Snowflakes for Sandy Hook is December 29th!

Sorry about that.  My brain is already in 2013.  Details below.

Snowflakes for Sandy Hook - December 29, 11 a.m. - Noon

So: a small but great project.  the Connecticut state PTA organization is organizing a 'winter wonderland' for students at Sandy Hook Elementary School, and have asked for donations of homemade paper snowflakes.  Raising the Village is partnering with Bija Kids (900 Fulton Street between Washington and Waverly) to host a snowflake making party!  The event will be on Saturday, December 29th from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m.  We'll supply origami paper and scissors (although feel free to bring some of your own) and some festive snacks.

While we will all be making snowflakes for the Sandy Hook students, we will not be discussing what took place there in any detail at the event.  We will say simply that some kids in their school died and they are all very sad so we are making the snowflakes to cheer them up and to show them that other kids around the country are wishing the well.  Because families have made different choices about whether to tell their kids about the event and how to do so, we ask that you keep discussion about it at a minimum on Saturday.  If you have any concerns about this part of it but want to come, let me know.

Please sent me an email if you are planning on coming  it will help with the planning.  Suggested age is 5+.

On what I'm not telling my child about the Newtown massacre, and what I might

So last week I had been planning a post for Sunday about our experience volunteering at the Masbia Soup Kitchen on Coney Island Ave., and then Friday came and with it the unbearable news that a disturbed young man armed with a semi-automatic assault rifle and two other guns had entered an elementary school in Newtown Connecticut and killed 26 people, including 20 children, six- and seven-year olds (the same age as my own child).  Like everyone else, I've spent the days since trying not exactly to make sense of this horrific event, because there is no sense, but simply to process it, to adjust to a reality where this has happened.  I've wanted to say something in the context of this blog, because it is about parenting with the purpose of engaging children in the world, and helping them understand their responsibility to others and their power to play a role in creating a better world, a stronger community.  It is also about finding ways for them to practice that role, in partnership with adults.  And here is an event that directly affects children, that cries out for all of our empathy, and our anger, and, beyond this sole instance, has brought suddenly into relief the danger that so many children face on a day to day basis from guns and violence.

But here's the challenge.  I have chosen not to tell my daughter (yet, still) anything about what happened at Newtown.  I've shielded her from the news, I've crossed my fingers that no other child at school will raise it to her, and am thankful that she has no regular exposure to the media.  If she has questions, I'll find a way to answer them, but so far she remains unaware, and for that I am thankful.  When I found myself sobbing intermittently over the weekend, I hid it from her.  I have no idea if this is the right thing to do, but it was the only thing that seemed possible to me, because I had no interest in increasing by one more the number of people traumatized by this young man's acts, because once you know this can happen, you cannot unlearn it.

A few years ago, on Martin Luther King's birthday, we went to do a service project at high school, where we got to paint a mural of Ruby Bridges.  In order to explain the significance of all of this to my daughter, why Martin Luther King was hero, and little Ruby Bridges, too, I had to introduce my then kindergartener to the concepts of racism, hatred and prejudice.  And even though it was towards a higher purpose, it felt horrible.  It was not the lesson I wanted to teach.  This is what faces us if we want to foster that broader empathy, and to engage our kids along side us in addressing injustice, hardship, need, in taking advantage of those opportunities to do good.  Knowing how to do that, and when, seems immensely difficult.  I would love to hear from those of you who have experience doing this, and what you've learned.

There are a lot of good links going around with advice on what to tell your child about what happened, and how to explain traumatic events like this one to children in ways that respond to their fears and their curiosity.  I defer to the experts on that.  But I've been thinking about what I might communicate to a seven-year old if I were going to talk to her about more than just her own safety, and her fears and her sadness.  Here are some things I might say.  The teachers and staff at Sandy Hook Elementary School were incredibly brave.  Bravery is everywhere and the capacity for bravery is in everyone, even though you may never notice it.  Sometimes, ordinary people do extraordinary things as if they were ordinary tasks, and we honor that.  We don't yet know everything about why this man committed this horrible act, but we know he must have been very disturbed in his thinking and feeling.  Most people who are sick in this way are not violent and do not harm people, and it is important that we as a community make sure that help and support is available for people who are sick and for their families.

