Category: Love Learning

An Enlightening Response to ‘Are You Afraid to Read Hard Books?’

On March 3, 2024, I published an article titled Are You Afraid to Read Hard Books?  While preparing today’s article I reread it and thought, “How did you write this.” Go ahead and laugh. It happens all the time. But when you feel passionate about something, thoughts and words come. It is an amazing thing.

This is one reason I encourage people to journal. I have reread things in my journal that blew my mind. Not only because they may have been well written, but the things that have happened in my life have been astonishing, when looked at later. But I digress. LOL

After that article was published, I got a wonderful email from one of my readers, who is also a dear friend. We have counseled together in the past and I appreciate her so much.

I get emails regularly telling me how good an article was or how helpful it was to the reader. This email contained some of that. What struck me though was another thing that happens now and then. Someone takes what I have written, and they build upon it! This is massively motivating for me.

I asked Joy if I could share her thoughts with you because what she has done with family reading is magnificent. I think that some of you will want to follow suit, in some fashion.

I have written several articles on the value of family reading. I read to my children, but I lacked consistency back then. Nevertheless, one of my adult daughters said one of her fondest memories was of me reading to our family.

What I love about Joy’s take on family reading, it encourages everyone to read, not just listen.

Here is her email:

Mary Ann, thanks for emphasizing the importance and power of communicating with others about what you’re reading. We discuss this all the time in Leadership Education circles–the importance of discussion and good mentoring for great literature, like the kind you were talking about. This is demonstrated in your examples of how discussing those books with other people changed your experience.

Another great way to gain more from what we read is to process it through writing. (You demonstrate this principle very well too!) As you mentioned, we can write notes and underline in our books, but we can also journal and write essays or blog posts that we can share with others. It’s another way of processing and internalizing the principles and lessons we learn in the books we read. This tool applies to reading scriptures as well. When we process and record our thoughts, questions, and insights through writing, we learn more and internalize and remember it better!

Audrey Rindlisbacher has a great podcast about the power of book clubs,  or discussion groups, like the one Benjamin Franklin organized. I shared it with my grown children, and it inspired many of them to join me in starting an online family book club where we discuss a book about once a month. Our first book was the Screwtape Letters, and our discussion was great and I’m excited to see how well we can keep it up. I can’t think of many things better than discussing great books with my family! Joy Petty

It never occurred to me to have a family book club. I mean, that is an outstanding idea. At first, I thought, “Oh man, our family would never do that.” Then I chastised myself for jumping to that conclusion and reached out to my children to see if there was any interest. I probably won’t have many responses before this article is published, but we will see.

Maybe you, like me, dismiss the whole idea. But don’t. If you have teens or grown children, ask them if they would like to read a book individually or as a family and discuss it. At the very least begin reading together, even if you do the reading.

Depending on the ages of your children, you can read to them or each person in your family can take a turn reading. At the end of each session ask for input. I didn’t do that, and I know now that it would have made the reading I did with my children even more powerful.

If you have older teens and adult children why not explore the option of a family book club? Who knows, it may be a big hit. Even if it only lasts through one or two books, and that could happen, the whole experience will bond you even more as a family.

And by the way, when you read and study yourself, you will be a powerful example for your family. It will have an impact. If not now, then in the future.

Now for the postscript:

After I asked Joy if I could share this email and she consented, we talked some more. I replied to Joy and shared my concerns about a book club and why I read to my husband and Mom rather than us all reading.

“This was so awesome. Can I share it in a newsletter? Great thoughts and I love that you have begun a family book club. I wish that were possible in my family. Lots of kids who do not read, mostly boys and my husband. I read to him, but it can’t be too deep, or he sleeps. LOL Anyway, I would love to share your thoughts.”

Joy replied with this, and it was so heartening. I suspect that is one reason I contacted my family to see what they think. : )

“I have several kids who don’t (or won’t) read either :-). We’re encouraging them to listen to the audiobook so they can participate. The book club is totally voluntary, and fewer than half of my 10 kids participated in our first discussion, but that’s okay. It’s a start, right? :-)”

Joy is correct, it is a start. Even if it doesn’t last for months or years, it will bless her family. If we make the effort to read in our family, in some fashion, it will bless our families too. I have seen this happen in my choppy, inconsistent past in my family.

I know it is true. : )

Switiching From Windows 10 to Windows 11. My Take Away!

I Don’t Like Change.

This has caused me some consternation as I have moved along life’s highway. Do you realize how much has changed since I was born in 1950!! It wasn’t such a big issue until I became an adult and technology exploded.

I can still recall our first computer. I was in my forties. It practically filled the small desk we had. I helped a friend with a project and sometimes I would sit in my chair so stumped I wanted to cry.

 

Now I am seventy-four and technology has taken wings. One thing that bugs me more than I can say is when I finally learn how to use a program or platform it changes. I know they do this for marketing and to stay relevant, but it throws me for a loop every time.

 

Even when using technology I’m reasonably familiar with, I occasionally have to stop and do some research. I google how to do this or that. Then I work to follow the directions which are often in Greek. I am not kidding here; it seems like Greek. Often I can work it out and feel a sense of relief and pride that I didn’t give up and can move forward with my project.

 

Sometimes I need to find someone who knows how to do what I don’t know how to do. Rarely, do I go to a store and get help. More often, I reach out to someone in my circle of friends or acquaintances that I know is good with tech. Almost always they can show me what I am missing and guide me to success. I’m always grateful.

 

Occasionally, no matter how diligently I try to follow directions or figure something out by myself I need to stop and pray because no matter how I have tried it isn’t clear to me. “God, what am I not seeing because I have clicked every button there is and it still isn’t working,” or something to that effect. Guess what. Almost always I have a thought to do this or that which resolves the problem. Sometimes I don’t know what I did and couldn’t repeat the process. LOL I need this help from outside of myself and it is a relief to know I am not on my own all the time.

 

A few weeks ago, I was forced to switch from Windows 10 to Windows 11. I know, you can’t believe I was still using Windows 10. I wasn’t willing to change because I didn’t want to have to figure out a new system. I was content with what I knew. But Windows 10 wasn’t going to be supported after a certain date. I had to move! I wasn’t happy about it. Weren’t things going just fine as they were? The whole idea freaked me out.

 

After the change, I did have problems. Some pages looked different. Menus were not the same. A couple of things required that I get my daughter involved and once a grandson. : ) But after a week I noticed how well I had adjusted and it felt as comfortable as the old 10 did. There were perks I didn’t know I was missing. I’m glad I made that scary change. Sometimes we have to be forced into that place. : )

 

This is how it is in parenting and life. We have to learn new ways as we go along, and it can feel hard and scary. But if we don’t panic or refuse to grow, we can do it. It is better to choose to make progress than to be forced into progress. : )

 

You can’t work with an eight-year-old as you did when they were two. It takes a new set of skills to talk to and direct an eleven-year-old than it does a sixteen-year-old. How you manage chores often stops working and you need to experiment with something new. Awesome relationships may suddenly be strained, and you aren’t sure what happened, when did the train go off the rails? We lose jobs and must find new ones. Maybe our current skill set needs a reboot. Possibly one of our children has taken a different path than we have designed for our family. Now what?

 

Sometimes our past surfaces and we find ourselves triggered, but we don’t know what triggered us or what to do about it. Has a child turned their back on you or the family? Are they suddenly distant? As our children grow, we might find we are unable to maintain our position with them. How do you work that out? Maybe a family member begins to show signs of anxiety or mental health issues. What, I am not prepared for that!

 

Life and parenting are not a straight and smooth road. I have walked both for decades always thinking it would get easier. It hasn’t. I returned to school when I was in my forties, with a seventh baby. My husband changed his profession a couple of times. I’m always called on to make personal changes, improve my way of being, and take responsibility for my responses. I must keep reevaluating relationships as my children grow and become parents and now, grandparents. No, the road never became straight or smooth, but by using what I learned as I went along, I didn’t just manage but thrived.

 

You can do the same. It will require work, purpose, and intention.

 

Here are a few things that have helped me along the way.

 

1. When you recognize that something isn’t working know it will require change and possibly information/resources you don’t yet have. Don’t panic. 

2.  You will need to take responsibility for your part of whatever the issue is and lay blame aside.    Blame is usually an indicator that our perspective is off, or our story is incorrect. 

3. When something has been working in your life or family and suddenly isn’t working, STOP. Be willing to look carefully at what has changed and experiment with something new. Ask yourself good questions and give yourself honest answers. It can feel aggravating, but nothing stays the same, things change. This will happen even if what was working was wonderful. Let your aggravation go and move forward.

4. Even when things are still working, you may need a reboot, so it continues to work well. If it feels like something is off, it probably is. Seek information and adjust.

