What’s That They’re Saying?
ICYC, your kids speak a different language. As if you did not know. I talk to parents all the time, they check the facebook, the myspace, and the text messages of their kids. “Nothing to worry about,” they tell me, “The kids just text back and forth, just letters really. No one can spell these days.”
Your kids can arrange – well- many things via texting and whatnot.
If you are curious, these sites can provide insight into some of the slang and text abbreviations your children may be familiar with. Or they may be helpful if your friends have a very bright young child and you are trying to communicate but it is too late for spelling over her head. Granted, seeing two grown adults with child saying things like “I wanted to tell my DH- GYHOOOYA” might be alarming to some people, but it is an option.
Not all of the sites have clean language (that’s why they needed to be translated in the first place):
1. Netlingo
2. Internet Acronyms Dictionary
4 . Urban Dictionary
Teaching Gratitude
I often hear parents – in public, at schools, in conversation, and in my office – tell me that children aren’t grateful anymore. I know- probably every generation of parents have said something similar. But when a 15 year old is wearing designer sweats and carrying a purse that costs my paycheck, one listens a little differently.
Parents usually want to raise children who are thankful for what they have, who are grateful for the opportunities, materials and gifts they are given.Parents also want to give their child a better life than what they grew up with, to see their children happy, and to prevent their child from suffering.These do not seem like poor desires for a parent. However, in a society where we have so much, it often goes a bit awry.
The conversation goes like this:
Parent: I just bought you that game system for $300 – your tennis shoes cost $100. When I was younger I had to work for anything extra I wanted. I wish you were happy with what you had, but you just want to “get.”
Child: But everyone has a cell phone and an mp3 player too (errr, and most of the 6th grade class does in case you have noticed). I just want what everyone else has.
Parent: You can’t have everything you want, you don’t understand the value of money.
****And it is true. Children are running around with some very expensive toys these days. They also have a great deal of homework. I talk to 11 and 12 year olds who have 2 hours of homework a night, plus a sport like soccer or softball. With school being 6 hours, plus homework, they are already “working” an 8 hour day. With scheduled sports etc, their day can be 10-11 hours long with no down time, no family meals, and time only to bathe, eat and sleep.
When I was growing up in the 70′s and 80′s I had no homework until the 5th grade, could finish it all with plenty of time to play until the sun went down, and could bike or walk around the city as long as I was in by dark and with a friend. I could walk home from school in the 3rd grade. Now, it would not be good parenting to let a kid walk home that young, and it is not safe to let a child out of line-of-site adult supervision in many neighborhoods. So, we have over-scheduled children, and children who are supervised constantly.
The price to this is that children play indoors more, are not forced to handle their own conflicts, do not learn to play independently, and do not learn that they can do things by themselves, like buy things at the store, learn directions, and solve peer conflicts.Children in affluent families may have a lot of toys, and then may also feel unable to do things on their own, and never have experienced conflict or independence in the ways of prior generations.
Children learn to be thankful when they have been given the love and attention that they need and also have learned to “want” and work for the extras.I am not sure that giving a child all of what they want (as opposed to need) will raise a grateful child.
All too often I hear parents say they want to make their child happy – and they mean happy right, now, in the moment as opposed to content, joyful, and responsible- able to generate their own happiness.Giving a child more things will not actually make them happy. It will make them unhappy, dependent and frightened to be on their own.
Spending time with your child, listening to them, teaching them to work for extras, and also helping them learn vicariously what it is to ‘want’ through volunteering can also help. Link here to a list of Volunteer opportunities for kids and teens that my colleague and I have been collecting. Also, these two books discuss this topic more in depth.
College Scholarships
Financing college is tricky business. Federal grants and aid are often based on parents’ income even for young adult children. Most dual income households will not qualify, even though college costs are expensive. However, hundreds of thousands of dollars in scholarship and grant monies go unused every year. Private scholarships and grants are available to people of all ages from high school through graduate school. If you come from a particular cultural background or have a specific life experience like having been adopted or survived cancer, there are also scholarships available for you that are non-need-based.
Some of the scholarships are specific to time of years and ages, thus require some personal information. However, I am always hesitant about giving this over the computer about minors. When I have helped foster kids look for scholarships I have simply used my name and birth date for the search with my business address. The website searches for appropriate scholarships, and the student may then fill out the application as him or her self.
Since there are thousands of scholarships out there, one will get them. I strongly suggest setting up an e-mail address for this purpose.
Preparing for College
- Crime statistics -Search by state and campus.
- ACT-ACT test site
- SAT-College Boards
Financing College
- Studentaid.gov government site about aid, grants, and loans
- Finaid information about different options to finance college
- Sallie Mae
FAFSA
Scholarship Search Engines
Study Abroad
- NAFSA: International Association of Educators
Scholarships for study abroad programs - Go Abroad Search engine for study abroad programs by country and area of study.
Specific Scholarships
- Dell Scholar
- KFC scholar
- Rhodes scholar
- David & Dovetta Wilson Scholarship
- Scholarship America
- Gates Millenium Scholarship
Once in College
- Course Reviews -Rate your professor – seems well, harsh, but it exists…
- Rate My Professors
Public or Private?
I was running errands this morning – out of the area- I might add, and I got the opportunity to overhear some moms discussing the educational opportunities for their children. They were strangers to each other and to me, grocery store line kind of conversation, the kind where several women just start chatting.
The pros and cons of public verses private schools was the topic. Which schools fed into which high schools and how to determine which private schools had the highest AP scores for college admissions. It was a very intense discussion. These moms clearly wanted to give their children the best possible start in life and had researched these issues very carefully- where they were going to live, what activities their children participated in even hiring educational consultants.
And then one of them mentioned their child’s age – 5. And then they all mentioned their kids ages- the oldest one was in the 4th grade. I almost said something. I am not sure what, but something.
I certainly have seen my fair share of kids in the practice from public and private schools whose parents have gone to as much effort at choosing schools as these moms had. Some of these kids have done very very well and others not so much. With homework often lasting 2 hours even for children in the 3rd or 4th grade, kids have completed an 8 hour work day just with school and homework when they are 9 and 10 years old. Not to mention the soccer, dance, and music.
Since it is no longer safe in most neighborhoods to let younger kids play unsupervised, I often see kids at 11/12/13 who really have never spent a moment of playtime without parental supervision. On one hand, this is good, kids need to be supervised in todays world. On the other hand, when I was 12 my friend babysat her 3 younger brothers and we figured out what peaceful, non-litigious conflict resolution was sans parental involvement (because if a grown-up had to solve it, it was not going our way). Now- we have public schools where children are not allowed to compete or keep score during kickball (there are no winners and losers) but then play highly competitive, expensive “club sports” after school. go figure.
It might have been easier to listen to this conversation, I suppose, if someone had mentioned what their child liked or did not like, or their child’s own natural pace of doing things. In wanting to give children the best life has to offer, I wonder if we have overlooked some of what childhood offers.