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Welcome! This is a free newsletter on becoming a Response-Able parent, raising Response-Able children.
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My mission is to strengthen families and improve parent communication skills (including my own), by helping parents learn practical, useable verbal strategies for raising responsible, caring, confident children.
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"When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years."
----Mark Twain
"By the time a man realizes that maybe his father was right, he usually has a son who thinks he's wrong."
----Charles Wadsworth
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"You should never ask your three-year-old brother to hold a tomato."
----Alecia, age 12
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Is it possible to expand your vision to see more in your child than he or she is presently showing? How could you communicate that vision to your child and to the rest of your family?
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Subscriber comments, ideas, and concerns are valued. Email your
comment to IPP57@aol.com
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STERILIZE: What you do to your first baby's pacifier by boiling it and to your last baby's pacifier by blowing on it.
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Every day in America 1,352 babies are born to teen mothers.
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Privacy Statement: Under no circumstances do we sell, trade, or exchange your email address, ever. It is safe with us. Always!
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by Chick Moorman
My neighbor recently purchased a $400 sandbox for his young children. How can anyone spend $400 dollars on a sandbox, you might wonder. Simple. It's a state-of-the-art sandbox with a swing set and slide attached to it. It's high quality through and through.
With all due respect to my neighbor (who loves his children and has the best of intentions when making major purchases for them, I am sure), children do not need a $400 sandbox. What they do need is the experience of going out to the backyard with their parents and building a sandbox. They need to hold boards together while we pound and do the pounding while we take a turn holding the boards together. They need to get a sliver and have it removed and bandaged. They need to help us sand the boards so slivers are kept to a minimum. They need to rub shoulders with us, sweat with us, smell us, see us, touch us, and hear us. They need the experience of building a sandbox much more than they need the sandbox.
So the number one summer rule for parents is this: When investing in your children, invest in experiences, not in things.
1.) Instead of buying another stuffed giraffe for your children, take them to the zoo and let them experience a real giraffe up close.
2.) Buying a new fishing pole is fine, but using it is better. Take your children fishing this summer.
3.) Have your children seen a horse, touched a horse, ridden a horse? Purchasing the Disney movie "Spirit" is one thing. Getting in touch with the spirit of a live horse and feeling its breath on your face is another.
4.) Take a blanket and pillow outdoors at night. Count the stars. Look for satellites.
5.) Take a walk in the woods. Look for animal tracks. Notice trees and flowers.
6.) Play catch, shoot baskets, volley a ball or a badminton bird. Challenge each other to see how long you can keep the ball going rather than who can score the most points.
7.) Have a water balloon fight. Get wet. Get wild. Get silly. Get with your children.
8.) Catch fireflies and put them in a jar. Later, let them go.
9.) Go to a parade. Get there early. Stake out your territory with folding chairs and blankets. Invite a friend or relative.
10.) Pick cherries, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, corn, apples, beans, or a vegetable or fruit of your choice. Get stained, dirty, and sweaty.
11.) Sit around a campfire. Talk. Listen. Roast marshmallows.
12.) Plant a tree.
13.) Write and send postcards - from home or from out of state.
14.) Clean a closet. Collect unused and outgrown clothes. Donate them to an appropriate charity.
15.) Take a trip to the library. Let your children choose several books. You choose some too. Read to your children over the next several weeks.
16.) Go on a photo journey. Allow each family member to take a set number of photos. Create a family album with the developed photos.
17.) Do loving service. Bake cookies for a serviceman or servicewoman. Mow the grass for an elderly couple. Pick up litter from a roadside picnic area.
18.) Go garage sale hopping with five dollars in your pocket. Give your children a similar amount. Come home when everyone has spent all their money.
19.) Walk in the rain. Sing in the rain. Skip through puddles. Take your shoes off. Take your adulthood off.
20.) If you live in the country, go to a big city and walk around. If you live in a city, go to the country and walk around.
21.) Check out a college campus.
22.) Make Popsicles with Kool Aid and toothpicks.
23.) Visit a post office. Mail a letter.
24.) Bring out old photo albums. Take turns saying, "I remember when . . ."
25.) Cut and paste. Staple and glue. Color and paint. Make a mess. Then clean up.
Let your children experience a farm, a skyscraper, a fire engine, a campground, or a foreign country. Let them smell flowers, look for birds, feed ducks, or bake cookies. Help them find a four-leaf clover, shuck corn, wash the car, or open a savings account. Whatever you do, remember: When investing in your children, invest in experiences, not in things.
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In the last issue of the Response-Able Parenting Newsletter, I included humor that made fun of fathers. The intended joke suggested that fathers are not as capable of taking care of children as mothers are. Kimber Bishop-Yanke tactfully reminded me of the importance of permanently laying that stereotype to rest.
My apologies to readers for male bashing. My intention is to keep a closer eye on what I include as humor in the future. Thank you, Kimber.
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"Parent Talk: How to Talk to Your Children in Language That Builds Self-Esteem and Encourages Responsibility" is now in paperback. This 301-page book by Chick Moorman is available through Personal Power Press at (toll-free) 877-360-1477 or ipp57@aol.com. "Parent Talk" is also available in a Simon and Schuster Fireside Original edition at local bookstores for $13.00.
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Spotted on a pickup truck in Key Largo, FL:
World Peace Begins at Home
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This new book is a treasury of practical ideas for building a caring and respectful intimate relationship. It is filled with language skills that create honest and open communication patterns between you and your partner.
Learn powerful skills to help you:
* Resolve conflict.
* Increase trust and caring.
* Demonstrate listening and understanding.
* Communicate feelings without wounding the spirit.
* Encourage both autonomy and connectedness.
* Rekindle warmth and passion.
* Revitalize your relationship.
SPECIAL 20% PREPUBLICATION DISCOUNT NOW AVAILABLE INCLUDES FREE SHIPPING AND HANDLING
This 280-page hardback book will sell for $24.95 beginning on its publication date of August 15th.
Today we offer it for only $20 postpaid. Your copy will be shipped out the day COUPLE TALK arrives at our warehouse.
To take advantage of this special prepublication offer, call (toll-free) 877-360-1477, email ipp57@aol.com, or send your check for $20 to Personal Power Press, P.O. Box 547, Merrill, MI 48637.
This special offer extends only until August 1st, so order your copy immediately!
If you liked PARENT TALK or TEACHER TALK, you won't want to miss COUPLE TALK!
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Please join us for one of the following facilitator trainings in the Parent Talk System:
1. Dearborn, MI, July 31 - August 2, 2003
2. Wausau, WI, August 4-6, 2003
Facilitator trainings are designed to prepare local trainers to present the Parent Talk System to parents in their communities. This 3-day skill-based training will help facilitators learn strategies that teach parents how to raise responsible, caring, confident children.
Join a select group of people throughout the world who are already using Parent Talk skills to improve family life in their communities.
Request a detailed brochure today at ipp57@aol.com. (Please include your mailing address.)
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C.) Back issues of the Response-Able Parenting Newsletter can be found here.
D.) Are you interested in receiving our educator newsletter? If so, e-mail ipp57@aol.com and request to be added to the educator newsletter list.
E.) Please recommend this free e-newsletter to any parent who is interested in adding tools to their parenting tool box.
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To find out more about workshops, seminars, and keynote addresses presented by Chick Moorman contact him at toll free, 877/360-1477 or email IPP57@aol.com
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Copyright 2003 Chick Moorman Seminars, all rights reserved. Share this with your circle.