Introduction: Family values: planning the family parents

FAMILY VALUES: planning the family. parents
plan:

1. 
   INTRODUCTION: Family values: planning the family. parents
   
2. 
   MAIN BODY
   

1. 
   Values teaching 
   
2. 
   Designing your values
   
3. 
   Identify the problem
   
4. 
   Design solutions
   
5. 
   Select a solution
   
6. 
   A values document
   
7. 
   Principles
   

3. 
   CONCLUSION: Importance of family values and parents
   

Educators have talked about values teaching for a very long time. In addition, phrases like family values and corporate values have received extensive press. Yet, when the hype clears, not much remains. There are no answers to the two fundamental questions our families and our cultures need to answer: What are our values? and How do we teach them?

The answers will remain hidden until one converts the noun into a verb. Valuing focuses on doing, active behavior. Now, we can unpack valuing. The first question becomes: what are the subclasses of our valuing behavior? At the most inclusive level, there are four classes of valuing behavior.

1. 
   Designing,
   
2. 
   Describing,
   
3. 
   Following, and
   
4. 
   Evaluating our values.
   

What the unpacking reveals is that valuing is a process; one that is identical to the planning strategy, but with the planning problem "What are my values?" already identified (see Management: Planning page). Essentially, the valuing process is fundamental, rock bottom strategic planning. The individual and family activities we plan, as the means (behaviors) used to achieve some ends (consequences), rests on these values. We judge the activities we plan and implement within the light of our values. This is true for a nuclear family, school, corporation, or government. Consequently, when our values are not in harmony with the larger social system, social disharmony emerges. We witness this disharmony on the nightly news as divorce, family abuse, street crime, drug addiction, corporate corruption, and governmental mismanagement.

Designing values (1) represents the three design steps of planning and is perhaps the most difficult subclass of the valuing process. Only with clearly designed values can we clearly describe (2) and follow (3) our values as we implement our activity plans across the families in which we live. The ability to describe values to ourselves and those around us (2) springs directly from the clarity of the values we design and how we can "link" them to specific activity behavior.

Moreover, it is the first step in transmitting our values to fledgling family, school, corporate, and government members. We can transmit them because clearly designed values allow us to see or recognize them as examples or instances that take place in our everyday activity behavior. We can move from the inclusive value classes to their instance representatives. Thus, we can point them out as they are or are not being followed (3).

It is our talk (see Teaching: Talking page) that can clearly link the values we have designed (1) with what is happening in one or more of our —home, school, workplace, or government activities. Thus, if we fail to master the method of talking, we will most likely fail in the following (3) and Evaluating (4) our values teaching, no matter how clearly they have been described during the design step (1).

Only if we can see and talk about our values within everyday activities, can we move to the final step of evaluating whether our values have been followed by ourselves and those around us (4). If our values are followed, all is well and good. If not, it is time to go back to the design drawing board because 1) something in our family system is not managing or teaching effectively or 2) we may need to restate our values.

All of us are members of many families throughout our lifetime. If we go through the valuing process, we will be in a good position to determine with some confidence that we will or will not fit within a new, prospective family.

DESIGNING YOUR VALUES

Designing values can be an individual or group process. The Family Meeting provides a place and a method to manage the designing-of-values process, as well as evaluate them. An important perspective to carry into the design process is this: