Creating Family Values

CREATING FAMILY VALUES: These are the particular agreements that you are going to reinforce in one another to keep you on the "path" of what is important to your family. When our children were at home, we would gather as a family to discuss our family's culture.  What did we want our home to feel like?  Look like? What did we want to known for? What is acceptable in our home? What isn't acceptable?  How do we speak to one another?What is important for our family?  Why do we do the things we do? These were a few of the questions we spent time talking about. 

We began these discussions with our children when they were around kindergarten age.  Before that time, Greg and I had the discussions and we set the value system of our family. But the goal was to engage the kids as soon as they could have a simple understanding of these ideas, and of course we made the discussions age appropriate. 

We re-worked our family values yearly. 

Here are ideas you can do to create your family values.  When you are finished with the initial family values meeting (make it as fun or as "play-ish" as you can), write up the agreed upon family values and put them on the fridge or somewhere you will all see them regularly.  Read through them together as a family weekly at dinner time or bed time.  "Catch" one another living them out! 

1) With young kids: Get out blocks and build a house together.  Talk about things that describe your family as you build.  {Example:  It is so fun to have the neighbor kids over at our house.  What are some things you enjoy doing when so&so comes over?  What is your favorite activity to do at our house?}  As you build the house together, have everyone share something they love about your family.  You can give ideas or ask questions to get your kids talking. {Example:  Who loves it that our family goes out to lunch after church every Sunday?  What did you think when we got to pack a shoe box with toys and gifts for a child last Christmas?  I like to use indoor voices when we are inside.  What does an indoor voice sound like?  Practice indoor voices.  How do you think we should talk to each other in our family?}  These are just a few suggestions. 

Mom and dad, have some ideas of what family values you would like to cultivate and use those as your building blocks (you may want to write on the blocks those values).  If you have a lot of values, your family could vote on the top 10 values.  Each person would get to pick their top value and then vote on the others.  You will get the priorities for your family!  
 
2) Older children:  Everyone in the family takes 5 index cards and writes a family value that is important to them.  Mom and dad, you want to have a list of values on a white board or a piece of paper that everyone can choose from.  

Collect all the cards and lay them out.  Match up any similar values.  Take time to discuss the values that are laid out, getting the "why" behind the chosen values.  After a time of discussion, vote on the values individually and the top make it into the value system this year!   Your family decides how many values you want (5-10 is a good number). If there are ideas written out that are new to your family, discuss how those will be implemented.  What will it look like for you to live these out? 

3) Teenagers/Young Adult Children:  Family life looks different when you have teenagers or young adults.  Schedules get harder to manage and school, work and activities of older kids can cause adjustments in having large quantities of time together as a family.   However, as your children age, find another model that works to keep your family values a priority.  Our family continues to gather yearly to discuss the values important to us.  It looks different now because our kids don't live with us and two of our kids are married so they are creating their own family culture, but we as the Tschida Family (Greg is the patriarch & I am the matriarch) :) still hold values that we adhere to.  These are the Tschida family values/What we are known for:  1) hospitality, 2) encouragers, 3) humble, 4) considerate, 5) family time together (quality time).   We have our values written out on a chalk board that is always in my kitchen.  I will take a picture of it periodically throughout the year and send it to everyone, just as a reminder of what we are going after as a family! 

Without vision, the people perish (live unrestrained and directionless).  Moms and dads, you have to assemble the vision in your hearts of what your family is known for, before you can expect others to see it.  As you "see" the core values that are important to your family, you will be able to reproduce it in others.  The ability to impart the core values will allow your kids to submit to them.  Parents, you live them out and reinforce them in your family.  How will you know if your kids have caught the vision?  You know it when they live it!  Have fun creating! 

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