What Do our Children Need?
Only they can answer that question.
So off I went to find them and ask them that very important question, well important to me anyhow.
What do you need?.
My second daughter told me quiet quickly that she needed:
Water, food, nature and leaves.
My eldest followed saying :
Water, nature, trees and to be free.
They had been in the middle of a game when I found them so before I left I asked them what they were playing, my second daughter said, we were pretending we were abandoned, at this point my eldest pointed out, not abandoned but free.
Before I became a parent, I thought that it was every parents duty to protect their children from all the negative influences in the world. I expected that I would want my children to be safe and that I would be the only one able to keep them that way.
It's true in some ways we do keep them safe, but in others we have to stand back and allow our children to find their own way. We need to have faith in their abilities and trust in the way that they learn and the path that they take.
These anxieties that some of us have about whether or not our children are learning enough, has led us to try and fill their minds full of knowledge. When in reality our children's minds are never empty to begin with.
Taking that step back is not always that easy. There is always that temptation to step in and say ' if you do it this way' or 'don't do that'. But if we do that, then what are we telling our children? That they cannot learn by themselves, that they need to come to us for all the answers.
A few years ago, whilst we were on the road, my eldest daughter became friends with another girl who was a similar age to her. They spend alot of time together and got on very well. One day my daughter came to me upset, her friend had told her that Dragons are always orange. My daughter believed dragons come in loads of different colours.
I tried to explain how everyone has different ideas about things and that, that is ok. In the days that followed my daughter came back to me upset about other stuff her friend was saying. Again we talked about how other people can think different things and we have to accept that, at this point my daughter said but that's what her mother tells her. So what does her friend think I wondered. After spending time with that girl and her family, I realized that this girl really didn't know how to think for herself, because her mother kept on telling her what to do and how to do it.
So what do my children need?
They need water, nature, food, trees,leaves and to be free.
What do all the other children need?
Go ask them.
Thanks to 
'Raising Kids in a Brave New World' please go and check it out.