Posts Tagged → parenting

Email to Families | New year, new schedule

Dear Families,

Happy New Year! The schedule in TeamSnap has been updated with the practices and game schedules for the next little while. There’s about 4 weeks left in the regular season. After that, we have playoffs consisting of 3 weeks of round-robin and 2 weeks of eliminations.

1. This weekend

There is a practice and a game this weekend (January 7 and 8). Looking forward to seeing everyone. We could use a goalie.

2. Goalie

If your child hasn’t played goalie yet or has played only once, the next four weeks is a great opportunity. We are looking for 2 players to be goalie more regularly as we head into the playoffs. We’d like them to be in net more consistently, so they have a chance to get comfortable and build up their skills.

3. Expectations for players

We are continuing our expectations from the fall.

  • Put on equipment independently.
  • Arrive 20 minutes before the start of a game
  • Take off equipment independently.

Thanks to everyone who has been able to do this. Let’s keep it up. Practices and games work really smoothly when this happens.

4. Lost and found

I have a white practice jersey and a neck guard. I will put these into the lost and found at Oriole, if they are not claimed.

5. Humble winners and gracious losers

We spend a lot of time talking about how to be a good sport when we lose a game, because it’s an important life lesson. Kids need to show themselves grace and appreciate the effort that they put in. They also can practice resilience and grit by coming back and trying again.

We don’t spend as much time talking about how to be a humble winner. Our team is in first place and some of our wins have been lop-sided. I don’t know how the rest of the season will turn out, but there’s a chance we will win another game. So here are a few things that humble w

  • Acknowledge the other team as worthy opponents. If they didn’t show up, there would be no game. Thank them for their play and, if appropriate, shake hands with them after the game. In house league, the team that you are on is a matter of chance. Any of our children could have been on the last place team.
  • Thank people that helped the team succeed. Hockey is a team sport. Many players, coaches, and parents had to pitch in for the win to happen. You can never go wrong by thanking someone.
  • Don’t trash talk teams or players. Our kids watch a lot of YouTube, which normalizes negative talk about losing or players with less skill. It would serve our children better to be able to empathize with their peers.

Thanks, everyone. Looking forward to seeing you this weekend.

Best,
Susan

Email to Families | Week 8 Update

Dear Families,

We have a few pieces of news and reminders to share.

1. Rebalancing

After the first few weeks in the season, it is sometimes necessary to re-balance teams. The league does this to keep games fun for kids by making sure that no team is winning or losing all the time.

Please join us in giving a warm welcome to T and L. They will be with us for the rest of the season. We’d like to thank S and T for being great team mates on and off the ice. We are sad to see them go and wish them well on their new teams.

2. Covering zones and playing positions

Here are a few videos on playing positions in the defensive zone that have been selected by Coach Matt. All players should watch these videos. This might be new information for some and a reminder for others. In either case, it gives our team a common foundation that we can build on.

Overall defensive zone coverage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9r9AJx2jKo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzh7D768sVA

Coverage for each position
Defence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aXsrNrT5RI
Wing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ikqt_iY4nSA
Center: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1BN-Om5i6Q

3. Expectations for players

To ensure that practices and games run smoothly, we have some basic expectations for players.

* Put on equipment independently.
* Arrive 20 minutes before the start of a game
* Take off equipment independently.

Many thanks to the players and families who are already meeting these expectations. If your child is not meeting these expectations, they may need some support from you to get there.

The changing rooms are small, so we’d like parents to wait outside. With the exception of tying skates and putting on goalie equipment, players at this age are capable of dressing on their own. If a player needs help with skate tying, they can ask for help or they can come out of the dressing room to ask a parent.

We need players to arrive early for games, so that we can have a team meeting. At that time, we review the lines and points of performance for the game. The coaches need to prepare a roster on paper for the game officials. It’s stressful for players and coaches when some kids don’t show up until the last minute. Also, this is why we ask that you keep your availability up to date on TeamSnap. If a player arrives after the game sheet has been submitted, they may not be able to play in the game.

