How to Raise Kids that are Prepared for the Future (and also: musings on homework!) with Diane Tavenner

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Speaker 1: Hi. This is Laura Vanderkam. I'm a mother of four, an author, journalist, and speaker. And this is Sarah Hart Hunger. I'm a mother of three, practicing physician and blogger. On the side, we are two working parents who love our careers and our families. Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun, from figuring out childcare to mapping out long term career goals. We want you to get the most out of life. Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura. We are very excited today to be interviewing Diane Taviner, who is the founder of the Summit Public Schools, which is a network of charter schools that has some fascinating ideas about education. Has done some amazing things in terms of sending graduates to college, and not just that, but getting them through college, which turns out to matter as well. She is the author of the new book Prepared, What Kids Need for a Fulfilled Life, in which she shares how many of the ideas that have been used at the Summit Public Schools can be put into practice more broadly. For those of us who would like to raise self directed children who can regulate their own learning, seek out challenges, and make the most of the opportunities they've been given. So we're really excited about that. Well, speaking of self directed, but the first thing I thought about when I saw this guest's bio and her book was tell me what to do about homework? I feel interested. Please listen to the rest of the part of this episode, But I just feel like that is where I really kind of it's a pain point in terms of how independent to let your kids be, what the teachers expect, what even if maybe if they don't expect something. Is there a right way to do things? Because the goal is in my mind, is to eventually have your kids be pretty independent with their work. And I know that when I talk to peers, we all say the same thing. Oh, back when I was a kid, no one stood over me while I did my homework, and yet I feel like I'm expected to in this day and age. So it's a struggle. Yeah, yeah, I mean I push back against this as much as possible. And I know that Diane talks about one of the strategies they encourage in the school is appropriate help seeking, and I think that is a great way to describe it, because we have definitely faced some challenges where a kid be like, I don't know how to do this, and I'm like, that is not my problem. If you want to come to me with a different question, then we can talk. If it is a specific math issue, that we can look at it and say like, hm, I still will feign ignorance, though I will often feign ignorance and be like, I wonder how you could figure this out. Let's see, I wonder if there's their icon Academy video. Is there something back in your textbook earlier you could look at. Oh, I wonder if that's related, you know, if I can look at say is that really to another problem you just did? I wonder if we thought about it a different way or it just but I don't know. I mean, I I just keep thinking it's I already did this grade. I'm done. I mean part of it. And actually, I will say interestingly, I Annabelle has fantastic teachers sincere like, yeah, I'm just so impressed, and there's less homework. Yeah, So I don't know if they're just doing more in school. So I do feel like some of this is driven by what's assigned. Like, and I'm not placing blame on anyone, but if a teacher sends your kid home with stuff that they truly cannot do and then are going to chastise the child if it's not complete, like the missing link is us right? And I've been in that position before, even though for the most part, I've been really happy with my kids teachers. Yeah, no, it's rough. It's hard to know what to do in those situations, and of course it's frustrating for the children. And yeah, people don't like homework. I'm sure adults wouldn't like the idea of I mean, if you think about what so much of homework is, it's kind of it's not real practice, which is what it should be, where you know, it's not about whether you got it right. It's like can you do this skill? Can you do it over and over again too? And then which case it doesn't matter if you get it right or wrong, like do you know the skill? That's what we're trying to get at. But you know, like adults wouldn't want to be like, Okay, so now you need to go home after work and write another memo about this topic, which which by the way, it's not for an actual meeting, Like it's just so you get extra practice writing memos. But we're not going to do anything with it. I'm either going to say it's good or bad and that's it. It would feel like such a waste of time and it's you know, school. Like. The other thing is kindergarten used to be like three or four hours and now it's a full day in most places, and then they're still asked to go home and practice things with their parents. Like that's that's a lot for a five year old. I mean, I know not everywhere has kindergarten homework, but I've only been in two schools and both of them have had kindergarten homework. So that's that's all I know, and I don't make it bring much. Well yeah, no, I'm I wouldn't be a big fan either. Well we have I mean, we only have half day kindergarten around here, which is entirely different issue, which I wish they would get themselves organized to do. That makes sense. I mean from a modern day like logistics standpoint, full day kindergarten does make sense. I just don't know that it all has to be so academic it could be half a day of play and half a day of work. Work. Yeah cool. But so Diane's got some great ideas and so we look forward to this interview and to sharing it with you. Diane, thank you so much for joining