Reading Is Fundamental ...For You With Your Child

 

Happy Father’s Day! I don’t know what your children get you for Father’s Day, but this year, in my family, we chose Jewish books that we think the father/grandfathers in our lives would enjoy. Now, I don’t know if the fathers reading this would appreciate a book.  But, there are a number of reasons why a book purchase is a good gift (aside from the fact that the recipients in our family enjoy reading!) 

Coincidentally, I came across an article this weekend “Johnny Hates To Read” by Yonoson Rosenblum.  He begins with a story: 

I recently watched a clip of a group of American college students frolicking on a Florida beach during spring break. They were asked a number of questions, and their answers could easily make one despair of America’s future. First question: Who was the Revolutionary War fought against? No clue. Second question: Who were the two sides in the Civil War? Here at least one of the college students ventured an answer: “Let’s see. It’s called the Civil War. So, it must have been the civilians against whomever was in power.” Where could such comical ignorance have come from? One explanation is that the current generation of high school and college students do not read, and many are functionally illiterate in terms of being able to understand the content of a simple paragraph. 

Rosenblum goes on to quote some statistics.  In 1976, 40% of 12th graders read at least six books for pleasure in the course of a year.  In 2021-22, the number was 13% (even during covid).  Over ⅖ of 12th graders today have not read a book for pleasure the entire year. He continues to quote an article from The Atlantic indicating that college students are overwhelmed by reading. College professors complain that students cannot comprehend basic paragraphs. A professor who used to assign 30 pages of reading, now if he assigns more than ten pages students say they are overwhelmed. 

Rosenblum then shares his thoughts as to the root of this problem…which you can probably guess. “The main culprit behind the lack of interest in books and magazines is the explosion of handheld devices programmed to provide neural rewards with little effort. Frederick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute reports that in the 1960s, full-time students at four-year colleges spent 24 hours a week studying. In 2022, 70% of such students were devoting less than ten hours a week to studying, even though they are much less likely to hold down jobs than were students in previous generations. So what do they do with their time? Two researchers estimated in 2023 that college students spend an average of seven hours a day on their smartphones, and that they pick them up 113 times a day. That is addiction.” (Rosenblum goes on to discuss a second factor- declining standards and expectations).

 And, aside from the lack of knowledge our non-readers are growing up with, the research shows that there are a plethora of benefits of reading that non- readers are not gaining.  I will only mention some here. Reading is essential for vocabulary development, improving focus and concentration, enhancing imagination, stress reduction, critical thinking, improving writing skills, improves neuroplasticity, enhances brain connectivity and on and on. 

So, what does father’s day have anything to do with this issue? Yes, both mothers and fathers need to be joining our Yavneh Parent Tech Committee, sign the pledge and enforce limits and expectations so our children will read more and be on their devices less. (Shout out for our Parent Tech Committee!) 

 But, additionally, there is actually research on the impact of fathers on reading practices of children.  Dr. Paul Schwanenflugel and Dr. Nancy Knapp (a relation?), in their article “ A Father’s Role in Reading” writes that we all know how important it is for parents to read to their children, (see a column I once wrote sharing that this applies to middle school students too!).  But, research indicates that often the parents who read are mothers. Only 19% of young fathers said they enjoyed reading with their children.  The fathers who do read tend “to pose more abstract questions that challenge children to use their imaginations or connect what they are reading to outside experiences.”  And, reading to their children helps fathers feel more emotionally attached to their children. 

Fathers are also important reading role models, particularly for boys. They continue, that if boys only see their mothers reading “boys often begin to see reading as an essentially feminine activity.” And, even as children grow into their teenage years this impact of their fathers on their reading behaviors continues.  Fathers who “recommend and discuss books with their teenagers have a positive impact on whether or what they read.” 

As we approach the summer, this message of “reading with one’s children” is essential, all year, of course, but especially when school is out, and if they are not in sleepaway camp they are home with us. And, this relates, of course, to “reading”/learning Torah with them as well.   The Gemara Bava Batra 21a shares:

דְּאָמַר רַב יְהוּדָה אָמַר רַב: בְּרַם, זָכוּר אוֹתוֹ הָאִישׁ לַטּוֹב – וִיהוֹשֻׁעַ בֶּן גַּמְלָא שְׁמוֹ, שֶׁאִלְמָלֵא הוּא, נִשְׁתַּכַּח תּוֹרָה מִיִּשְׂרָאֵל. שֶׁבִּתְחִלָּה, מִי שֶׁיֵּשׁ לוֹ אָב – מְלַמְּדוֹ תּוֹרָה, מִי שֶׁאֵין לוֹ אָב – לֹא הָיָה לָמֵד תּוֹרָה..