Ideally, the players go on the ice as soon as the zamboni leaves the ice, so they can have a good warm up.

4. Positive reinforcement

I’d like to wrap up with comments on things that have been going well.

We had a great practice last week. We worked on skills and every player who was there improved significantly. I was delighted because one of my goals is for players to learn and grow.

So far this season, we’ve had 6 different players in net, including one person who had never been a goalie before. I’m really proud of our kids for stepping outside their comfort zone and trying something new. These are the kinds of lessons that we can take from the ice into life.

As parents, it’s important for us to provide positive reinforcement to the kids. About 70% of kids drop out of sports by high school, because it stops being fun. Many kids find the ride home particularly miserable, because parents like to provide “constructive criticism.” The most important things we can say to them are “I’m proud of you when you play hockey” and “I like watching you play.” I know how challenging it is to make this change, because I did it. But the results have been worth it.

Thanks to you, the families. We wouldn’t have a team without you. If you have any questions or concerns, we are here to help.

Best,

Susan

Putting children first

Original post 2022/11/01

The Ontario Legislature is currently debating Bill 28, Keeping Students in Class Act, 2022. The purpose of the bill is to prevent education workers from going on strike and imposing a settlement on them. The worst parts of this bill are 1) preemptively invoking the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian constitution and 2) circumventing the Ontario Human Rights Code. This is no way to run a government. It’s not how the notwithstanding clause was meant to be used and human rights aren’t limited to when it’s convenient.

If you want to learn more about the labour conflict, there’s lots of material. If the government wants to put children first, the solution is easy: pay fair wages, so schools can hire and retain qualified people. Of course the government should be responsible holders of the public purse. So that means staying at the bargaining table and making reasonable offers. Not by fast-tracking legislation that a priori takes away rights.

Why shouldn’t we use the notwithstanding clause?

Section 33 of the Canadian constitution allows governments to exempt laws from the Bill of Rights. Since Sections 2 and 7-15 of the charter protects individual rights, it was felt that some kind of mechanism was needed to supersede individual rights in an exceptional circumstance after careful consideration. The Province of Québec has been a heavy user to shield their language laws. The constitution probably would not have ratified without it

33 (1) Parliament or the legislature of a province may expressly declare in an Act of Parliament or of the legislature, as the case may be, that the Act or a provision thereof shall operate notwithstanding a provision included in section 2 or sections 7 to 15 of this Charter.

Unfortunately, the clause is being used like a cheat code when the game of governing gets to be too hard. This is the third time that the Ford government has attempted to use it.

What can I do?

Rather than ranting on social media, here are a few actions you can take. Actions at the top of the list tend to be more effective and less effort. Do one or more than one. It’s up to you.

Option 1: Contact Premier Ford, Minister Lecce and your MPP

Call Premier Ford: 416-325-1941
Call Minister Lecce: 416-325-2600

You can email too, but call is better. Premier Ford pays attention to the feedback that comes in each day and his phone is answered 24/7.

If you are just as stunned by @fordnation & @Sflecce‘s use of the Notwithstanding Clause to trample education workers’ rights, don’t just tweet. Call them.


Ford: 📞416-325-1941
Lecce: 📞416-325-2600


I am a parent. I want my child in class as much as anyone else. Not like this.” — Danyaal Raza (@DanyaalRaza) October 31, 2022

When you call, make your points and be polite. The people on the phone are just doing their jobs.

Here’s what I said.

“I’m concerned about Bill 28, Keeping Students in Class Act. It uses the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian constitution and sets aside the Ontario Human Rights Code. This is not a good law. The government should get back to the bargaining table and give education workers a fair deal. Their wages should keep up with inflation and schools should be able to hire qualified people to do the work.”

