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How to Raise Moral Kids: 3 Steps for Teaching {Episode 49}
86 Plays5 years ago
Every parent wants their children to grow up to be kind, moral adults who are confident in choosing right vs. wrong. But how do we instill our most heartfelt values into our children?
In this episode, Audrey and Bonnie share their top 3 takeaways for raising children with a firm set of morals that will bless their lives and their future families for decades to come.
Episode sponsored by Novalie
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Transcript
The Universal Desire for Moral Children
00:00:01
Speaker
Hey moms and dads, what is your biggest wish for your children? Is it that they grow up to be kind, moral, contributing members of society who are also happy and confident in knowing how to choose right from wrong? We know that these are also our wishes for our own children. And so today's episode is going to be exploring our top three takeaways for how to raise moral children and get those adults that we all envision raising.
00:00:25
Speaker
This episode is sponsored by Novalee, Bonnie's new online clothing boutique with colorfully bold clothing for women. Go to Novalee.co to sign up for our email blast and get notified of upcoming after Christmas sale. Our newsletter subscribers are also the first to know about new arrivals and other promotions. So head to Novalee.co or visit us on Facebook and Instagram at Novalee clothing.
Finding Joy in Motherhood Chaos
00:00:52
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Outnumber the Podcast. I'm Bonnie. And I'm Audrey. And we're homeschooling moms to a combined total of 18 children. We know firsthand that motherhood is full of crazy chaos and overwhelming obligations, but it should also be full of love and laughter. Regardless of where you are on your journey, come join us as we work together to find joy in the chaos of motherhood.
00:01:17
Speaker
Welcome back, guys. We are so excited about this episode. We have been thinking a lot about this, about raising moral kids and teaching morality to our children. We're so excited, but we are going to start with a little humor segment I have for you guys. Are you ready, Audrey? Yeah, hit it. Earlier this year, Finn, who is six, he was just barely six, was making himself some lunch
00:01:39
Speaker
And I guess he was using the toaster oven and he got a burn by his armpit. And he was kind of crying about it. And I said, oh, no, son, I'm sorry. But how did you burn your armpit? That's what I was going to ask. He goes, um, grilled cheese, duh. I'm like, uh, OK. So the grilled cheese is in your armpit, or OK. I'm going to find out he opened the door and like rubbed up against it. But I was like, oh, that's an unusual burn spot, but all right.
00:02:07
Speaker
Seriously, duh, mom. And before somebody wants to call the authorities on me, yes, we are very independent at our house and we learn how to make our own lunches and breakfast. And I will say this, yes, it involves a couple of minor injuries, but I never let my young children do anything, you know, that would cause severe injuries. And I think that a few little burned fingers go in a long way in teaching lessons, you know? So that's kind of how we operate in the kitchen. Definitely. And that's totally going to be my stock answer whenever somebody asks me a question.
00:02:34
Speaker
Girl cheese, duh. It is kind of the answer to everything. I love girl cheese. All right. So today, talking about teaching our kids morals.
The Role of Families in Teaching Morality
00:02:47
Speaker
And so much emphasis is put on worldly pursuits. Education has completely separated separation of church and state. And so there's no morals taught in public secular education today. People focus on careers and success.
00:03:04
Speaker
developing talents and abilities, lots of emphasis put on basically everything else except morals. So the only place where morals are taught now is in families. Um, and so that's our responsibility and that's kind of why we want to talk about it today. Yes, totally. And just as an intro, I just wanted to share the definition of the word moral cause we're going to be using it a lot. So I want to make sure that we're all on the same page.
00:03:30
Speaker
So as an adjective, the dictionary says that moral is something that's concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior.
00:03:37
Speaker
and the goodness or badness of human character, which badness, I didn't know that was a word, but okay, dictionary says it is. And then the other definition is holding or manifesting high principles for proper conduct. So we're basically talking about right versus wrong. And it's a very interesting landscape right now when you start talking about morality in the world. And so we're gonna share our thoughts about it with you and how we best believe we can raise moral children.