I might also tell her that an event like this might have been prevented if it wasn't so easy to buy guns for which there is no alternative purpose but to commit acts like the one this man committed. And we need to hold our leaders accountable for what they've done and failed to do to make this impossible, and we need to raise our voices to make sure that they are brave enough to do the right thing.   I might want to move on to talk about what it means to see guns everywhere in our weaponized culture and what that does to our ideas of bravery and power, and I would want to situate this issue in a larger discussion about other ways we fail all of our children, but I might just stop there, for now.  Because a seven-year old needs to discover the world and its vast imperfections (as well as its glories) by degrees.

What are you telling your kids, and how are you engaging them in your own responses? 

Things to do this weekend and beyond 12/14....

Well, with Hanukkah in full swing and Christmas around the corner, it can feel like there's not much time on hand to squeeze in community activities, but it seems important to me to keep the needs of others and the challenges in the world all around us present in the midst of our celebrations (without being the dour doomsayer in a room full of carolers).  Going to set an example by not prattling on about that but providing (I hope) some opportunities for this coming week.

• Sunday, we're going to volunteer to help with food preparation at the Masbia Soup Kitchen on Coney Island Ave., in an event organized by the social action committee at the Hannah Senesh Community Day School.  There is still room for more volunteers - if you're interested, send an email here.  I will post about the experience afterwards and get a sense of how well this works with kids.
• As I mentioned last week, Occupy Sandy is organizing a day of action on Saturday, with community rallies in the Rockaways and Staten Island at noon, and a citywide convergence on the Mayor's house on the Upper East Side at 5 (bring flashlights!).  You can get details here.  As with many Occupy events, you have to be a bit tolerant of some vagueness around the edges of the message, but the events themselves seem clearly defined.
• Last week I posted about an effort by queensmamas.com, called Family-to-Family which is looking to connect volunteer families with individual families in need, to provide support, help connect them with resources in the community and generally make the holidays a little easier, with the larger aim of bringing families from different parts of the city closer together.  If this is something you think your family might like to do, check out the information on the website - you can do as much as you're able, and it's a way of volunteering as a family that's very personal (which also may be why it scares some folks off, but different approaches appeal to different folks so....).
• If your time is limited and can't get somewhere to volunteer right now, New York Cares has started a Winter Wishes project which allows you to purchase items from Amazon in answer to wish registries for lots of different social service agencies serving kids, seniors and others.  What I like about this is that the range of options is large and for those of us with kids who still believe in Santa and don't understand why we need to buy gifts for other children ("Doesn't Santa bring them?"), buying lamps and canes and gift cards are easier to explain.  While it's not as active as going and doing something, having the kids help pick out gifts is a nice indoor, cold weather activity.
• On Saturday, there appears to be a work project at Added Value farm in Red Hook from 1 to 4pm.  It's not up on their calendar but there is sign up for it through New York Cares here.

Not a volunteer activity but a different kind of opportunity: Disney Friends for Change Grants are $1000 grants to kids ages 5 to 18 to support youth projects to help meet the needs of others.  Proposals are due February 10th.  If the child applying is under 13, an adult has to submit the application.

 Got any other ideas?  Share 'em!

"Opportunities to Do Good"

A friend called my attention today to an article by Dr. Perri Klass, a pediatrician, in the New York Times' Well column, called Understanding How Children Develop Empathy.  You can find it here.  The column looks at what we know about "how and why we become our better selves," noting that "the capacity to notice the distress of others, and to be moved by it, can be a critical component of what is caused prosocial behavior, actions that benefit others: individuals, groups, or society as a whole."   Empathy, in other words, can be that first step in developing a greater sense of responsibility for the world around you, and, we can hope, the habit of acting on that responsibility - volunteering, sharing what you have with those who have less, voting, signing petitions, starting social movements, etc. etc. etc.

So how do you foster empathy and prosocial behavior?  There are, according to the article, a couple of different theories (and some underlying science) about why people develop the capacity to feel for others, and the desire to help them.  The first is that it feels good to help others, and that we develop habits of charity for the same reasons we may develop other habits, that there is some "neurological reward" triggered that serves as motivation.  The second is that we develop social cognition, a recognition that other people have needs and goals.  The two theories are not mutually exclusive.  Taking this into consideration, the article suggests that we can foster this behavior in children in a few ways.  Parental modeling is important, always.  So is taking the time to explain how other people may feel as the result of another's behavior (e.g. "How do you think he felt when you took the toy?).  The author, and the experts she cites, also suggest that you don't provide actual, material rewards for prosocial behavior, but provide "opportunities to do good - opportunities that the child will see as voluntary."

Opportunities to do good are everywhere, and one of the things I found helpful about this piece is that it reminded me that the smaller, individual opportunities can be as important as the grand ones in terms of the development of a child's sense of connection to the world and her role in it.  If compassion and caring may be habit-forming, then there are many ways to develop that habit.  One of the reasons for starting Raising the Village was the conversations I had with other parents about how difficult it was to engage in volunteering and other community work with kids, because of time constraints, planning challenges, and lack of easy access to activities that permit and welcome children.  I'm hoping we can continue to create and share those larger opportunities to involve kids in the work of our communities. 

But even when those larger opportunities aren't around, or life gets in the way, we do well not to forget or forego the little habits of compassion.  In my house, we've had a lot of commitments lately, and seasonal viruses and, well, the recurring elementary school plague of head lice, so finding the time to practice a bit of meaningful civic engagement has been challenging.  But this evening, we spent the time before dinner writing thank you notes for gifts my daughter received for her birthday.  A slow process with a seven-year old, but it proved to be surprisingly enjoyable for both of us, as we thought about what she could say (and spell) that would communicate to others how much she appreciated each particular gift.  It's a bit ironic, I realize, to bring this up, since my very first post for this blog was entitled "Beyond Please and Thank You."  Still, it helps to remember that a please or thank you, or a chance to set the table or write up the grocery list can be an opportunity to do good.  

So, what opportunities have you've found?  What's worked well, and what hasn't?

Things to do, Weekend 12/7 and beyond

Oy, how quickly the weekend roles around again. There are some good opportunities coming up - as always, if you've got something to share, let me know.

For the upcoming holidays:

• Queensmamas.com is organizing a Family-to-Family program, matching a family in need (with a focus on those affected by the Hurricane) with a volunteer family that can help make this holiday season a better one, with the idea, too, that this will forge a more lasting bond between the families.  Queensmamas.com will provide support for the volunteer families in terms of identifying services and resources.  I love this idea, because it's a way to get to volunteer as a family without just sending money or wrapping a present anonymously.  Still, it may feel like a big lift for some.  The registration form, though, allows you indicate what days and how many days you're able to help.

• On Saturday and Sunday (Dec. 8 -9), the New York Food Bank will be in Bushwick (address available when you register) wrapping gifts to be donated.  You do have to register as a volunteer to sign up (but what a good idea), and they indicate that the minimum age is 14, but I expect there is wiggle room there, since kids can be great at helping to wrap gifts.  Check in advance. 

• Where to Turn is organizing a toy 'store' for Sandy victims in Staten Island, and is looking for volunteers to staff the store (and also looking for toys, btw), which will be at 3948 Amboy Rd. in Great Kills.  Where to Turn is an organization formed after the 9/11 attacks to help affected families on Staten Island, and have become a general crisis relief organization.

In addition, Occupy Sandy still needs volunteers for cooking and food distribution.  The kitchen is at 461 99th St. in Bay Ridge, at St. John's Episcopal Church.  They need volunteers from 9 to 5, generally.  The main volunteer clearinghouse and launch site is at 520 Clinton Ave.  There is a great list of locations for donation drop off and volunteering here.