us. Can you introduce yourself to our listeners? Yes, good morning. I'm Diane Pavner. Thank you for having me. I am the author of Prepared What Kids Need for a Fulfilled Life. Awesome? And can you tell us a little bit about your career and family journey that you've been a teacher and you're also a mom. I am a teacher and a mom and an educator for the last twenty five years, and my career and my motherhood sort of weave together, as you might imagine. My son has attended one of my schools for the last sixth grade, and so both parts of my life come together on a regular basis. Yeah, I know. That's a really cool part of hearing about that in the book. And so, Diane, I mean, in your career with an education, one of the things that led you to the creation of some at public schools. I mean, you had taught in so called bad schools, you'd taught in good schools so called good schools, but you found that many kids still weren't prepared for their futures, regardless of whether it was sort of a dysfunctional school problem or allegedly functional school, but they still weren't learning what they needed to. So talk about how this led you to create some at public schools and your philosophy behind your schools. Yeah, some of the public schools really was a community effort. There was a big group of parents that came together and they were seeing the same things that I was seeing. That schools were either like you said, not functioning well for really anyone. But even those schools that were you know, ranked at the top or thought to be really great, were still in a time in an era where they were teaching skills that aren't really needed or valued today in our world, and they actually weren't really looking at kids holistically as whole people, and they aren't really designed for the outcomes that we now want as parents for our kids. Because what we want as parents is for our kids, of course to be economically secure and have you know, enough success in their life where they're safe and happy. But mostly what we want is that second part. We want them to be happy, and schools just weren't designed to really prepare kids for the future they're entering. And so this group of parents came together with me and we set out to create a school that would do just that. And the interesting thing is you had just become a parent when you launched exactly that same year. In fact, I bet that was fairly week. Yeah, six weeks apart I had my son and six weeks later we started summit. Any I imagine that starting a school is a very full on endeavor, as is dealing with a newborn. Do you have any memories of what life looked like that year? Just put that up. No, it's really it's you know, when I think back now, it's almost I think about, Wow, how did I actually do that. I'm sure you guys have had that experience too. You look back to the beginning, you're like, WHOA, I'm not sure how we survived that, but somehow we did. It was incredibly intense, and yeah, I think somehow as moms, we just we just plow through and managed to do it. And I guess in my piece, I was very lucky because both things I was doing were so important to me, and so there was never a question of if it was worthwhile or valuable. It was so so imperative. Yeah, can you? Oh, can I sneak in? And I'm just curious as someone who you know, my kids are pretty on the younger side. Second grade is my oldest child. I listened to an interesting Freakonomics episode recently on how Steve Levitt wish is that math was no longer taught in those schools the way it is. He would prefer them to teach economics and sort of more in statistics, especially like you know how to understand data. So that's like one example, But can you give me a few concrete examples of ways you felt that traditional schools were failing or what they were missing, or perhaps what they were doing that wasn't worthwhile. Yeah? I think two big things, And the first most important is the curriculum in most schools is not project based. And what we mean by that is it's not asking kids to solve real world problems and bringing what they're learning together in a sort of coherent, bigger idea. And so what you know, you guys are familiar with school, most people are. You go into a class you sort of especially as they get older, you have a unit of study and it's going to be about I don't know, the World War two or something like that. And you know, kids sort of learn these discreete facts and information usually from a lecture and then a book or a textbook, and they answer questions and then ultimately they take a test or maybe write an essay. And so that's kind of the traditional mode of learning. And what you do in project based learning is you actually start with a really big question and ask that question, so you know, science, and it often will include multiple subjects in that question where you have to bring together knowledge and ideas and concepts from all different parts of the curriculum in order to solve a problem or in order to get to an answer. And so in project based learning, kids and then you're doing a real performance at the end a performance test, so you're doing a debate or a socratic seminar or a presentation or a model or something that's much more real world that would actually be part of something that you know, you and I would need to do in the course of our work later in life, and really getting kids ready for that or their real life, and so that's a big part of it. And then the second part is just really developing as people and so focusing on what we call the habits of success. So these are everything from interpersonal relationship skills, so how do I connect with others and communicate with others and collaborate with others to my own self management how do I self regulate? To how do I learn how to learn and how do I learn how