5. Be open to whatever resources/information are required. I cannot tell you how many classes and books I have taken/read in the last forty years. It took me ten years to realize that I needed to grow and change how I viewed the world, children, and relationships, but once I jumped that hurdle, I ran down the track. I have used what I learned. I have grown as a person. I have become better. I have adjusted my way of being. It has all mattered!

 

I reached out to women and a few men when I needed guidance. I picked people who were where I felt I needed to be, whether how they managed chores or a relationship, how they worked through disappointment or grief, or how they upgraded their skills or managed their money.

 

Be willing to accept mentoring or counseling if needed. Last year I had to work on something in my relationship with Don. We had been married 52 years! I visited with a counselor three times. She helped me consider questions I hadn’t thought to ask myself. It made all the difference.

 

As you know I am a praying woman. This is not my last resort. I begin and end with it and use it often in the middle. Frankly, this has been the most reliable and useful tool in my ‘life’ toolbox, and I recommend it to you when you don’t know where else to turn or what else to do. It has never failed me.

 

If you are looking for help/resources, you will find them.

 

Making changes can be challenging just like using new technology, but if you trust yourself and avoid panic or blame, if you ask honest questions and give honest answers, stay the course, and seek reliable resources and information, you will get the help you need. You will be able to travel this road of life and parenting with greater success even if you are imperfect, and you are.

 

Remember that it took me ten years after I began living as an adult and parent to realize I needed to grow and change. Despite my slow start and the years it took to change, I did. My family suffered bumps and bruises, while I grew and became better. However, my children took my less-than-stellar example and have moved forward. They are growing and becoming better and have done it faster than I did. We are still here.

 

So, embrace change. Be willing to accept that you need to learn and grow. Manage the frustration that comes with change. Seek the help you need.

 

Don’t stay stuck in Windows 10 when you could have the perks of Windows 11! And don’t remain stuck in life or parenting. Be unafraid and willing to do the work to move forward.

SPARKS – The Big Fail!

Years ago, I spent a great deal of time with my grands that live in Utah. We lived one block away. This was before we consolidated our two families into a three-generation home. My daughter, Jodie, was homeschooling. At that time, I was teaching and mentoring mothers who homeschooled. Then I made a transition. I realized that many of the excellent things I was teaching applied to a whole spectrum of parenting, not just those who homeschooled.

Over the ensuing years, I have shared many of the lessons I taught to those long ago homeschool moms and have demonstrated how they apply to every family.

One of those lessons was the idea of Sparks. I wrote my first article on this cool subject in April of 2010. Wow, that was a long time ago. I love the idea of Sparks and have written many articles on the subject since then. In that early article, Sparks Bring Learning to Life. I explained what a Spark is and how it can help you, as a parent, help your child love the idea of learning. This is certainly valuable if you homeschool, but equally valuable if your children attend public or private school. Life is about learning, and the best-lived lives happen when we continue to learn. It is helpful when we show our children how fun learning can be and that is done best when we respond to their Sparks, the things they are already interested in.

In my book Becoming a Present Parent  I wrote that the value of seeing your child’s Sparks is that it’s a wonderful way to get Present with your child. It’s powerful not only in helping them love learning but also in creating tighter relationships. So, what is a Spark? Simply put, a Spark is anything that a child says or does that lets you know they’re interested in something right now. The article mentioned above will teach you how to recognize a Spark and then how to use it to create fun, family-learning moments, and to solidify your parent-child relationship.

Over the next few months, I want to share some examples of how I, and other parents, were able to use Sparks to connect with our kids. They are fun ideas that you can incorporate with your children, even if they haven’t shown up as a Spark, because you can also ignite Sparks. Light a spark and watch it burn!

Besides, it’s nice to have a quiver of ideas in your back pocket, especially with summer right around the corner and the sometimes boring days it brings. Learning slows down and tech takes over. It is useful to have some fun ideas and then gather your kids around for some non-tech enjoyment. We are talking about kids under twelve, but occasionally teens will hang around and even join in.

One of the reasons I’m going to tackle this issue of Sparks in the next couple of months is because I’m going to be spending LOTS of time caring for my grands. I fly to Seattle for a week, mid-month, where my grands range in age from almost twelve to four. Then it’s on to Colorado for a week. These grands range in age from married with kids, down to age four. I need a reminder, because as I see Sparks, I can respond, and our time together will be more powerful.