You can also contact your MPP by phone or email. You can find your MPP by using your address. If your MPP is not a Conservative, it’s less effective, but still worth doing.

I emailed using basically the same words as I did over the phone.

Option 2: Write to Prime Minister Trudeau and your MP

The federal government can disallow a law passed by a provincial government. It hasn’t been used for many years, but in the past it was used a lot. Bill 28, if it’s passed, would set a bad precedent and it’s worthwhile putting up a fight.

Comment
by from discussion
intoronto

Option 3: Donate your “Catch Up Payment”

The Ministry of Education has a one-time program to give parents $200 per child ($250 for a special needs child) to help them “catch up” on learning gaps that came about as a result of the COVID pandemic. The program cost $365 million. As an individual parent, I can’t move the needle on three years of pandemic schooling with $200. But imagine what a teacher could do with $5400 or what an entire school could do with $140,000.

Apply for the payment and donate it.

I suggest CUPE, as they will be facing fines and legal fees. Email for Interac is info@osbcu.ca. You could also donate it to an opposition party. Or your favourite teacher.

Option 4: Join a picket line

Join a picket line to support them.

“Find a picket line here: cupe.on.ca/dontbeabully/” Source: @Yoequality on Twitter

I did.

From Hockey Mom to Head Coach

My son plays hockey in a house league in the U12/U13 division. Everybody who signs up gets to play. Each week there’s one practice and one game. It’s chill.

I’ve been wishing for better coaching on my son’s house league team for a while now. The best coaches are amazing. They show kids how to tie up skates and bring an extra stick for a kid to try. They don’t just work on skills, they build character.

The challenge for coaches are the competing demands on their time. They can’t always show up. These dads (yes, they’re all dads) have work, family, and leisure obligations. When they don’t show up, there’s a gap in consistency and continuity. And sometimes there’s the “Select” team that they have to worry about.[1]

In September, an email went out looking for volunteers and coaches. There was one tidbit that caught my eye. There would be professional on-ice coaches for the first half of the season.

So I put up my hand to volunteer.

The on-ice help was important to me, because I don’t play hockey. I can barely skate. I helped out the first season that my son played, so I know some basics. But that was a very long time ago and the kids are more capable now.

I think the league didn’t take my offer seriously. I didn’t get invited to the pre-season preparation sessions. The league convenor emailed me the week before the season started saying that he would let my son’s coach know that I was willing to “help out.”

It wasn’t what I was hoping for, but if they genuinely didn’t need me as a coach, that would be OK with me.

Fast forward a couple of days and an email goes out to all the coaches. I’m on the list and I found out who would be the head coach and assistant coach for my son’s team. I’m an assistant coach after all.

The head coach emailed us two assistant coaches and asked if one of us could take his role. He’s already coaching a select team and he will have to miss a lot of practices.

The other assistant coach declined, because he has three kids playing hockey and would have trouble being consistent.

I said that I’d be happy to be head coach. I could keep folks organized, but I’d need help with the hockey.

The season lasts from October to April. I have a lot to learn.

[1] There are tryouts to get on the Select team and they play against teams from nearby leagues. The players get their names and a number of their choice on their jerseys. Kids on the Select team are required to be on a house league team. They have an additional 2-3 activities on their calendar and it’s not unusual for these to conflict with house league. About one third of the kids and coaches are involved in both teams.

Original post 2022/10/10

The 80% Mom

One thing you said haunts me still. When I asked about motherhood, you said that children don’t need as much as you gave. “Eighty percent is probably plenty.” I was shocked by your words. Did you regret having given so much of yourself? Now, those words seem like a gift. A way of offering me a model of motherhood, beyond even your own example.

I first read this about a year ago and it really struck home. It comes from an open letter by Karin Cook to her mom who had passed away from cancer many years before.