By the way, I'm interested in this organization, Kids Helping Kids, and it's approach to kids and social action.  If anyone has any direct experience with them, can you let me know?  Thanks.

And please, please, please, take a minute to fill out the activity survey here.  You don't have to put your name down, it does not obligate you in any way.  Just trying to find out how this site can be most useful.

How do we Raise the Village - Take the Survey!!

This site has been up for about three weeks, and has mostly served as a bulletin board for ideas and for news of upcoming volunteering or social action activities.  It's been great to see all of the traffic here and on the RtV Facebook page ("like" us if you haven't yet!).  I've had a lot of ideas and some suggestions about where to take this project, and I'm thinking about what to do next.  So, it seemed to make sense to poll folks and see what they'd most appreciate.

Please help us all out by taking the survey here.  It won't take you long, I promise.  If there are others you know who haven't seen the site or the Facebook page but might be interested in this project, please asked them to fill it out as well.

Thanks!

Nancy

P.S.  Did I say you should take the survey?  You should, really.

Can Kids Speak Truth to Power?

On October 15, Occupy Sandy is planning a day of action to highlight continuing pressing needs more than a month post-hurricane and the need to pay attention to who is directing, benefiting from, and participating in the rebuilding and recovery process.  This has gotten me thinking about kids and political action, particularly activities like demonstrations, rallies and direct action protests.  Anyone who has ever parented or spent oh, say, an hour with a toddler knows that children have a remarkably instinctual understanding of civil disobedience and direct action.  Indeed, I once comforted myself as I struggled with a child gone totally limp on the floor of a place she did not want to leave with the thought that somewhere in her brain she was actually singing "We shall not, we shall not be moved, we shall not, we shall not be moved, like a tree standing by the water, we shall not be moved."   As someone who has been hauled off by the cops on a few occasions for these types of activities back in the day, I was impressed.

Still, thinking about engaging kids in demonstrations and rallies about larger issues than whether the hat stays on the head or not raises a lot of questions.  It's one thing to cart the stroller with you to a demonstration or march when your child is too small to understand, as I did a bunch of times when my daughter was little.  It's like bring the baby into the voting booth, it matters a tiny bit to them, a lot more to us.  There's also using the little one in a state of nature as part of the protest, like the Great Nurse-In, or in a favorite story of mine, retold in one of Studs Terkel's oral histories, about how a group of mothers in Chicago got a meeting with a high official who was ignoring them by bringing their children into his outer office, giving them candy apples, and letting them loose.  I guess one might have ethical issues with this tactic, but I think it's genius.

 Once they're older and ask questions, though, how do you engage them authentically around issues that may be fairly complex, as most are?  (If you think this isn't controversial, by the way, check out the vitriol in the Amazon comments section around this book, That's Not Fair! A Teacher's Guide to Activism with Young Children, and see what flips your stomach does when you look at this coloring book).   Last year, we went to an Occupy Wall Street event, and then went to a protest about the millionaire's tax and public education funding in front of Governor Cuomo's Manhattan office.  On the one hand, this was an issue, funding for public education, that is directly relevant to younger, school-aged kids and that they at various levels, can get.  Still, try explaining graduated taxation to a six-year old.  Also, what a governor is.  And a millionaire.  I did try, and she carried a sign and chanted and made me proud, and perhaps a little uneasy.

In this spirit, I've been doing some digging on resources for parents who are thinking about this - if you've got 'em, share 'em.  I like this article, from the website Compassionate Kids, which provides some practical nuts and bolts advice on activism with kids, starting with "Park legally" (there's also a good piece on volunteering with kids here).  Also found this list of issue-oriented activities for kids on a home-schooling site - there are a number of resources for this broader category of social action, particularly for middle school to high school age youth, fewer on the demonstrative side and fewer for younger kids.  Here and here are a few stories about other parents and activism.  Looking for more.....

In the mean time, what do you think?