As we take on this new reality of doing school from home, Jeff and I believe a path to finding more joy and less frustration as a parent is to become more Socratic with our children.
As promised in my last post which described what it means to be Socratic and the five steps to getting there, I’ll break down each of the steps individually over the next few days.
Step One: Get clear on your “WHY?” as a parent.
This step has three underlying questions:
- What do I want for my child? Answering this question is harder than it seems. I was able to get to my own answer by imagining I would die tomorrow and have one last chance to give my children a message about their learning/work. Would my message be: Get good grades, get into college and get a good job; or, Discover your inner gifts and use them to help others for this is where joy lies; or, Don’t worry, be happy; or, something else?
- With the answer to question #1 in mind, what do I want to be as a parent? This brief description of four parenting styles may help you decide.
- What do we want to be together as a family? This steps requires taking time to talk about what it means to be a family, even create a mission statement as well as decide on a few goals for your life together. The Acton Academy families write family plans based on the simple process outlined in Patrick Lencioni’s book, “The 3 Big Questions for A Frantic Family.” It’s a great read!
We hope by pondering these questions, your life begins to feel more like an adventure and less like a stress-filled hodgepodge.
Tomorrow, I’ll dig into what it means to “Set the Contract.”