Establishing and Exemplifying a Moral Code
00:04:01
Speaker
Well, you're going to break this down into three different ways. Number one is going to be deciding on a moral code for you and your family. Yep. Number two is then how to exemplify and put that code into practice. Right. And then the third thing is to hold your children accountable for when they break the rules of that moral code. Well, it's popular to believe that everybody has their own truth, innate truth, but this is kind of false.
00:04:26
Speaker
Kids don't, they're not really born with an innate understanding of what's right and wrong. And they need a firm foundation built in that. And lots of times kids
00:04:39
Speaker
never ending question why is coming with them trying to find out where the foundation is, where the borders are, why do we believe this? Why do we believe that? So if you look at morals as things that are black or white versus everything is gray. So that's a way that we think about and try to teach our kids about morals is that some things in life are
00:05:07
Speaker
black or white, one or the other, and it can't be in between. That's great. I love that you brought up how often kids ask why because these are prime teaching opportunities to say
00:05:18
Speaker
This is why. And to be honest, many times I don't know why, even when we're talking about this moral code that I'm trying to teach my kids. And I'll tell them that. I don't really know why, but we're taught this way and this is how we choose to live. And that's what we're going to do in this household. So they are unequivocal in how they're expected to act and what mom and dad are going to tolerate and not tolerate. Okay. So while we believe that there's a basic code of right versus wrong,
00:05:43
Speaker
you know, like kind, over cruel, allowing someone to live, over murdering them, that sort of thing. Your family can also create their own specific moral code that you'd like your children to abide by. So, for example, you know, the Ten Commandments versus like your own family motto. Right. This usually comes, the moral code usually comes from another source like the Bible or religious text or
00:06:08
Speaker
You could be like Hammurabi and make up your own moral code. Or you can create a family motto or a mission statement to give more specific direction or maybe easier for kids to understand. So what we're trying to say is every family should have a basic moral code that is independent of their family. So whether you choose to believe in the Bible or the crayon or whatever it is,
00:06:31
Speaker
There is something that is greater than you that you should be teaching your children. And here's why. We also believe in family mission statements and that sort of thing. We're going to talk about those. But here's why. Your children are going to rebel from you. Chances are good at one point in their life. They're going to be like, mom doesn't know what she's talking about. I'm going to go out and do whatever I want. If they do not have a higher code or a higher purpose or a higher being to be held accountable to,
00:06:54
Speaker
then they will just go out and make every mistake humanly possible, right? If they believe in a God who holds them accountable to a set of laws that has nothing to do with you and your husband, then chances are good, even in their rebellious faces, they will remember that and go, okay, well, I might tick off mom with this choice, but do I really want to tick off God? You know, I think that's a really important distinction between, you know, an absolute set of values and a family one.
00:07:22
Speaker
Right, exactly. One way I like to explain that to maybe my teenagers when they're sort of questioning why we do things the way
Long-standing Morals vs. New Ideas
00:07:31
Speaker
we do.
00:07:31
Speaker
And maybe sometimes I don't have the exact answers. I say, well, you know what? People have believed this for centuries. And I'm not going to suddenly turn around and say that I am more intelligent or have a higher, better, stronger moral code than people all through the ages that have believed this certain thing. And so I'm just going to admit that
00:07:55
Speaker
I'm dumb enough to accept not dumb enough, but like I'm maybe submissive enough or I'm maybe even smart enough. I would say humble enough. Humble and smart enough. Yeah, really. To accept what everyone through the ages has bowed themselves to. Right. That's an interesting point. If there is a very popular piece of, you know,
00:08:20
Speaker
pop culture that is pulling us away from what our ancestors have always believed, we might want to stop and think, is this progress? Or is this just us thinking we know better and we're actually going to regret this 100 years down the road? Right, exactly. Exactly. Because some of these new-fangled modern ideas, we can't see the results of them. But we can see the results of the way that people have lived in the past. And that's kind of what I'm trying to say, is that I'm adopting
00:08:48
Speaker
the beliefs of my grandparents because I can see that how it affected them and the results of that. Like their story is finished and I can see that or nearly finished and I can see the results of that. But to try out this new idea or this new moral code, I don't see the results of that and that doesn't feel safe to me.