to set my own goal and direct my own work in a really thoughtful and strategic way that's aligned with who I am and what I care about and what I value. And so those two big parts are not really part of the traditional design of school, No, not at all. And one of the things you talk about in prepared you go through a class where they were doing goal setting and it was fascinating to hear about. I mean, I was sort of hoping all my meetings would be structured this way in the field, but you know that those students took the first minute or two of class to be like, well, what is my goal for this class period? How am I going to go about doing that? Then you have like your forty minutes devoted to the goal, and then at the end the reflection, can you talk a little bit Yeah, exactly, and that really is a core of sort of the prepared philosophy, these three parts where you start, we say, first of all, you look back, so you think about where am I coming from? Like what did I do last period? Or what did I do yesterday? Or you know where I am I? So you reflect on that, and then you think ahead in this next forty minutes, in this next two hours, in this next twenty four hour cycle, what is it that I want to do in order to move myself forward to my ultimate goal? And breaking things down like that, and you know, when we're working with kids, you have to start a bit well quite frankly sometimes with adults too, as you guys probably know, but you have to start with small time time segments at first, and it give me fifteen minutes at first, you know, where you just think about how am I going to purposely use these next fifteen minutes in order to ultimately get where I want to go based on where I am? And that is the rhythm and the cycle that we use throughout the school day in the whole entire context. And then we take it out, you know, much further than that. So we have ninth graders sitting down and thinking about four years later. Well, they can do that when they're have to see in those like small segments on a daily basis that ultimately add up into the same set of behaviors, but you can make them bigger and longer and more complicated as you practice that discipline. Yeah, and I think what's great about that is that you know, it's wonderful that you all do that as a classroom, but any kid could also start thinking that way. And so we have parents, you know, kids aren't going to a summit school, for instance, who might say, exactly what would you like to get out of your your math class? And you can go in and think about that. You guys, have you talk about the five power behaviors that someone teaches kids to take charge of their own learnings or different sort of learning strategies. Can you talk a little bit about this? Yeah, And so this comes from everything we do, is really comes from the learning science and what you know, there's a whole body of knowledge out there that most schools either sort of know about or know a little bit about, but having't really applied into what they're doing. And you know a lot of these folks have written books and so parents read about them too, But what we've tried to do is bring that kind of comprehensively together. And so these five power behaviors of self directed learners really come out of the mindset work a lot of it, you know, Carol Dweck and Growth Mindset and David Yaeger who actually worked with us on them. And so those five behaviors are about helping kids really taking ownership and agency of their own life and then their own work at school. And so for example, this includes what a lot of people would call persistence. So it's like persisting through a challenge. And so what happens when a child runs up against something, they're doing something, and oh, they hit a blockade, and so what we know is we want them to be able to either move over that or around it or through it. And so that persistence through a challenge is one of those five behaviors. You know what we just talked about. That routine of looking back and planning ahead and thinking about how it's connected is one strategy kids would use, but there's a number of them that they could use. Another on the other end of the spectrum is challenge seeking. And so a lot of kids are in school and they're just sort of styaling it in because it's not challenging to them. But the way they think about it is like, well, I just do what the teacher tells me to as opposed to really thinking about what do I want to get out of this and how am I going to seek out challenges because it's helping me aim towards my goal. Another one is appropriate help seeking, and so it's pretty common in school where you know, kids are often and maybe as parents we even experience this where our kids are like they come home and they don't know how to do their math homework and they just sort of throw up their hands and they're like, I don't know how to do it, and basically, you know, tell me how to do it, and then oftentime what happens as a parent, we'll sort of get in there to try to help, but ends up doing it. We see this a lot on you know, science fear poster boards and things like that, and so appropriate help speaking is where a student has actually really empowered themselves. They know specifically and targeted what they need help on, and then they go to the right source for that and ask for that specific piece that enables them to get unstuck and move forward. And so these are the types of behaviors that people who have a lot of agency and who really consistently are able to meet their goals and perform engage in. And so these are the types of behaviors that we're working on every single day in the course of regular classes and the mentoring relationship with our students to build those skills, because their habits they take a long time to build. Yeah, well, I love you just