Continue reading →

The Buddy System for Working Moms

Madeleine Albright said, “There is a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.” Her intention was to point out that women as sisters should help each other succeed. Successful women have an especially high burden in this regard. To me, her comment seemed to be directed at individual women. A couple of things that I read/heard this week made me wonder if this should be directed at the structural and social arrangements that we have. In other words, we as women need to systematically seek each other out to be partners and help each other succeed in the workplace. I give you two very different examples to illustrate, one from a former professor and one from an officer in the Navy.

A personal essay by Kathy Weston appeared in Science recently. She is a science writer, who used to be a professor at University College London. After 20 years in her position, a Research Assessment Exercise deemed her contribution to the department to be inadequate. She left before she could be fired. Her career started off well enough, but her research projects became more modest and unambitious over the years. The causes included the competing attentions of family and her own self-doubt. One paragraph of the essay especially caught my attention.

Trying to run a lab full time with small children at home is very likely to result in a drop in research productivity or quality, and yet little allowance is made for those of us, mostly women, who find ourselves in this situation. I believe I could have run my lab very successfully if I had been permitted to job-share with a close female colleague, also with two young children. Between us, we could have covered all the bases, and perhaps as a team we would have retained our competitive edge and hence our enthusiasm. This just does not happen in the male-oriented world of science in which, traditionally, dogs are keen to dine on dogs rather than share the bone between them, so to speak.

And the part about collaborating with a female colleague is important. While sharing a lab with a male colleague certainly would be beneficial, he would not be feeling the same pull from home and pressure to perform at work.

Petty Officer 1st Class Sheena Sullen was the subject of an story on NPR this morning. She had enlisted in the Navy and was about to be deployed on a missile destroyer. Her fiance had already been deployed, so there was no one available to look after her two children, ages 14 and 8. Sullen made a call to her childhood friend, Jihan Sanders. After careful consideration, Sanders quit her job and moved into Sullen’s home in another state along with her own children, ages 12 and 9. It’s an incredible act of friendship– in both directions.

For Sanders, it is a privilege to be a temporary mother, as Sullen had been to her. “I never had a mother, so I didn’t know what it was like, even how to act like a girl,” Sanders says.

Sanders is helping Sullen at home, so Sullen can succeed at her job as a Naval officer. If Sullen could not have deployed, it would have been the end of her career.

What if women could have buddy systems that were not ad hoc? What if it became the norm for women to find other women to help them run households and research laboratories? This pairing up would have nothing to do with romantic relationships (and would probably be better if it didn’t). It would be more like a sister than a mate. I don’t want to suggest that Weston would still be professor if she had a buddy to share her lab. Her story could have done in any number of directions. But it would have helped, and it would probably help women, including me, would benefit from an arrangement like this.

And as a special bonus, that special place in hell would be a lot smaller.

What did Solomon know about motherhood anyways?

There is a famous story in the Hebrew Bible about how Solomon adjudicated a dispute between two women both claiming rights to a child. The story is intended to show how wise Solomon was.

1 Kings 3:16-28 (New International Version, ©2010)

A Wise Ruling

16 Now two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him. 17 One of them said, “Pardon me, my lord. This woman and I live in the same house, and I had a baby while she was there with me. 18 The third day after my child was born, this woman also had a baby. We were alone; there was no one in the house but the two of us.
19 “During the night this woman’s son died because she lay on him. 20 So she got up in the middle of the night and took my son from my side while I your servant was asleep. She put him by her breast and put her dead son by my breast. 21 The next morning, I got up to nurse my son—and he was dead! But when I looked at him closely in the morning light, I saw that it wasn’t the son I had borne.”

22 The other woman said, “No! The living one is my son; the dead one is yours.”

But the first one insisted, “No! The dead one is yours; the living one is mine.” And so they argued before the king.

23 The king said, “This one says, ‘My son is alive and your son is dead,’ while that one says, ‘No! Your son is dead and mine is alive.’”