00:09:09
Speaker
Exactly. I love how you put that. I think that's why social media and cell phones and that sort of thing is so scary to me right now for my kids because I don't know where it will lead. All I can do is pray and make the best decision I can because I don't see generations of consequences of a child being on social media all day long. It's a little scary, but yeah, I love the way you put that.
00:09:32
Speaker
So moving along to this family mission statement or a motto that we can create and kind of hold our kids accountable to. I wanted to share a few things from our own family mission statement that we've created. Maybe we'll do a whole episode on family mission statements. I think a lot of people are curious about that. So that could be kind of fun. Yeah. So we talk about how every day we work, play, learn and pray.
00:09:53
Speaker
We apologize and forgive each other. We respect our own bodies and others, our home and our possessions. We need to work on that because I've been scribbling on walls lately. We remind ourselves that we are children of God when we say kind things to each other. We love surprises, but we don't keep secrets. That was a big thing that we talked about that keeps kids safe from abuse and that sort of thing. We seek good and avoid evil in all media.
00:10:18
Speaker
We love honor and obey our parents. We choose peace over fighting and we show love through our actions and words. So that's our families.
00:10:25
Speaker
Wow. I love that. I don't think I could do a whole episode about a family mission statement because we don't have a written family mission statement. Well, that's new for us. We had a few things we tossed around for a while. We just did that and I'm pretty excited about it. Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty awesome. It'd be cool to have your kids memorize that even. Yes. Yes. I know. I need to put it on the wall and be like, start, start reciting when you fight. Write this down 10 times.
Consistency in Moral Teaching
00:10:51
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. You're still mad at each other when you're done and then we'll talk about it.
00:10:57
Speaker
So we don't have a family motto, but we do have a code that we live by and ours is The Bible and we like the King James version text We just go ahead and use that one Partly because like I said, it's what our grandparents use and so we stick with that but we do have some ideas and things that my husband discussed
00:11:16
Speaker
presented to me early on in our marriage before we started having kids and things that have kind of had an effect on the way that we've raised our kids. So one thing that he said to me is that kids don't adopt your beliefs, they adopt your way of thinking. And so that is very interesting to think about, like that goes way deep and I could probably do a whole episode on my thoughts on that. But if we teach
00:11:46
Speaker
by example, our children, the way that we think, like why we think what we think. And we'll talk about this actually more in this episode when we talk about exemplifying our codes. Then they're going to follow those patterns of
00:12:04
Speaker
belief of way of thinking instead of just adopting a set of beliefs because mom and dad said this. So that's one thing that gave me a lot of thought and has shaped the way that we've raised our kids.
00:12:18
Speaker
That's a great point. Another thing is the idea of absolute versus relative. And that's one that my husband and I discussed even before we got married and we were dating, we discussed the difference between absolute and relative. So again, this concept of black or white versus gray. And you can, you can accept or reject the idea that there are some absolutes in life. And if you accept it, then things become very clear and defined and there's boundaries.
00:12:45
Speaker
and there's morals. But then if you reject the idea that there's absolute and you think, well, everything's relative, then you begin to question everything in life. Everything is gray area and you have to try to
00:13:00
Speaker
swim and find your way through that gray area and decide with each time that a topic comes up, you have to decide where you're going to stand on that gray area. But if you have a belief that some things are absolute, that's just black and white. And you don't have to make that decision again every time that that certain incident
00:13:20
Speaker
or moral or decision or whatever comes up. And that has one thing that just kind of frees up time and thought and also gives like a stability, a foundation where this is what we believe and then we build on that. Yeah. And eliminates that decision fatigue, right? Your child knows what decision he's going to make when presented with sex, drugs, alcohol, whatever, and doesn't have to keep thinking, well, should I try to impress these friends or not? I love that.