mentioned the mentoring relationship. You talk a lot of and prepared about mentoring rather than directing, and to learn this kind of in your own parenting journey too. I really appreciated the anecdote about your son's kind of crappy thank you note he wrote about the chaperone of one of his trips. Can you talk about that and how you guys work, Yes, yes, definitely. So, Like I'm sure many moms who want their children to be grateful and express thankfulness to people who do great things for them, I wanted my son and a thank you note to this wonderful woman, Leela, who he's done on this incredible trip with which is such a powerful experience for him. And so he didn't want to do it, didn't want to do it. I was sort of nagging him, and finally, Okay, he did it, and he came back and showed it to me. It was like one sentence of like dearly alas, thank you for the night, exciting trip, or something terrible like that. You know, in the moment, what I wanted to do, quite frankly, was like yell at him and say, you know, why do you think this is able? And sometimes it would just be easier. I could have just resorted to basically writing it out for him and making him copy what I wrote, but neither of those would have helped him grow, and so I tried to connect it to his own goals. So I knew that he was working on he loved like creative writing. I knew he was working on some creative writing at school and trying to get better, and so I just called back to that and said, you know, what's your standard for your writing? And we had this whole conversation that is much more like a mentoring or coaching conversation, where I was asking him questions about what he wants. And he had also told me that he really appreciated Leland. So we talked about that, and I just helped him, see, how is she going to get that from this one sentence? And don't you want her to know that? That's what you told me? And when he realized is that and the meaning of this it wasn't me just being mean and making him stop playing and write a note, but the actual purpose of it. He was willing to engage and came back with a significantly improved and actually meaningful note for her. And so I just thought, I think about that as a parent, where we're tired, and we're busy, and we know what because they're supposed to do, and it can just be exhausting to try to get them to do those things. And if we can pause for a moment and key into what do they want and what are their goals and how do we help them match their behaviors with their own goals and motivations as opposed to ours, that ultimately will lead them to engage in a way that is much more probably consistent with what we want, but also you know, meaningful for them to develop those skills that they need to develop. Hey, listeners, one of the best parts of the holidays is connecting with family. I love swapping stories and reliving moments together. But keeping these memories alive can be hard, and that's why I'm a big fan of a very meaningful gift story Worth. 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Yeah, well it started when he was about thirteen, and my husband and I started thinking about, you know, like a lot of parents, wow, it's only five years until he leaves. And you know, sometimes I don't know about you, but I got nervous. I was like, oh my gosh, how is he going to be able to take care of himself when he leaves? You know? And one of the things that we were thinking about was how, you know, how was he going to eat in a healthy way? And we're really sort of obsessed with you know, healthy, good food, and so we thought to ourselves, well, you know, cooking something that you practice my husband and I learned over many many years, and so what if we just asked him to make dinner one night a week, and you know, he always had opinions about what we were eating and some things he liked better than others, and so we turned it into this opportunity where he sort of got to control dinner one night a week, and but not like completely. We tried to really start with a sort of curated experience to set him up for success. So, you know, I pulled out a bunch of recipes that were fairly simple, kind of beginning, cook a small number of ingredients that would probably be something he would be interested in, and he would pick from that and then we you know, figure out the ingredientments and they would be on the shopping list of the week, and then he had his night that he would And it took my husband and I quite a long time for us to figure out our role in his learning, because at first he didn't really know anything. You know, cooking could actually be dangerous. You can cut yourself, you can burn things, you know, all sorts of things. And when he first started getting in there, we hadn't really been thoughtful about how we would engage and so before you'd know it, you know, we're in the kitchen with him, and then we'd taken over and we're starting to do it, even though we intended to show him how to do it, and we had a number of false starts where we were doing what Terence Austen do, which is trying to prevent him from jailing, and quite frankly, I think we were we wanted we expected dinner to be as good as we would make it and as quickly as we would make it right out of the gate, which was just an unreasonable expectation, and that usually ended up us just taking over and he wasn't learning anything. And so we finally had to sort of sit down have a reset about how are we going to actually teach him the thing we want him to learn, which is how to cook. And so we set up some rules. We required ourselves to stay on the other side of the counter, so we're in the kitchen, but we weren't in his space. We would, you know, keep an eye out and observe, but we'd be doing something else, so we weren't one hundred percent focused on him. When