Let me introduce myself

In the next few months you’ll find an expanding roster of contributors to this blog. We hope that we’ll have a diverse collection of folks writing about their knowledge, experience and interest in fatherhood and dads issues.

I’m a relatively new dad with 2 kids under the age of 2 and a half yet it often feels like I’ve always been a dad. The life I left behind is hard to remember.

As a way of introducing myself to readers I thought I would share a video I made for a work project last year that talks a bit about my approach to parenting and life in general. I look forward to exploring my own journey with you, not as an expert but as a learner.

Even Google Knows the Power of a Good Dad

How fathers are depicted in the media has changed over time – from Walt Cleaver to Bill Cosby to Homer Simpson.  Even commercials wade into the act.  We’ve seen dads cleaning homes dressed in a tutu, sitting at small tables having tea, and hanging out at the ice rink drinking coffee and watching his son play hockey.  Dads have been seen as super heros driving cool cars with their children safely sleeping in the back seat and tenderly

Enter Google.  One of the most powerful marketing machines on the planet uses the tender and attentive presence of a father to promote its tools.

<object style=”height: 390px; width: 640px”><param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/R4vkVHijdQk?version=3″><param name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”><param name=”allowScriptAccess” value=”always”></object>

Emotional – yes.  But I’m guessing that most dads look at that and can’t help but think about connecting with their own kids.

Nice work Google.

Evaluation of Super Dads Program

FII-ON is embarking on an evaluation of our Super Dads Super Kids program.  SDSK is a father-child activity program that gives them time together AND an opportunity for the dads to have a discussion on a relevant parenting topic.   This is a great opportunity for us to assess the effectiveness of one of our resources and we are looking for organizations who may be interested in being part of this with us.  More details about SDSK can be found here.

We will have an application process for any organizations who want to work with us.  You can download all the details about the evaluation project here: SDSK-Eval-APP.

If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at info@cfii.ca.

Many Dads In Many Situations

What is a father?  We often think, “Well, it’s a guy with kids”.  Sure. But if you think about it, it’s clear that men are parenting in many different kinds of family circumstances today.

Some situations promote father involvement.

A small but growing group of men stay home while their wives go out to work.

Some families do off-shifting — during the day Mom’s home with the kids while Dad works. When he comes home, she goes to work and the roles are reversed.

Many fathers are choosing to work at home and so have more opportunity to spend time with the children and get involved in family routines.

Single dads raising their kids on their own, which happens to be the fastest growing type of family in Canada (not the largest number, but the fastest growing – Statscan 2006)

Other family circumstances make involvement more difficult.

Many fathers don’t live with their children. Some men are living with and helping to raise their partner’s children from a previous relationship.  In any of these situations, the main goals of a father don’t change — but there may be special challenges.

Blended Families

Many fathers now live in what we call blended families.  Some men instantly become stepfathers when they marry a divorced woman. You could be in a family with your wife’s children from a previous marriage, your children from your previous marriage and/or children that you had together.  If your new partner is the stepparent, your involvement will be very important to your children as they get used to living with her. If you’re a stepfather, your first task is to form a relationship with your partner’s children. (This also applies to adoptive fathers.) Kids need time to warm up to a stepparent.

Don’t try to do it all at once. Start from where the children are. Find out what hobbies or activities they enjoy and be interested and supportive, whether it’s hockey, gymnastics, dolls or video games. If your stepchildren have a good relationship with their biological dad, it’s best to respect and support that relationship.  If there is conflict between your wife and her ex-husband you’ll have a very fine line to walk. There’s no easy answer. As much as you might like to, you can’t fix the problem yourself.  Your best contributions are these: Try to stay out of the conflict yourself and be prepared to support your partner by offering an understanding shoulder when she’s upset or by taking the kids out for awhile when she’s had some difficult issues to deal with.

Getting to Know You

When Albert moved in with Erin he couldn’t wait to start acting like a dad. He thought her ex-partner was too easy on the kids and thought he could straighten them out a little. But it wasn’t working. When he’d bark at the kids, they’d just cry and run to their mother.  And she kept telling him to butt out. “Leave their behaviour to me.  They don’t really know you yet.  I don’t want them to be afraid of you.”

Albert thought about it and saw that she was right. He left most of the discipline to Erin — backed up her rules, but concentrated on spending time with his stepchildren.  They played games, read stories and watched TV together.  Albert realized that he had to establish a feeling of trust before he could move on to discipline.

Divorced Fathers

Divorce is never easy. And it’s hard to be a parent after divorce, especially if you don’t see your children that often.  Some fathers gradually drift out of the picture because they say they can’t bear the pain of not seeing their children enough.  That may ease the pain, but it means that the children lose their father completely. And most children do want a relationship with their father after divorce. Keeping up that relationship can be complicated by conflict with your ex-wife.

One issue that becomes difficult is communication.  Even divorced parents have to communicate sometimes. That’s hard to do for two people who wish they never had to see each other again. But the place to start is to think less about winning and losing, and more about how everything you do will affect your children. The best chance you have for maintaining your relationship with your kids comes when you can reduce the amount of conflict you have with your ex-wife.

If you need help with that (and many people do) community services can help you find professional mediators trained in helping people to resolve conflicts.

Working It Out

After the separation, Pete and Nina could hardly speak without fighting. Pete felt Nina wasn’t being fair about his visits with the children and Nina thought his demands were unreasonable. Eventually both realized that their tension was affecting their kids. They went to see a family mediator who acted almost like a referee.  The mediator helped them work out a parenting plan that spelled out things like when the children would be at each parent’s house and how decisions would be made about their health and education. With the mediator’s help they also came up with a schedule that worked a little better with Pete’s work hours and agreed on some ground rules about what they would and wouldn’t talk about in front of the kids.

