The upcoming “Jewish Parenting 101” sessions at Congregation Solel in Highland Park will tackle some challenges universal to anyone raising a child: What is good enough when it comes to his or her accomplishments? How does a parent help a child make the distinction between a need and a want? Should a child be compensated for chores?
The program Sunday at 9:45 a.m. is open to anyone and is the first of monthly informal sessions at the synagogue, 1301 Clavey Rd. It is an outgrowth of a more formal three-session workshop led by Cantor Vicky Glikin and based on the bestseller, “The Blessings of a Skinned Knee: Using Jewish Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children,” by Wendy Mogel, a Los Angeles-based clinical psychologist.
In the book, Mogel quotes a school principal, who cuts to the heart of the anxious mindset among many modern-day parents: “Children develop in fits and starts, but nobody has time for that anymore. No late bloomers, no slow starters, nothing unusual accepted! If a child doesn’t get straight A’s, his parents start fretting that he’s got a learning disability or a motivation problem … Parents just need to relax a little and be patient.”
Easier said than done, said Alexandra Wendt, who is facilitating the new parenting series.
“The original workshop sessions were supposed to be 45 minutes, but they would last an hour and a half,” she said laughing. “Every parent had so much to talk about even with the smallest of topics.”
Here’s just one example: A child has a science project which calls for construction of a tower. The child builds one story. Is that good enough? Does the parent push to build another story?
And another: Chores (the topic of Sunday’s session). What is appropriate to ask of the child? Should the chore be tied to an allowance?
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The sessions are structured like a book club, with participants reading a portion Mogel’s book and then discussing it. At heart, Wendt said, the sessions are all about giving parents the tools to raise a “mensch,” and the bedrock of that is fostering a child’s respect for his or her parents.
All denominations are invited because there is value in diverse viewpoints and different strategies, Wendt said.
. “Success stories are shared. Parents open up about non-success stories as well. This is a non-judgmental place. Just by participating we have admitted we are not perfect parents. We all come from different places, we were all raised differently and will raise our children differently, but we all want the same thing. We want our children to succeed in the world and be good people,” she said.
Elizabeth Levin, of Highland Park, who attended previous “Jewish Parenting 101” sessions, was not expecting to divine an empirically “right” or “wrong” way to rear children.
“I’m a parent of two young boys, so any time I can connect with other parents, I take the opportunity to do so,” she said. “We can always learn from other people and talking about different ways of doing things is helpful.”
“Finding the commonality in the trials and tribulations as well as the good and exciting things about this thing called life is very fulfilling,” Wendt said. “There is no wrong or right. What’s nice is the conversation.”