he you know, got stuck or had issues and he would ask us, we would verbally help him. Very rarely would we demonstrate, but sometimes we would, but we'd have him sort of hand the thing over to us so we could do it on the other side to show him something, so we weren't taking over. So a bunch of steps like that that enabled him to really begin to practice. And the truth of the matter is like what he made took all lot longer than if we were making it, and what he made wasn't as good as if we had made it, and the kitchen was significantly messier on those nights, but over time it got better and better. And what I think we had to realize for ourselves is, you know, we had to let go of some of those expectations of kind of high quality perfection right out of the gate in order for him to actually learn and develop the skill. And it really made me reflect as a mom about how many things in our lives do I want to sort of be if you will, perfect or at my standard, where I end up taking over and doing it because I want it my way, and as opposed to letting the child actually have the moment of the little small failure and trying it and then us talking about that and then learning from that, because that's the only way that you end up learning and growing, and so it's been a really powerful experience for all of us and a big awakening for me from the mom on side over to the educator's side of what does that actually look like in school as well, because oftentimes people now have this idea of you need to let kids fail, but they wait till these giant, high impact moments, whether it be a course or a giant test or you know, the internship or something as opposed to finding those small moments where the learning can really happen and the stakes aren't so high that doors of clothes for the future for your child. Yeah yeah, Now we've we've heard that from a few guests in the past that you know, maybe the college application is not the first time you allow your child to faire direct correct exactly. But this leads me to my next question on homework, which is an issue we hear from a lot of our listeners. You know, even kids who are younger than the kids would be in the summit sort of high schools and all that, but a lot of parents really struggle with how to deal with homework, and sometimes it's that their children are getting a lot of it. Some of it is seemingly by design the children cannot do by themselves, or there's just so much of it that it's overwhelming for a child who's like seven eight years old. So how do you recommend parents deal with homework? I mean, is this a place where you can sort of say, yeah, you do you and a small fail on this? I mean, should you have conversations with teachers if it seems to be too much of it or outside their level? Just how as an educator would you recommend people deal with this? Yeah, this is in fact, the conversation about homework was the conversation with my girlfriends. Is the conversation that prompted me to ultimately decide to prepare. It is such a common stress point in families and for kids, and quite frankly for teachers too. And this is where I think we are not working collaboratively at home and at school, and I think there's a lot lot of like disconnect and misunderstanding there. And so let's talk on two levels. One just me as an individual parent dealing with my own child, and then two sort of bigger picture, how do we collectively work together to maybe make this homework situation a little bit better. So let's start with the individual parents. This is a place where if I think we as parents, like the cooking example I just gave, we have to figure out what our role is and it can't be doing the homework for our children and so, and homework is sort of the lowest stakes moment at school, I do think, where there's opportunity for failing in order to learn. And so I think as parents, one of the things that we can do is we often have in our mind the best moment and the best way for our kids to do their homework. And one of the things I learned as a mom from my own son when he was in elementary school is I had made all these assumptions that were not consistent with how he viewed homework. And it was a really humbling experience to discover that, you know, he was really resentful of having to do work at home. He didn't understand why, he didn't understand the purpose of the work that he was being asked to do. He felt like, in his mind, school was school and home was a time where he got to be with his family and play with his toys and play with his friends. And he was very frustrated that that sort of school came and interfered with that, and so when I was expecting him to come right home and do his homework, because in my mind it was like, that's the smart thing to do and then you have the rest of the evening. He was really angry about that, and quite frankly, had been sort of trying to focus and sit all day and didn't have the ability to come straight home and do that. And so I had to really spend some time talking with him about, you know, why you would do homework and what parts of it made sense to him and didn't, And then we ended up haining to go and talk to the teacher about that. And then the teacher had all these perceptions as well, and for example, when he wouldn't do the homeworks, he would make him stay in for a recess, which is a common thing teachers do, which was the worst possible thing for him because he needed that time to be out and moving around in order to be able to focus in class. So we were doing all the wrong things and it wasn't until we actually talked to him about it and understood it. And one of the strategies I share in the book around that is the five Whys, and it's basically you don't often get the real answer, and the first to go around when you ask why, you have to keep