So no matter who you are and what type of situation you find yourself in, you are still dad.  And we hope you get some time this Father’s Day weekend to be the dad your children are looking for.

Happy Father’s Day from the Father Involvement Initiative – Ontario.

Father as Teacher Part 2

One of the main roles a father has is to be a teacher of his children.  A previous blog began some thoughts on this.  Here are some more ways fathers can teach their children.

Words that help to correct behaviour

Chandra is excited about her new kitten. She wants to play with it all the time. But she is too rough. She mauls the kitten almost like it was a stuffed toy. “Careful, Chandra,” says Dad. “Your kitten is just a baby. If you want to hold him, you need to be gentle.”

Using the words “careful” and “gentle” helps Chandra connect the ideas of gentleness and care with a real experience where they are necessary — handling a helpless baby animal. Setting a limit — that she has to be gentle or Dad won’t let her hold the kitten — helps her see that her behaviour is what determines whether or not she’ll be able to handle her pet.

Learning to make decisions about behaviour

When children are very small we spend a lot of time watching over them, telling and showing them what to do and making decisions for them. If they are to develop character they must learn how to act on their own with less and eventually no help from adults. Here are some ways we can help them gain experience.

Giving choices

Offering small age-appropriate choices is one way to help young children learn to make decisions and about the impacts of those decisions.

Liam and his father are shopping. Liam wants a cookie from the bakery. “You can have one more cookie today,” says Dad.

“You can either have one now or have one after dinner. Which would you like?”

Doing things for themselves

“Dad, can you get me an apple?” says Kari. “I think you can handle that yourself,” says Hiro. “The apples are in a bowl on the kitchen table.”

_______________________________

“I don’t know what to wear to school,” says Jake.

Dad could tell Jake what to wear, but at age seven, he is ready to learn how to make decisions like what to wear on a

cold day. “Check the weather forecast in the newspaper,” Dad suggests.

Jake checks. “The newspaper says it’s going to be minus three today,” Jake says.

“Do you think your baseball cap will be warm enough?” Dad asks.

“No, I need my winter hat,” says Jake.

It’s OK to do things for our kids sometimes. But they also need to learn how to look after themselves, take on responsibilities and deal with challenges. If we always tell them what to do and do everything for them, they won’t learn to act and think for themselves. Letting children take on small responsibilities like getting their own snacks and deciding what to wear are good places to start. However, first they may need to spend time doing the task along with you – “Would you get a cup for me to pour your juice into?” – before they can do it on their own.

The boundaries between your child’s responsibility for herself and your responsibility as a father will keep shifting as they grow. The idea is to let your children do as much for themselves as they can handle. Keep an eye on them to make sure they’re doing OK and be ready to provide guidance, support and direction when needed. Give positive feedback when they have made good decisions and help them learn from their mistakes. But try to remember that one day our kids will have to behave and get through their lives without us there to tell them what to do. They need lots of experience.

Don’t overdo it with the teaching

• We don’t have to turn every single situation into a lesson. Besides, if we overuse any kind of parenting technique,

children start to tune us out.

• Keep it simple with small children. Preschoolers need short, uncomplicated instructions and explanations that they can understand easily.

• Don’t expect too much too soon. Children sometimes amaze us with the patience, determination, good judgement, self-discipline or honesty they show. Other times they will disappoint us. Making mistakes is part of the learning process. True character takes a long time to develop. Children need to feel loved and accepted even when we’re not happy with their behaviour.

Japan Earthquake Relief

For years we have been partnering with agencies in Japan as they work to engage fathers.  Because of this close connection FII-ON has decided to do what we can to support the country as it deals with the aftermath of the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear situation.  So often the impact of natural disasters go on, but the media loses its interest and therefore the rest of us around the world lose our connection to the plight of these people.  We want to help keep this situation before us all.  If you want to read more about what we have done in our partnership with folks in Japan and help out, please follow this link.

Every little bit counts.

Father as Teacher

Teachable Moments

Children are always learning. They learn by imitating, by experimenting and by following their natural urges to explore the world and the people around them. They also learn from us. Parents are children’s first and most important teachers.

Kids learn about character partly from real life experience. A girl who works hard on her skating and makes the hockey team as a result, learns that perseverance and hard work often lead to success. A boy who holds the door for a mother with a stroller and is thanked, feels proud and also learns that people appreciate courtesy. That makes him more likely to be courteous in the future.

But children don’t always make a clear connection between their actions and the consequences of those actions. In fact, kids often think their success is due to luck and that failure is bad luck or someone else’s fault. We can help them make the real connection by taking advantage of teachable moments: situations when a child’s action provides us with a chance to teach them little lessons about the relationship between behaviour and results.

“Dad, I don’t have any clean socks.”

“Where’s that pile of laundry I gave you to put away yesterday?” Sasha asks.

“I don’t know,” Mika replies.

Sasha walks into his nine-year-old daughter’s room. It’s messy. “Whoa, this room needs cleaning up. I see toys, books and dirty laundry all over the place,” says Sasha. “Put your toys and books away and put your dirty clothes in the laundry hamper. Then see what you can find.”

Ten minutes later, Mika comes out of her room wearing clean socks, “Ah,” says Sasha. “I see you found the pile of clean laundry. This is why it’s good to keep your room neat and clean.” He taps a finger on Mika’s head playfully. She rolls her eyes, “I know. It’s easier to find your socks.”

Sasha could have yelled at Mika, made her feel ashamed about the messiness of her room, or found the socks himself. But instead he used the situation as a teachable moment. He showed Mika how she could solve her own problem and helped her see the connection between keeping her room clean and being able to find things.

Be watching for more thoughts about how we can be a good teacher of our children.