2008, Issue 1
Educating, Connecting and Supporting families in Monash
Dads At Home
Peter Bourke
Blundah (sic)
As your child gets older you delegate more tasks to them to give them a sense of importance, responsibility and of course to help you out with your jobs around the house. At least, the intention is to make your jobs easier to do. So it was with some excitement that after asking my boy to go in the house (we were at the clothesline), to go upstairs and to gather some coat hangers to help hang out some of the washed shirts, he agreed. He returned after some minutes with a grin of victory emblazoned on his face.
I was looking to have about 12 coat hangers to use but only 3 were delivered. But to add to my pain, when returning upstairs to get some more spare coat hangers from the cupboard, I found about 40 items of clothing that had been pulled off their hangers and left on the floor. And yet to this day I don't know why he only delivered 3 coat hangers to me after pulling so many items off their hangers.
Of course here a mental note was taken.
When getting children to do a task for the first time, watch what they do and offer tips that may lead to your desired result – jobs that are easier to do.
Wondah (sic)
One day while dusting one of the paintings in the house, my son surprised me with his observation. The painting/print is by Monet. It is a watercolour and to many appears as a blur of colours with small hints of the image, which to most is a lily pond in a park with some buildings in the distance.
It's amazing what they see and we don't.
Updated: 1 May 2008
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