Family Meeting

*dun dun duuhhhhn*  Yes, that's the foreboding tone of an impending family meeting.

The agenda:

• Kindness. Our goal as parents is to raise the children into adjusted adults.  The most important thing in life is building relationships with others through kindness.
• Yelling. Getting in a yelling match with your mother (or your brother, or your sister, or your father), is not acceptable.  I refuse to partake in said yelling match.  If yelling ensues, I will leave the room for 5 minutes and will return to discuss the problem in a normal tone of voice.
• Respectful vs. disrespectful behaviors.  The children will brainstorm both types of behaviors and suggest proper forms of discipline for disrespectful behaviors.
• Chores. As part of this family, children are expected to contribute by performing their chores in a prompt and cheerful manner.  The children will name all of the chores they currently are capable of completing, thereby giving their mother a list of chores for our new Chore Ribbon.

This is actually the second family meeting we've organized and executed.  The first was to discuss and establish our bead jar reward system.  That's another post for another time. The bead jar has been successfully up and running for some time, but we needed a refresher course in kindness and respect.

This family meeting went over surprisingly well.  M especially enjoyed it, asking for more discussion, prompting Daddy to append two additional addenda to the agenda.

The comic relief came around the second bullet point:
Mom: "when you grow up and go to work, what do you think would happen if you got in a yelling match with your boss?"
M (with not a second of hesitation): "What if I am the boss?!"

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