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Accidentally raising eco-minded kids
August 4, 2007

We all try to teach our children values, knowledge, and skills everyday, but few of us can be sure what really make sense to them or what they actually have understood and absorbed. Most of the time it feels like I am preaching to deaf ears. But occasionally I am rewarded with these astonishing moments that make even the most difficult child-rearing challenges worthwhile.

Yesterday I picked up my 5 year old daughter from her pre-school. Sitting in the back seat, she said, “mom, you know my friend Liz at school? I hmmed without paying much attention. She kept going, “Liz always uses a lot of paper towel. So today, I said, ‘do you know paper towels are made from trees? Do you want to cut down all of the trees?’”

I was a little surprised at the direct approach my normally shy daughter employed, “what did Liz say?”
“She said she didn’t know. So I said, ‘don’t use so many paper towels then.’ And Liz said, ‘okay.’”
End of story. Yeah, that simple.

I pulled the car to the side of the road and turned to her to tell her that she made me so proud. She looked at me like I was making a huge deal out of nothing.
“Where did you learn that paper towels were made from trees?” I did not remember when I “preached” that to her.
“Remember you read the sign to me in the bathroom?” she tried to remind me.
“Hum? Bathroom?
“Mom! Monterey Bay Aquarium!” she could not believe that I did not remember that event.
“Oh,” I could barely recall. But looking at my toddler, I was filled with pride.

So here are a few lessons I have learned from this:
1. No need to preach to the children. They pick up cues from what you do.
2. Gently guide the children, even when it seems that nothing is being retained. They absorb everything in their own way
3. Perhaps the next time when I see my friend John pull into my driveway in his Hummer, I will tell him that his vehicle is on the global warming black list, instead of grumbling behind him. Maybe, just maybe, he does not know.

CindyW at Organicpicks

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