Teach Your Children About Love

love
Dr. Bob Barnes and Torrey Roberts, Sheridan House Family Ministries

By February, many of our families are back into the swing of the new year and all that entails. We are back into school rhythms, sports, homework, etc. This month offers another great opportunity for teaching and training our children. With so much focus this month on Valentine’s Day, why not seize this time to teach our children more about love. We can focus on sibling love, loving our neighbor, modeling romantic love and setting up some fun family traditions as well.

 

Speak into their hearts

We can use this season to pour into our children emotionally. When our kids were small, they each had a mailbox on our kitchen counter. Every morning through the month of February they could open their mailbox to find little notes of encouragement, character qualities we could see emerging in them and sometimes little treasures. I have read about other parents attaching love notes to their children’s door every night through February. Why not jump on this opportunity to encourage our children and speak into their hearts.

 

Random acts of kindness

This is also a great time to focus on sibling love. Siblings can get in on the action of leaving encouragement for each other in the mailboxes. In the Sheridan House Residential homes, we set up Random Acts of Kindness boards where we would “catch” them in the act of being kind to each other and would post it on the board. There would even be a family game out of who could be caught showing kindness to others the most.

 

Demonstrate love

loveThis is also a great time for parents to model love in a marriage. Eyes are always on us and how we treat each other as spouses. The flowers and cards do not go unnoticed by our children. We are training them how they should treat their future spouse. Role modeling is important because our marriage sets the expectations for our children. This is a great month to refocus on that with our spouse. You can also use this time to have a valentine’s “date” with your children.

Even though the day to day doesn’t feel like it, the years we have with our children are fleeting and even small moments create memories. These are the lasting moments that our children will carry with them. How will you use this month to teach and train but also create moments for your family?

 

Visit parentingonpurpose.org for more advice from Dr. Bob Barnes and Torrey Roberts.

For more articles by Dr. Bob Barnes and Torrey Roberts, visit goodnewsfl.org/author/dr-bob-barnes-and-torrey-roberts/

 

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