One of the reasons we began to expand our garden into a mini-farm is that we wanted our children, the older of whom were getting into their preteen years, to have meaningful chores.
In so many families, the young people are not given very much if any real responsibility. Before WWII there weren’t any teenagers. The word "teenager," first appeared in the third edition of Webster's (1961); it was not in the second (1934); there it is noted only as an adjective "teenage." That is not to say that there were no young people in their teens, there were plenty. But the term “teenager” had not yet been generally applied to our youth. There were youths--young men and women and they were treated as such--they were given responsibilities and expected to act in a responsible manner. They went from childhood to young adulthood.
"Teenager" came to apply to youth as their responsibilities, and our expectations for them and their behavior declined for various reasons (child labor laws, availability of the automobile, etc.), and they had to wait out their teen years to be given real responsibilities in life.
On a farm, young people have real responsibilities. If, for example, you are given the chore of milking the family cow or goats, then you must do your job, or the family may go without milk, butter, and cheese. This neglect of responsibility can have a real, immediate affect on the entire family. On the positive side, if you are the one given the chore of milking, and you do a good job, you bring milk, butter, and cheese to the table for your family to enjoy--a very satisfying accomplishment.
The young people in our family have been given various chores that carry real responsibility. Each one has been given a row or two in the garden to tend. Each one in rotation has fed, watered, and milked the goats; each has fed and watered the chickens and collected eggs. So each has had the pleasure of bringing food to the table for himself and the rest of us.
When these kinds of chores are done well, a sense of accomplishment and pride of ownership come into play, changing one’s outlook. Some of our kids say they don’t care for green beans all that much, “but they do taste better when you grow them yourself.” Yes they do. Life is better when each day means something because one has done something productive and meaningful.
Do you want to produce a teenager? If you do, give your young person an allowance for menial, meaningless, or make-work chores, or worse, give him or her allowance to pay for the chores that an adult member of your household does as a matter of obligation to the household (housework, laundry, yardwork), or worst, give him or her an allowance without any chores required.
We don't give an allowance to our children at all--we don't want to make teenagers, we want to raise up productive, responsible young men and women. We have given our youths meaningful responsibilities around the house and farm. We have also made opportunities for them to earn money--some have grown crops for cash, some have bid on jobs on the farm, some have farmed-out their skills and energy to family and friends who needed help around the house or yard. Some are looking for their first product or service to begin a business of their own.
When given responsibility and given plenty of room to grow, learn, make mistakes (as youth will do) and to be responsible, children never have to become Teenagers at all.
Further reading or listening:
- Dr. Michael Platt, Myth of the Teenager -- http://www.home-school.com/Articles/myth-of-the-teenager.php
- Joel Salatin, Getting Your Hands Dirty: Teaching Your Children To Love Work; CD http://www.dcs1225.com/recommends/kidslovework.html
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