Peer Pressure

I’ll never forget the phone call from my twelve-year-old son’s school counselor. “Your son was the only one in his group who didn’t participate when the other kids decided to sneak into the restricted gym storage room,” she said. “When I asked him why he didn’t join them, he said, ‘I knew it wasn’t a good idea, and I was okay being the only one who thought so.’ I’ve been doing this job for fifteen years, and that level of independent thinking at his age is extraordinary.” ...

Last Friday, my 9-year-old came home from school with a troubling story. A classmate had pressured her to help “borrow” a pencil from the teacher’s desk without asking. “I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t know what to say,” she admitted. Instead of just telling her what to do, I remembered our family’s commitment to the Life-Ready approach. We practiced different ways to say no and discussed how to handle similar situations. The look of relief and newfound confidence on her face told me we had a perfect opportunity to practice moral courage in a low-stakes environment. ...