asking why and why and really be quiet and listen to get to the bottom of things and then be able to work with your child in order to come up with something that works for both of you. And so I guess my very specific advice would be like, if your child is not coming home and able to do their homework consistently, like you have to get to the bottom of what it is for your child, and it's probably a combination of a whole bunch of things that will include working with the teacher around that to make sure this is actually meaningful and working and impactful and makes sense. And what I would say on that sort of jumping to the higher level is when you talk to teachers, most of them feel pressured to a sign homework by parents, believe it or not. And there is sort of this mental model of good teachers who are quote rigorous a sign homework, like that's what you do. But the reality is most of the homework that gets a sign in this country is not actually appropriate for independent student practice and or meaningful. And so kids are smart and they know when something isn't impactful or meaningful or useful to them, and they resent that and they don't like that, and it's really getting a signed so that the perception of parents will be that they're child's in a good classroom with a good teacher at a good school that expects this of them. But when that sort of escalation happens, before you know it, it becomes work that only parents can do, and then we get into this terribly vicious cycle between schools and families. And so I think we all need to sort of take a step back in a bit of a timeout. And I think that starts in the individual relationships, but then we need to think more globally about that as well. Yeah, that's great advice, and it's still hard to do in practice because there's so much pure stuff surrounding this, Like I I'm sure you're aware that, like many classes have like a what's up group of all the parents, and I've just I have started just ignoring it. Like if people start debating, you know, the right answers to the second grader's homework that the parents can't figure out on that right, what does that one will be wrong tomorrow? I'm not I'm looking at this, but it's tempting or you feel like you're doing something wrong as a parent if you choose completely engage. So I like that. I like that you're reminding us that you know there there could be like a plan c. You know, it doesn't have to be do everything the teacher says, do none of it, like you may you may have to ask yourself why and maybe delve up the right kind of you know, or balance for each child. And maybe what parents don't realize in that moment is when the second graders come back with homework where the answers are all right because the parents have figured it out, what does the teacher see? The teacher sees all the right answers right, and so the teacher is just going to keep doing the same thing because what the teacher is seeing it winds up and say, okay, well this is working right. And so I think this is where it is really incumbegous on us as parents who are at home who see what's happening, actually make sure that the student is doing the work, because that is the feedback to the teacher about the appropriateness of the homework. And if we just come in and compensate, then the whole thing just keeps viraling and escalating. You're right, it is one of the most challenging topics we have in education. Yeah, well, it's always difficult to keep our eyes on the end goal versus in the moment what seems easiest. And so that was one of the really cool things about reading prepared and hearing the story of sum at public schools and how it you know, what it looks like when people completely rethink that. So, Diane, we always end our interviews with a love of the week, which is just something that is really cool for us at the moment, and so we can go first, so you can have a moment to great. So you know, one thing I have actually enjoyed doing is our middle schools and high schools use power School Portal, which probably a lot of systems use, so you can see that teachers will post grades, they'll post you know, test scores, homework completion, all this, so you can go in and I will not look at it except with my son. So I'm never going to look at it except you know, if he and I are standing there to gather. It's usually because at this point, because he's asked me to look at it because he wants to share something with me. And I have also said that I will never start by like looking at the lowest grade, that that is not allowed to lead with that that. But I'm you know, it's I've had to put guidelines on myself for using it, but now that we have it, I really appreciate it because it opens up the opportunity to talk about grades. So I do like the system. I think obviously it could be very easily, but I am enjoying having that access. So that's something that I think is really cool right now right cool mine is also I decided to go school themed as well. But I do appreciate when the teachers use the apps that make it very easy to communicate with them. And I've used both remind and class Dojo, depending on which teacher it is, and I'm always respectful, like I don't expect to like get an answer from them, you know, immediately if I send it, And sometimes I'll even write that like respond when you get a chance, totally non urgent whatever. But they seem to check that more reliably than they check email, and it will even work for a quick line like today they send out an email because the aftercare program is closed, so they wanted to know where the kids were going. And I, while we were recording this podcast, was able to just say he's going to be in the pickup line today and she already responded back. So, yeah, those apps are great, and I think the teachers are very good about like