24 Then the king said, “Bring me a sword.” So they brought a sword for the king. 25 He then gave an order: “Cut the living child in two and give half to one and half to the other.”

26 The woman whose son was alive was deeply moved out of love for her son and said to the king, “Please, my lord, give her the living baby! Don’t kill him!”

But the other said, “Neither I nor you shall have him. Cut him in two!”

27 Then the king gave his ruling: “Give the living baby to the first woman. Do not kill him; she is his mother.”

28 When all Israel heard the verdict the king had given, they held the king in awe, because they saw that he had wisdom from God to administer justice.

This story, and the interpretation of it, drives me nuts. It feels very unfair and imposes a very narrow view of how a mother should be have. It emphasized the self-sacrificing aspect of motherhood and makes this an expectation of all “good” mothers. Why is it not possible for a “real” mother to prefer that her child die than go to some one else? Someone who might not be a good mother, such as a child abuser or drug addict? At the same time, I would be very sympathetic to a mother who has been looking after a demanding, colicky baby and has become completely fed up with the situation. Long term sleep deprivation (I’m talking months here, not days or weeks) is a nasty thing. I could see King Solomon’s offer to divide the child in half being the last straw– “You want him? Fine. Take him.”

It would be more productive for all concerned to think of “mother” as a verb, and not just a noun. Mother, the noun, is like a job title. It’s static. Once you give birth, adopt, foster, or marry into a child, you are given this label. It does not say anything about how, or even if, you fulfill any of the duties of the position.

Mother, the verb, is an action that needs to be performed over and over. It’s a process that needs to be sustained on a daily basis. You do this by caring for and nurturing someone, by paying close attention to their emotional, physical, spiritual, and intellectual needs.
Some of us have a mother (the noun), who isn’t very good at mothering (the verb). Maybe they were too young or immature when they had us. Perhaps they may were struggling with their own demons of mental illness or addiction. Or they were in need of a mother themselves. For people like us, Mother’s Day can be awkward and bittersweet.

Some of us have people in our lives who are good at mothering, but aren’t necessarily mothers (the noun). We may have had a relative, teacher, or neighbor who looked after us when we needed it. Men can mother too. The stay-at-home dad in my family is proof of that.

So, what did Solomon know about motherhood anyways? Did he give birth to a child? Was he responsible for the care and feeding of a child on a daily basis? How many nights has King Solomon stayed up walking the floors with a baby who won’t stop crying? There is little historical evidence to answer these questions definitively. But it would be fair to answer in the negative. Raising children tended to be women’s work and not in the job description for a royal prince. (To be fair, not necessarily work for a royal princess or queen, either.)

So did Solomon get it right? We don’t know. But if Solomon were alive today and making judgments using the same categories, it’s more than likely that he wouldn’t have. It’s not as easy to be wise, when you’re not living in a narrative, people are not stereotypes, and categories are in flux.

Sendak’s Trilogy and The Secret Life of Children


A few months ago, we started reading Maurice Sendak’s books to Lentil. We’ve had “Where the Wild Things Are” and “In the Night Kitchen” for a while, but Lentil wasn’t ready to appreciate them yet. We had read certain books over and over again, and we were ready for something new. She loved them. The stories are not at all sensible or logical, and the art is beautiful. She looked at the pictures so closely and was so quiet while I was reading. The book jacket for “In the Night Kitchen” mentions that these books are part of trilogy, according to Sendak. Since Lentil liked these books so much, I decided to hunt down the third.

The local children’s book store had not heard of this, so I turned to the Internet. So the third book is “Outside Over There.” Most of the reviews on Amazon are positive, but a few parents were horrified by the book. The plot involves a young girl has to rescue her kidnapped baby sister from goblins (who look like babies) while their parents aren’t paying attention. In the reviews on Amazon, the parents felt that the book didn’t provide reasonable role-modeling of parents and might give their children nightmares; however, they did like the Wild Things and Night Kitchen. I found this odd, because parents are entirely absent from those books, and scary things happen in those books too (Max meets monsters and Mickey is baked in a cake.)