00:13:49
Speaker
Okay, so number two, we're going to talk about exemplifying our value set. So this, this might get a little bit uncomfortable because now we're talking about our own behavior, not just our kids, right? Yeah. So I think we all know that kids are extremely perceptive, especially when it comes to hypocrisy. So they can sniff it out a mile away. And when, if they sense it, they will lose respect, not only for you, but for the values that you're teaching. And that is kind of scary. So if, if you're teaching one thing and doing something else, they're going to lose respect across the board.
00:14:20
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, exactly. My thought on being an example, my first thought is consistency. So being an example is something that, like I can't say one thing one day and the next day decide, say something different or do something different, but I have to, there has to be consistency in the way that I live my life. So that, that is basically what an example is, is something that
00:14:48
Speaker
In fact, my teenagers, they'll laugh and they'll say, oh, well, you know what? Mom thinks about that. And I don't even have to say anything. They're just, oh, well, you know what? Mom thinks about that. Because I've been that example. I haven't changed on my thoughts about whatever. Yeah, that means you're doing something, right? Hopefully. Then I'm kind of having a new thought. I've been sort of on a
00:15:13
Speaker
I hate to use this term, but sort of a journey of self-discovery down a new avenue in the past couple of years. It's this thought of self-love and being kind to yourself and then being able to be more loving and kind to others. This is kind of a personal thing to me to share, but I've been pretty hard on myself in my past life.
00:15:40
Speaker
So I think because of that, I've been pretty hard on other people. And so just having some grace with myself and more love and kindness toward myself is allowing me to have more grace with others and be more kind with others. And the reason I bring it up right now is really part of what prompted this new
00:16:06
Speaker
air quotes, journey of self-discovery is because I started thinking a lot about what I want my kids to be like. And that's what I do. That's what I want them to do. I want them to have inner strength and outer compassion. Whoa, that's super powerful. I'm going to meme that. It's going on Instagram. That was great.
00:16:27
Speaker
Yeah, I just came up with a few examples when thinking about exemplifying this code of, this moral code that I want to teach my kids. You know, if I teach honesty, then I need to be prepared to go back to the store when a cashier forgets to bring something up. Even something as small as like a pack of gum and it's a pain in the butt and you got a bunch of kids in the car. I know. And you have to unstrap them. Yeah, I know.
00:16:47
Speaker
Hopefully you can have a big kid and just say, stay here. I'm going to go pay for that stupid thing. Or if I teach kindness, I cannot be gossiping and judging, at least in front of my kids. I shouldn't do it at all, but I just say, if my kids hear that, then out the window goes my teaching of being kind and nonjudgmental, right? I think we should do a whole episode about not judging others versus upholding a standard for your own family.
00:17:16
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. Totally. I struggle with that a lot. I want to teach my children right versus wrong without them going out and immediately judging everybody. Right? Yeah. Yeah. That's tough.
00:17:27
Speaker
And then finally, if you teach the value of work, or if I try to teach my kids that we work before we play, then I can't very well binge on Netflix half a day before my laundry's done, you know? And that's kind of a hard pill to swallow. We're like, we're adults. We can live how we want. We can. We totally can. But we have to realize that we are teaching a lesson every time we act. And that's a hard pill to swallow sometimes. Yeah, exactly. I just want my Netflix, right?