The article I am sharing this week was written in late 2011 and is about an epic failure in the Sparks arena. It illustrates the number one thing to remember about Sparks – the younger the child the shorter the Sparks shelf life. So when a Spark pops up you need to be prepared to respond. When you do, the results are amazing. Next week I will share a success.

Oh yes, one other thing. When children know you care about what they care about, regardless of the age of the child, they will open up because they know you care and will respond. This goes a long way in the relationship department, especially with teens.

CHILDREN LEARN BEST WHEN INTEREST IS HIGH

I go to the library once a month and get four weeks worth of material to share with my grands. On my last trip to the library, I got books about pre-math subjects. That’s where my focus was. However, Jack’s was on elephants.

Each week I visit my grands with my recognizable plastic bucket filled with interesting items. Two weeks earlier, when the bucket went visiting Jack said, “Hi grandma, you brought the bucket. I asked him if he knew what we were going to do that day and he got a huge grin on his face and said, “Yes, elephants.” I pulled out the contents and we had a fun afternoon, but no elephants were included.

The next week when I arrived, I asked Jack, “What do you think we are going to learn about today.” With a huge grin and a face that was lit with the sure knowledge that he knew, he yelled, “Elephants”. I knew right then that it should have been elephants. I had missed my opportunity to respond when the Spark was fresh.

When Jack said he wanted to learn about elephants he fully expected that he would find the materials available the next week. I could see his disappointment when it was something else. We had fun but I sensed he wasn’t fully enthusiastic because what he wanted to know about was elephants.

This last week I was prepared with information about elephants. Guess what – I had let the window of opportunity pass by! We did have fun, but I could see that the enthusiasm he had had two weeks earlier was not present. Imagine how joyous would have been our experience if I had materials about elephants the week before. It would have made a difference.

I am going to spill it and tell you why I didn’t have things going well when it came to elephants. Frankly, the first week I missed it. I heard him say elephants and I let it pass right through my head. I didn’t want to go to the library again, I wanted to use what I already had prepared, and I was excited about the pre-math stuff. Then I forgot about elephants until the next week when Jack’s happy, anticipation-filled face reminded me. I had been thinking about my needs and not Jack, so I had completely missed the Spark.

When I did show up with elephants in the basket on the third week it was fun, but Jack wasn’t as engaged as he sometimes is, and we didn’t do half of what I had prepared. The younger the child, the more important it is to hear and respond to a spark quickly. They move from one interest to another fast.

Tips to help you respond to your child’s Sparks

  • Have a consistent place to make notes to yourself. When Jack mentioned elephants, I should have written it down or noted it in my phone, so I wouldn’t forget. If the Spark requires a trip to the museum etc., you need help to remember because it will require planning. Although we should respond to a Spark as soon as we can, occasionally time will pass so have a way to remind yourself.
  • If you can’t make it to the library for books, then use the internet. It will only take 10 minutes max to print off a page of info. that you can read and prepare in your mind, as well as a few pictures. You can also all gather at the computer. Then while you share the pictures you can ask questions and slip in some facts. There are always craft ideas and cute lunch and snack ideas online for just about any subject. There are free worksheets and color pages online for any topic you can think of, including elephants. Add another 5 minutes and you can have those downloaded and printed.
  • Take another 10-15 minutes to gather your materials for crafts and plan snacks so that you can introduce something fun over the next few days. I always use what I have. I rarely make a special trip to the store. I am averse to buying when I can make do. So, if I need a straw and I don’t have one I call my husband and he stops at Wendy’s after work. If I need a feather and I don’t have one, I make one from paper. If I need sliced turkey and I don’t have it, I figure out how to make peanut butter or tuna work. In 30 min. or so, you can have wonderful ideas that work for a week or two, that help you respond to your child’s Spark. They will love that you noticed. And this works in reverse. You can use this 30 minutes on something you would like them to be interested in and they may be Sparked.
  • If you have things to do and don’t we all put them on hold for 30 minutes and respond to the spark, even if it’s only a short conversation, reading a short book online, or asking them questions. Your child will be excited and much more engaged.
  • Most of all, remember that seeing Sparks is about seeing your children’s interests and needs. When you begin using these strategies you create magic and children learn to love learning.
  • Catching Sparks is usually easy, but responding to them is a skill we develop over time. So don’t become discouraged when you have a fail like I did with the elephants. Just keep practicing.

‘Light a spark and watch it burn!’