war, to create peace, to save a life, or just to live a good life requires of us—every one of us—that we be both good and strong.”

~ Eric Greitens, Author of The Heart and The Fist: The Education of a Humanitarian, The Making of a Navy Seal (2011)

So, what’s a parent to do to help raise a good citizen in this world?
Let’s face it our kids need to be equipped to be able handle increasingly complex moral issues involving a multitude of cultures participating together in a global economy (stacked precariously on questionable foundations), with exponential population growth, and environmental concerns that don’t leave any corner of our globe unaffected. The ripple effect of our daily decisions from how treat our neighbor, to whether to vote or not, to where we spend our money, to how we deal with our garbage now send ripples farther and wider than ever before in history. Learning to solve our planet’s problems in sustainable, cooperative ways is more important than ever!

Here are Dr. Lisa’s suggestions to consider:

Nurture a strong, secure, and loving bond with your child from infancy through adolescence. Through this bond, you can become a powerful mentor for your child—especially during tough times.
Show empathy and compassion for others. Share out loud your curiosity about how others feel, think, believe, and live. Make it okay to discuss differences and notice all the similarities the human family shares.
Offer lots of opportunities through family time and socialization opportunities for your child to develop care and concern for others, their community, and the environment.
Model the values you wish your child to embrace: honesty, kindness, etc.
Define the values that matter to you as a family, notice them in your everyday life,  discuss why they are important to you? Pick a value a week, like those Lion’s Whiskers associates most with moral courage:

·         Loyalty

·         Trust

·         Honesty

·         Integrity

·         Accountability

·         Responsibility

·         Fairness

·         Impartiality

·         Justice.
Show self-discipline in creating the kind of life you wish them to emulate.
Teach goal-setting and decision-making skills.
Discuss and weigh the pros and cons associated with simple and complex moral dilemmas involving not only “right vs. wrong,” but also even more complicated “right vs. right” or “wrong vs. wrong” scenarios.
Show respect for yourself and others, especially your children.
Put the Six Types of Courage into action—let your child witness you walking your talk, taking personal responsibility, and having the courage to stand up for what you believe in.
Embrace a multicultural perspective for what is good and right in this world—you don’t have to eat, marry, or pray like others, but you can still model respect and tolerance for differences. You can venture to be curious about, seek to understand, and even embrace different cultural beliefs as appropriate.
Model what a good citizen is for your child, and work together to make your family, community, and the world-at-large a better place to live. Seek out lots of opportunities to do good and be charitable in the world together.
Pick a cause you believe in to contribute your time, money, signatures, and care to as a family.
Praise your child when they act in ways that are moral, good, and in sync with your family values.
Provide a community of like-minded friends, family members, teachers, religious and/or civic leaders for your child to learn from.
Tell stories from your own life or those of moral courage heroes you respect.
Read traditional moral tales (this is a link to Jennifer’s bookshelf) and discuss the life lessons they understand imbedded within the story. Jennifer regularly provides tales to choose from in her previous posts, too! Just click on this link to find a treasure trove of moral courage stories to share. Help them put into their own words the moral of the story, see if they can offer an example from their own life when they’ve had to “never give up,” “do the right thing,” “tell the truth,” or “be loyal to a friend”. Highlight future opportunities for them to put into practice the particular value you wish them to emulate. Narvaez, Gleason, Mitchell, and Bentley (1999) caution parents and teachers that simply reading moral stories to children does not guarantee their understanding of the core moral message. In the imagination of a five year-old, a story like The Little Engine That Could (1930), the “Little Engine” could be faced with the nonmoral theme (one highly related to courage) of simply never giving up. A nine year-old reader, on the other hand, may relate to the underlying moral lesson pertaining to importance of perseverance in order to help others. As children mature, and their prefrontal cortex continues to develop into young adulthood, they are capable of increasingly complex interpretations and better able to identify complex moral dilemmas and a story’s underlying moral message.

For more guidance about how to help your child become a responsible citizen, Navaraez (2005) helped develop this downloadable book, thanks to funding from the U.S. Department of Education and the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001.

How are you raising your child to be a good citizen? We’d love to hear your ideas, too!