Although the three books don’t have the same characters, the books are a trilogy because they are thematically related. According to Sendak, the books are about

how children master various feelings — anger, boredom, fear, frustration, jealousy — and manage to come to grips with the realities of their lives

A recent article in the New York Times, Maurice Sendak’s Concerns, Beyond Where the Wild Things Are mentions that Sendak had relentless nightmares about kidnapping. Sendak is also haunted by a terrible sense of inadequacy, even now as he approaches his 81. Journalist Patricia Cohen wrote:

That Mr. Sendak fears that his work is inadequate, that he is racked with insecurity and anxiety, is no surprise. For more than 50 years that has been the hallmark of his art. The extermination of most of his relatives and millions of other Jews by the Nazis; the intrusive, unemployed immigrants who survived and crowded his parents’ small apartment; his sickly childhood; his mother’s dark moods; his own ever-present depression — all lurk below the surface of his work, frequently breaking through in meticulously drawn, fantastical ways.

As children mature, it is good and appropriate for them to separate from their parents and be able to function independently. The degree of separation and independence, of course, varies with age and the personality of the child. It is fiction to suggest that a parent can be present for every moment of a child’s life. I believe that children can have complex internal lives, right before our eyes at an age much younger age than we expect. Last month on This American Life, Episode 361 entitled “Fear of Sleep” was on sleep disorders, both medical and emotional. Act IV was about a boy, Seth Lind, who saw Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining when he was six years old and had trouble falling asleep for the next two years. The horror movie particular affected him because the movie was told from the point of view of a young child. As part of the segment, Seth interviews his mother about that period of time. She had no idea that he was so tormented and recalled that he was a happy, go-lucky kid. Later in the segment, Seth is asked why he never talked to his parents about his fear of sleep. His answer was along the lines of: in the end, everyone goes to sleep and you have to deal with it on your own. At the risk of sounding cynical, I think there’s an essential truth there. We’re much better off giving children support, skills, and freedom, than attempting the impossible task of monitoring them 24/7.

Whither wet nurses?

Rita Arens’ post Whose Boobies? on BlogHer caught my interest. In this and other posts, she is honest about not being entirely successful at breastfeeding her child, because she had difficulty identifying breasts as anything, but sexual. In this post, she mentions misgivings that she and other women have about wet nurses and cross nursing (nursing some one else’s child). Some of the concerns that she cites are medical issues, cultural taboos, and intimacy concerns.

While I think these do play a part, to me the most significant factor that has changed is the family structure. In the current age, we think of the nuclear family as a good thing. The basic family unit is now mom, dad, and kids, with little extended family around. We live together, work together, and bond together in these units. A reliance on someone else for bonding or emotional sustenance is a kind of failure, especially for the mom. In the past, and in some places now, a child is raised by an extended family. A baby could be picked up and comforted by anyone. There were many hands– and many mammaries– to share the work. Extended families were the social safety net. These arrangements are what is denoted by the phrase “it takes a village to raise a child.”

In this analysis, milk banks are a little more acceptable than wet nurses, because only the nourishment is being transferred. Actually, it’s illegal in the US to sell breast milk, because trade in bodily fluids, such as blood, is prohibited. Hence, we have blood banks and milk banks. A volunteer blood donation program generally has higher quality blood (e.g. fewer pathogens) than programs where donors are compensated financially for their contributions. (Cue the image of the homeless person with the leaking bandage on his arm and a few dollars in his pocket.) Consequently, one certainly couldn’t make a living by selling breast milk. But what about providing wet nursing as a service?

While we’re at it, why are men allowed to donate sperm and receive financial compensation? Sounds like a double standard, I say. It’s far less medically risky and socially damaging to share breast milk than sperm. There are many children out there who are wondering who is their anonymous sperm donor dad.