As Rav Yehuda says that Rav says: Truly, that man is remembered for the good, and his name is Yehoshua ben Gamla. If not for him the Torah would have been forgotten from the Jewish people. Initially, whoever had a father would have his father teach him Torah, and whoever did not have a father would not learn Torah at all. 

The Jewish educational system used to be that parents taught their children at home. But, Yehoshua Ben Gamla saw that not all had someone to teach them, and so he started the school system. That system developed to the point that parents outsourced learning with their children to schools. 

But, during the summer, we have them back!  Interestingly enough, I came across an article by Rabbi Yaakov Feitman, “Summer- The Time For Parents To Do Their Homework.” He quotes an article from The New York Times, July 24, 2016 that  “experts” are recommending that instead of bribing children to read during the summer, “they don’t necessarily have to be money, treats or toys. It could be that it’s a special thing to go to the library with Dad and that alone time is part of what’s rewarding about it… Such nonmaterial rewards may be the most effective.”

This is our chance! Our chance to engage our children with a love of reading and learning, and to form those connections and bonds with them. So, on this Father’s Day, read a book… in front of and with your child,  and as the summer approaches cherish this time with your child and learn together! 

Advisory Update:

Sixth Grade: These last weeks of school our sixth graders are engaged in lessons on summer safety- particularly when away at sleepaway camp, gratitude to teachers and creating a success guide with tips for middle school success for next year’s incoming sixth graders. 

Seventh Grade:  These last week of school students are creating an end of the year time capsule to remember all they accomplished this year and are spending time sharing gratitude with their teachers. 

Graduation Parenting

 

I think I may have mentioned this before, but my family knows that I am a huge Rabbi David Fohrman fan. I listen to his Aleph Beta videos every Friday while cooking and when I run out of time I print out the transcript or read his book to share whether on Shabbat, Pesach, Shavuot- you name it! 

This week’s video hit home as we approach graduation this week, and we “send our 8th graders into the world.”  For those of you who have older children, you may not feel the significance of this event, but as someone who interacts with middle school students daily, I view this event as if we are sending them into adulthood. The parenting strategies you, as parents, have established during their years at Yavneh pretty much set the tone for your relationship with them until 120. So, I wonder, what is our role as parents as we send them off? 

Rabbi Fohrman clearly knew what I was thinking as he shared, “One of the problems with having children is that they do not come with instruction manuals. The Torah is a great instruction manual for life. So we might ask, is there an instruction manual within it for parenting? I want to suggest that in this week's Parsha, there is a parenting manual. It's only three verses long and in those three verses is just about everything that you need to know, to parent your child, or at least the seeds of everything you need to know.”

The three pesukim he refers to are in Bamidbar 6:24-26 are known as Birkat Kohanim.

כדיְבָֽרֶכְךָ֥ ה וְיִשְׁמְרֶֽךָ:היָאֵ֨ר ה | פָּנָ֛יו אֵלֶ֖יךָ וִֽיחֻנֶּֽךָּ:כויִשָּׂ֨א ה | פָּנָיו֙ אֵלֶ֔יךָ וְיָשֵׂ֥ם לְךָ֖ שָׁלֽוֹם:

May Hashem bless you and watch over you. May Hashem cause His countenance to shine to you and favor you. May Hashem raise His countenance toward you and grant you peace.

It has become a custom to bless our children weekly on Friday night with these same pesukim. And, so, Rabbi Fohrman says, “I would like to suggest that those three verses, the three verses that we parents say weekly to our children, is not just a blessing as to how God should treat them but by extension, a kind of manual as to how we should treat our children.”

These pesukim seem repetitive, but in essence they are saying three different things. Rabbi Fohrman quotes the Nefesh HaChaim, Reb Chaim of Volozhin, who says that “Blessing” means to multiply the strength- to build someone up. So when we bless our children we are building up their physical, emotional, intellectual, and moral strengths. That is a fundamental job as  a parent. That is “יְבָֽרֶכְךָ֥ “.