Empathy in Discipline Strategies
00:17:58
Speaker
For us it definitely means holding kids accountable and I believe that kids really appreciate hard and fast consequences and then a release from that from that so a consequence allows a kid to It does the same thing for them that it does for us it allows them to Repent from the thing they did wrong change and go forth in freedom not beheld
00:18:28
Speaker
to this, um, you know, keep bringing it up. Uh, well, you know, you can't, you can't XYZ because you ABC, you know, and now we still have to, you know, but just a hard and fast consequence. Okay. Here's your, here's your punishment. Here's your consequence. And then they're free to go forward. And I, I really believe that strongly.
00:18:49
Speaker
That's such a great point. It goes back to a little bit of what we talked about with Andy in episode 42 about how we cannot continue to make our children feel like making them feel bad is not going to encourage positive behavior, right?
00:19:04
Speaker
Yes. We just reach out with empathy, with kindness, with love. And we say, shoot, you broke a rule. So here's the consequence. And when you're done taking care of that, we move on. And that is such a stark contrast to, I think, how most of us were raised, which is disappointment, shame, blame, holding grudges, all these things. That's just my default. I just go, darn you. And I blame them all day long for my bad day. Yeah.
00:19:32
Speaker
when really that is not helping them at all. That does not make them want to be a better person. That makes them just want to hide their bad deeds from you because they just ruined your day, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I have been thinking a lot about Andy's episode two and some of the things that she said in that. And one thing that I try to do with my kids is try to let them know when I'm disappointed without burdening them with guilt. So
00:19:59
Speaker
I think it's perfectly acceptable to let them know that that was not my expectation for them without heaping on emotional guilt with that. That is huge for me. Yeah. And we have to start with ourselves, right? Like you said, first I have to start by not doing that to myself. Yes. Dang it. Why did I do that? Instead of just letting it go, that was a mistake. And next time I'll do better. Moving on. Absolutely.
00:20:28
Speaker
So another thing that came to me in regards to holding kids accountable is to pick your battles, right? We've all been there where if we were to stop every little squabble and every little argument, we would do nothing but assign consequences all day long. So to just decide, you know, what's your line in the sand? Okay. Well, when my kids start harming each other physically, that's my line in the sand. Okay. That's when I step in and assign some consequences. There's not going to be any physical harm.
00:20:51
Speaker
And another one of our rules is we value honesty over almost anything. So if something was broken or something was damaged or even somebody hit someone, but they hid it from us, then they're going to get in a lot more trouble for the dishonesty than for the actual altercation. Both my husband and I thought that was a very important lesson to be learned. So that's just a reminder to pick our battles and decide what we're really going to focus on.
00:21:14
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure there's a lot more that you could list and I'm only going to list a couple of our battles too. But honesty is one of ours too. Zero tolerance for lying. Like I always tell my kids, if you come to me and you tell me that you did something wrong, yes, there will be a consequence, but then we'll be done and it'll be over with. But if you hide it from me and I find it later, then you have two consequences. One for lying and one for hiding it from me.
00:21:40
Speaker
Okay. Another one that we absolutely encourage as like you as brotherly kindness and a strong family bond. We really, really want our tribe in the future to be strong and connected. And that just is not going to happen if they're hate each other so much. Everything we talked about in our sibling rivalry episode, right? Yeah. Yeah. And then a final thing we encourage with our kids is to develop their own connection with God. So we believe in.
00:22:10
Speaker
God, and we believe in having a strong connection with Him. And we tell our kids, we cannot have a relationship with God for you. That is something you need to learn and develop for yourself. So we spend time really helping them learn to make their own relationship with God. Oh, man.
00:22:30
Speaker
This is so good, Audrey. I can't wait to edit this episode. I'm just going to listen to it over and over. This is, this is good stuff. Okay. So final, my final thought on, um, following through with keeping kids accountable is to stay calm. Okay. We kind of mentioned this, stay calm and firm.
00:22:47
Speaker
but kind and then follow through with the consequences. So that's in contrast to what I was doing for many years as a young mom, which was yell, scream, rant, and rave, and then never talk about it again. Yeah. My husband pointed out to me a little while back. He's like, you say, okay, all the time, but you never follow through.
