September 2006
Your Parenting Coach: Revisiting the Family Meeting
The first few weeks of school are more hectic for our family than the Christmas holidays! My kids are starting 3rd and 5th grades and there is always so much to do to get them ready for school. Any suggestions for reducing the stress and frantic running around?
– Stephanie/Seattle
I have one suggestion that I believe can help in numerous ways: holding a Family Meeting.
It can instill more responsibility and confidence in your children, enhance the communication between family members, add positive energy and boost creative ideas, while reducing stress and bringing more peace and organization. Sounds like magic? It is! It’s the magic that results from authentic bonding with people that we love.
The family meeting, in effect, is a “sacred pause” that allows everyone to slow down to figure out better ways to do things. Everyone can voice frustrations and then re-think decisions, making adjustments that benefit the family as a whole and parents and kids as individuals. Your children are old enough to appreciate the formality of a meeting while enjoying the attention they get as active participants. Here are guidelines that have helped me and many of my coaching clients hold successful family meetings:
1. Set a regular time with a beginning and end time. Usually an hour is long enough. A weekly meeting can be beneficial to make this an event your children look forward to. When things get really hectic, you can also hold a mini-meeting for 15 minutes daily for as many days as you need to.
2. At the first meeting, begin by stating the over-all purpose of your family meeting. Some purposes may include: to get together to learn more about each other and how we can help each other as a family; to coordinate schedules; to make or change rules; to discuss an important issue, such as an upcoming sleep-over or whether or not to purchase a video-game system; and to let each other know about upcoming potential stresses. When I was about to travel for speaking engagements, our family meeting was a great place to share how stressed I was feeling and how everyone else could support my being away for a few days. We also went around the circle, and my children told us what they were anticipating as stressful for them: more homework than usual, a big game they wanted to do well in or a sensitive issue they had to address with a friend. Whatever it was, my husband and I lent our support and let the kids know we would be more aware of these potential stresses in our children’s lives.
3. Once everyone knows why you are meeting regularly, put out a sheet of paper and have everyone write down the topic or topics they want to address. With children adding to the agenda, there is an immediate buy-in, resulting in natural attentiveness at the meeting.
4. Begin each meeting in some symbolic way. You can light a big candle that represents the entire family with smaller candles for each parent and child. You can say a prayer or read words of inspiration. We lighted candles and then went around the circle and everybody said one thing that they appreciated about each family member. This started off the meeting on a positive note, while helping us all to center and slow down.
5. Go through the agenda items, keeping track of the time. But allow each person to voice his or her ideas and concerns with the rule that no one interrupts. This helps kids practice deep listening and impulse control.
6. Finally, even though you are allowing your children to voice their opinions, you are still the parent. The family meeting doesn’t mean that the kids have to agree on all the outcomes of the discussions. But from my experience, children are much more ready to help out and act more responsibly when they feel heard and appreciated.
With regular family meetings you will find that more things get done in a less hurried fashion, that you have thought through tasks more completely and that your family continues to learn from one another what it takes to make the best life possible together.
Gloria DeGaetano is the founder and CEO of the Parent Coaching Institute in Bellevue and the host of Parent Appreciation Radio Saturdays at 11a.m. on 1150 AM KKNW-Seattle.
©Gloria DeGaetano, 2006
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