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*** Monthly Feature Column ***
Positively Speaking
Building Assets in your Kids
December 2006 – Asset #9
Service To Others
by Kelly Curtis.
‘Tis the season of giving, and although we often focus on the material aspect of it, there are many ways to involve the whole family in an important asset: service to others.
Search Institute has identified “service to others” as one of the 40 Developmental Assets, which means research shows it’s a characteristic of healthy, caring, resilient kids. The more assets youth have, the more likely they’ll resist risky behaviors in the future.
Search defines service to others as: “The child has opportunities to perform simple but meaningful and caring actions for others.”
This past week, my kids and I went shopping for our local food shelf. But there are many ways to serve without spending a cent. Chilihead, at Don’t Try This at Home wrote a perfect example of this — her kids raked their neighbor’s leaves without any adult guidance.
MVParents is a resource for parents looking to develop assets in their families. The Saturday before Thanksgiving was National Family Volunteer Day and in its newsletter, MVParents listed many suggestions for families to get involved with service. Here are a few of the ideas they shared for each age level of children:
For parents with children ages birth to 5:
- Coordinate a food drive and deliver the goods together.
- Treat an elderly friend, relative or neighbor to lunch.
- Make and send cards to hospitalized children or nursing home residents.
For parents with children ages 6-9:
- Provide foster care for a pet through an animal shelter.
- Organize a neighborhood closet-cleaning day. Deliver everything you collect to a shelter.
For parents with children ages 10-15:
- Participate in cleaning up a park.
- Become a mentor family to a young person through a mentoring organization.
- Volunteer at a library to lead a story hour for kids.
For parents with children ages 16-18
- Volunteer with a local organization that helps adults learn to read.
- Organize or participate together in a fundraiser such as a walk or run.
Perhaps we can help each other with our collective experience. This month’s “comment brainstorm” is to share ideas for serving others. This might be a volunteer opportunity in which your family has participated, or something you’ve seen others do. The activity can be little or large.
Thanks for joining us to build assets in your kids! I look forward to seeing you again next month for Positively Speaking.
by Kelly Curtis
Pass the Torch
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Local Girl says
What great ideas. I always talk to my daughter about charitable events but it would mean so much more to have her participate!
KellyC says
Kathy — Thank you so much for sharing these excellent ideas!
Kathy Pitt says
I think giving service at this time year, reflects on WHO we really celebrate Christmas for. We are serving Him, when we serve others. Our family does secret santa drops of goodies on peoples front steps, we invite those with out families to share our Christmas Dinner, and this year we are going to help serve lunch to others in need. We don’t have much ourselves, but I want my children to give to others and expect less themselves, to feel the true spirit of giving of themselves.
Kelly says
mcewen – I went to your site and it looks like you’re doing a fine job of building assets.
Great work — and service — comes in many forms.
Best wishes to you as well!
mcewen says
These are all great positive ideas, however I think our sites are a little lower for the time being. Thanks for keeping me up with what people in the real world are doing.
Best wishes
KellyC says
I love those examples, Red Dirt Mummy! Thank you for joining in on the discussion and sharing your experience.
Red Dirt Mummy says
A great column, Kelly. I try to involve the kids (well the older one at the moment, the little one is only 15 months!) in this kind of service to others. Example: a friend has just returned home from hospital so we took a meal and some cookies around on Friday. Offspring #1 was involved in the baking and knew they were for our friend. When Daddy came home from work Offspring #1 flew out to tell him all about our cooking and delivery adventures and was able to explain why we had cooked up a storm.
At Christmas one of the stores has a ‘wishing tree’ where you can place gifts for needy children. We have always bought a gift for a child the same age as Offspring #1 and now for Offspring #2. Last year was #1’s first time choosing ‘his’ gift and we explained what/who it was for and he chose a lovely gift, helped wrap it and put it under the tree at the store. He told his grandparents all about it and took a great deal of delight in knowing that he was giving a gift to someone whose Mummy and Daddy didn’t have enough money to buy any.
Kelly says
You bring up an excellent point, Susan. Although I think volunteering at a soup kitchen is fantastic, and some communities would be serving people experiencing less severe cases of poverty, I do think it’s important to scope out the service before committing to it.
My kids have rarely witnessed extreme poverty, but we talk about it a lot. And when we visit the big city, and see homeless people on the street, or with signs, we talk about it. But this way we discuss it without having to directly interact.
On the other hand, there are numerous high-impact activities that older kids can absolutely benefit from. And a teenager’s shock may be no less than that of a six-year-old, but they’re better able to process what they’re seeing.
Great discussion.
Susan says
I love that Search defined these 40 assets and that you’re sharing them with us. It is so great to have these parenting suggestions set out like this.
And I agree with Pamela, we should all work on having an overall attitude of wanting to provide ‘Service To Others’ and looking for opportunities.
But… In my case… I have a rather odd memory of a time when my parents involved us kids in serving others.
I was about 6 years old, (Carolyn was 12, David was 10, and Janice and I were 6) and my parents brought us all down to the local mission to help serve Thanksgiving Dinner.
But it really upset me… in fact, it kind of scarred me for years. I was an ultra sensitive kid and I’ve always been almost too empathetic and completely overloaded with fear for everything. So when I saw all of these people who had nothing, lived on the streets and looked so unhealthy and unclean it literally broke my little heart and made me so afraid that it could happen to me or my family. For years I remembered faces of the men and women I saw there. And I felt so sad for them and so scared that not much separated me and my family from a fate like theirs.
As I grew older, I understood the situation better and I think I’m still glad that I had that experience… although for me, it probably would have been better to have waited a couple of years.
In my twenties, I actually did quite a lot of volunteering in soup kitchens and handing out food on the streets. I still feel very sad for folks that have ended up on the streets… especially the teens… but really everyone. I can never forget that they are no different than I am… they just had a very different set of life circumstances handed to them.
So, I’m curious Kelly… what do you think about what age we should expose kids to the extreme poverty and sadness around us? Have you ever heard of kids like me becoming so upset from seeing such things? Do you think it was still a good thing that I served at the mission at 6 even though it upset me?
Kelly says
Excellent point, Pamela!!
Pamela says
We should apply this to our ADULT lives as well. It’s never too late to learn, I hope.