00:23:09
Speaker
Yes, or my kids have learned to not, when I'm in my anger, I will throw out these consequences that are totally unreasonable and I'm not in the mood or have the energy to follow through with. And then my kids just learn to ignore me. So then they're just ignoring the screaming and they're like, well, she'll get it out of her system, then we'll be fine.
00:23:28
Speaker
Whereas con, so silly contrast that with an outpouring of love and empathy and you made a mistake. I know what that feels like. I'm sorry that happened. Big hug. This is your consequence. And then another big hug when it's over, you know, and then moving on. But man, that's contrary to my, my human nature, you know, it's just, it's just hard. But that, that way they are taught, you know, that way any altercation actually creates a greater bond between you and them.
00:23:58
Speaker
And then they learn not to hide anything, mistakes. They learn that they can overcome them and how powerful that will be as they grow older. Yeah, exactly. A skill they can use for many things later in life.
Evolving Parenting Rules with Maturity
00:24:11
Speaker
So my final thoughts on consequences are, um, there's kind of a common belief that, um, our common way of parenting that when kids are little, you just let them have free reign. And then, um, after a while you start teaching them rules and then, you know,
00:24:28
Speaker
that the path gets narrower as you go down. But the way that we've done it is kind of different. We start them with a very narrow path. Morals, rules, consequences, really young. They get that foundation and those boundaries built really young. And then when they get older, the path widens and they get more freedom and they get more liberty and fewer consequences and they get their own, they get to
00:24:56
Speaker
determine their own path with more freedom. But because we've set those boundaries young, then like I said in our episode on raising girls, that's when they're young is when they love to learn these things and they love to have these boundaries set and they will carry them forth into life for themselves. And so that's like, that's been our experiences. Start off on a narrow path and then it widens as you go.
00:25:22
Speaker
Yeah, I love that. I love that. And because when they're very young, their world is very small. They really just need to know some very basic truths of how to act. And as they gain more experience and more choices, then they can learn how to apply those very strict rules to
00:25:39
Speaker
you know, greater shades of gray, for example. You know, their life isn't going to always present them with very basic black and white choices, you know. Right. But they will have that black and white that they can apply to those areas of gray. Right. They can compare it all with what they were taught as very young kids. Yeah, I love that.
00:25:54
Speaker
So to wrap up, this was kind of an unusual episode, but we really felt powerfully about sharing it with you guys. I think that one of probably the greatest thing we can do in our life is to teach our children how to live morally upright lives, how to create that connection with God or whatever higher being you believe in, and to have that basic moral code that they can
00:26:16
Speaker
go back to every time they need to make a difficult choice.
The Societal Impact of Teaching Morality
00:26:19
Speaker
And it's not easy teaching them that and living in keeping with it yourself, but I guarantee that it's worth it. Yeah, absolutely. And I wanted to note that we live in an amazing country. We have freedom in the United States that was built on a foundation of Christian values. And we have that sort of the societal
00:26:44
Speaker
foundation that we were built on and our constitution is written from and all that, helps hold people in check. Just think about, you're driving down the road at night and stores are closed, but there's still things outdoors on displays and people, they can leave them out there because people have this basic honesty level that they don't just drive up and load things into their vehicle and take off.
00:27:08
Speaker
for the most part, where not every country in the world does have that freedom and that foundation of Christian values that they're built on. So I just did want to acknowledge that here in the United States, we are very blessed to have this country built on a foundation of moral values. Yes, true. And how essential it is for us to keep teaching that to the next generation so that we can maintain the same freedoms that we have today. Yes, absolutely.
00:27:35
Speaker
Thanks so much for tuning in. If you've enjoyed this episode, we'd be so grateful if you'd leave us a written review on iTunes. If you have any questions or ideas for future episodes, you can reach us at OutnumberThePodcast at gmail.com and find us on Instagram at OutnumberThePodcast. See you next week.