Have a New Kid by Friday - Dr Kevin Leman [70]
One last note: do not allow children to have a TV in their bedroom. TVs should be in a central room in the house, where anyone walking by can see what is on the screen. Putting a TV in a child’s bedroom, especially if you have cable service in your home, is just asking for trouble. Would you ever allow your child to walk down the sleaziest street in your local city? Then why allow your child access to all the sleaze that comes through cable and late-night television? You have a responsibility to protect your child’s mind.
Musical Influences
We all have our likes and dislikes when it comes to music. Chances are good that you don’t like your child’s music. (Hey, did your parents like what you listened to? Does your child like listening to the Eagles or U2? Point made.) But do you really gain anything by putting yourself in direct opposition to your child over music? Your child’s musical tastes will change rapidly. The group you can’t stand that’s hot now will, within 6 months, most likely be pushed aside in her repertoire for the next popular group (which you probably won’t like either).
You don’t have to like your child’s music. But you can always find something good about it—you might as well, since you’ll be surrounded by it, especially during your child’s teenage years.
“Great beat.”
“What’s the name of that song?”
“Who’s performing that?”
At age 15, my daughter Lauren can fly like a mad woodpecker from one radio station to another in the car. “Oh,” she coos, “I love that song. It’s my favorite song,” and then we’re flipping through four more stations to find her other favorites.
Why not have fun with your child’s music? Get to know her world?
But there’s also a place to draw the line, and that’s at the lyrics. Some lyrics are downright repulsive, vicious, and demeaning to ethnicities, men, and women. If your child is listening to such lyrics, it’s time to throw up the red flag. “Honey, let’s stop a minute. I want to hear those lyrics better. Would you mind turning that up? Do you hear what they’re saying? Do you agree with that?” Eminem comes to mind, with his violent lyrics about a young man dreaming about slashing his father’s throat. What parent in his right mind wants his child to go to sleep with that image in her brain? There’s no way you should pay money for that CD or allow your child to listen to it.
You may not like the music, but it’s the lyrics that count. So listen carefully.
Music Lessons
“My daughter was so sure she wanted to play the clarinet. So we bought her a clarinet for sixth grade band. Then, about 2 weeks into it, when all we’d heard were squawks, she stopped practicing.
She said she didn’t want to play the clarinet anymore. And we’d spent all that money. . . .”
“Rob is 12. He plays the piano beautifully and has played for 6 years. But lately his practicing has been in a slump. When I asked him about it, he said, ‘Mom, it’s not cool to play the piano anymore.’ But I hate to see all his talent go to waste. How can I encourage him to keep it up?”
Any music lesson has to be contracted in minimum bites of a semester. In other words, it’s not fair for your child to say she wants to try something, then quit 2 weeks into it when things aren’t as easy as they seem. Every music teacher I’ve talked to says you need at least 4 to 6 months to begin to understand an instrument (and for it to not sound like something from a horror movie). But today’s instant-breakfast, microwave kids want things to happen quickly and automatically. They get discouraged when they don’t (and, you have to admit, so do you).
But if you want