How the Family Changed Over Time

One of the best keys to being a great parent is to make sure you are spending some quality time with your child every day.

According to the Horatio Alger Association's report, The State of Our Nation's Youth: "If they could have one wish granted, students would choose to have more time to spend with their families (46%)". Finding extra time to spend together as a family is never easy but it is possible. The problem is that many of us spend far too much time in distraction that could be spent on more life-giving activities. Some families thrive on being busy while others need to have a more relaxed schedule.

For example, approximately half of all families today eat dinner in front of the TV. Although many families complain about a lack of time, the average family has a TV playing for over eight hours per day! Back in the '50s families gathered around the dinner table to eat and talk about their day.

This, and other facts that keep surfacing everyday are disturbing to me! And the idea of passing on to our children, that life's daily duties are what family focus should be. Even above time with one another. Should disturb you too. The good news is, it just takes a few small steps to completely reverse the effect. By creating literal habits and routines of spending time together at specific times, we show the family how important they really are. Go ahead and add it to the schedule if it's needed! And when it's in the planner, side by side with "do the laundry" , "mail that package" , etc. I bet the scales will tip. And family time will be seen as the priority it should have been all along.

My family started to play a sort of game at dinner, it's called high-low. We go around the table and each person shares the high and low parts of their day, then we discuss them. It is a really good way to keep communication lines open as the children get older because they know that they can talk to you about anything they want. The rules are that you can't fight or argue at the dinner table so they know that you won't get mad about their high or low.

Simple? Yes. But also very effective.