But, the second role of parents is “ וְיִשְׁמְרֶֽךָ” - to watch over them and protect the from harm. Sometimes harm comes from the inside and sometimes from the outside. As Rabbi Fohrman notes:’Sometimes that harm can come from the outside. You give your kid rules, only cross at the crosswalks. Look both ways. Sometimes the harm can come from the inside, children can veer off in irresponsible directions and there the need to discipline the child emerges, to protect them, sometimes from themselves. But discipline is always a function of keeping the child safe in some way or another. It is really the only rationale for discipline, you don't discipline a child for your needs as a parent, you don't discipline them because they make you look funny in front of them all or what will the neighbors say if junior acts out like this? That is not for the kid, that's for you. The rationale for discipline is to watch over them, so that they can grow. Yevarechecha v'yishmerecha, 'Bless and watch over'.”

These obligations to watch over our children and build them up, maintains Rabbi Fohrman, begin in the womb even before they are born. The word for womb in Hebrew is רחם the same root as the word רחמים- compassion. To have compassion on someone means to help him/her grow and keep him/her safe. 

The parenting skills found in יָאֵ֨ר ה | פָּנָ֛יו אֵלֶ֖יךָ וִֽיחֻנֶּֽךָּ:כויִשָּׂ֨א יְה | פָּנָיו֙ אֵלֶ֔יךָ וְיָשֵׂ֥ם לְךָ֖ שָׁלֽוֹם are, according to Rabbi Fohrman, “May G-d light his face towards you”, meaning, like Hashem towards the Jewish people, as a parent, that your face should literally light up when you see your child. 

And, וִֽיחֻנֶּֽךָּ is from חן. As Rabbi Fohrman shares: “…let Him grant you grace. What does grace mean? The Hebrew word chein comes from the word lechanein, also related to chinam, for free; to give for free. It's completely undeserved love. It's what we might call unconditional love. It's different from rachamim, compassion. Compassion is the love that I bestow in order to attain something. It is conditional. I'm trying to build you up. I have a goal… but chein, grace, that is unconditional. It's love that has no goal. It's love for its own sake. It's love because you are my child, and I can't help but smile when I look at you. It's the kind of love that every father and mother knows, when their eyes meet the eyes of their child, and they can't help but smile.”

The third kind of love is: יִשָּׂ֨א ה | פָּנָיו֙ אֵלֶ֔יךָ וְיָשֵׂ֥ם לְךָ֖ שָׁלֽוֹם.  First compassion, then unconditional love and then the third kind where, like Hashem does with Bnai Yisrael- He raises his gaze to meet the gaze of Bnai Yisrael, so too as parents meet the gaze of our children. “Love between “equals”” This is when they are at an age where they are face to face with us and can make their own choices. At times our children make choices different from ours. And, at that time we need to look them in the eye and “grant them peace.” “It's a much more difficult love for a parent to give, but to truly be a parent, it means to be able to let go. It means being able to accept your child, even in moments when they disappoint us. It is one thing to look down at a child and to meet his gaze; that is chein. It is a much harder thing to look across at a child and meet his gaze and give him shalom, give him peace.”

Where does that ability come from? It comes from all the years we spent building rachamim and chein with our children. 

Rabbi Fohrman ends with recommending that if you aren’t blessing your children each Friday night you should start doing so. “And, As your child comes over to you, use those few moments to think about these three kinds of parental love and ask yourself, at this stage in my child's life, which one of those kinds does this child use? Do they need to be built up? Do they need to be guarded? Maybe they need the smile that says I'm just so delighted with them. Maybe they need to see more chein. Or maybe they need peace. Maybe they need me to pick up their chin, to look them in the eye and to tell them that I can go forward with them in love, even when they've chosen differently than I have.”

So, as we approach graduation this week, I hope that we at Yavneh have done a good job in partnering with you to support your children with רחמים, חן and שלום.  Hopefully we have provided them with a feeling of safety as we protected them with compassion. We trust that they know we will always unconditionally love them and our faces will light up when we see them. (Tell them to come back and visit!)  And, that we will always wish them well, wherever life takes them.