you know, they don't look at them when they're not and they're busy with the kids. Right, great, Well, thank you for the opportunity. It's such a great idea. And here's what I'm loving this week. We have started this community of who we're calling prepared parents. So there's a lot of parents in the world who want to be active and engage and help their kids develop and are doing the best they can, and they're really busy, and they need short kIPS and quick advice, and they need reinforcement for the good choices they're making, and they need you know, examples and models in a community that's supportive. And a colleague and friend of mine has launched this amazing website, Prepared for Success dot org that is about that community of parents and has really pragmatic, quick like five minutes tips and ideas for parents who are interested in parenting this way, and I'm loving the stories on that site and the parents how they're engaging and collaborating with each other and trying to put these practices into daily life. Wonderful. Well, Diane, thanks so much for joining us, and our listeners will need to check out her book Prepared, which tells both the story of the Summit public schools and has great tips that parents can use to help mentor their children and help them become the sorts of people that we want them to be. So thanks so much, Diane, Thank you, Diane, thank you both. I appreciate it. All Right, that was fascinating. I feel like now I have at least a little bit of groundwork in terms of my future approach to homework. I don't know about you, but we can move on to our Q and A. All right, so I will read the question from listener A. My friend group includes three babies, now, mine being the most recent edition. One couple seems to think my husband and I are the perfect option for babysitting. Now. It seems they think we can trade evenings, which is fine, except that I don't want to be a babysitter and I am perfectly happy hiring someone rather than expecting my friends to take turns with me. Am I being too harsh? How do you say no when a friend expects you to be their childcare option on nights and weekends. This couple also has family in the area that they use for babysitting and daycare as well. I know they don't mean any harm and they would be happy to watch our daughter too. I just have issues with using friends in this way, especially if I haven't actually agreed to the arrangement. Yeah, I mean, I thought this is a kind of fun question. There's people have different kind of philosophies in ways they approach life, and there's certain things that I mean, if you are trying to save money, for instance, and you have a broad social network, this can be a great option. And in fact, if somebody wrote this question the opposite way to me and said, well, we just don't have the money for date night, but we're trying to stay connected as a couple, what can we do? I would suggest something like this. You know, see, if you have have peers, friends, neighbors that you can swap with, and that can be awesome. And it may just be that this couple has such an extended network that they just don't even think in terms of like, you know, paid childcare, and so in their minds you always ask a friend or neighbor that should be your first choice. Right that may not be your sort of way you grew up or the philosophy, and in your case, you just like the straightforward paying somebody exchanging money for goods and services, which is also a great approach to making these things happen. So I mean, I think that you could compromise if you wish to. You could say that you would do it, maybe like once a month you guys would swap. That might be somewhere that you could sort of cement those social ties and yet not feel like you are always the Friday night babysitter because you don't actually want and every Saturday night babysitter or whatever they're willing to trade off with you. You could also sort of proactively invite them for stuf that you do together as a family, so that way you are nurturing those social ties, but there's no sort of question of swapping kids for it, or you know, couples only things, and so then you're not available for each other as sitters because the two of you as a couple are doing stuff together. But you also can can sort of imply that you wouldn't be the right people to do this. I mean, one thing, you could just be you know, your your schedule, yours and your spouse's schedule has been really unpredictable because of maybe extended family issues or work, and you'd just hate to, you know, leave them hanging, Like, do you think this would be really rough on the relationship if you, you know, were not able to watch their baby some night when they were expecting you to. And I think that's totally legitimate, Like you, that could be a very rough part of the friendship if you had to not do it. So why don't you just say, like, yes, there will be times we can't do it, And so I think you probably want to seek out a different solution. Yeah, if somebody, I mean, I like my mind was even blown by this, I'm going to come up much more like harsh than you did. I just think, like, who would make that assumption without a discussion. I totally think it's great to arrange that kind of swap if that's what everybody wants to do, But I wouldn't even necessarily Look, I'm a Board certified pediatrician, and I still don't really want the responsibility of watching somebody else's baby, not because I think somebody will happen to them, but like, especially we're talking about young babies here, like are they gonna cry for hours on ed? And then I'm gonna be like oh with the mom when I know would they not want to? Like my head is like I just cannot really wrap my head around wanting to do this or maybe my friends. I just can't imagine anybody asking for this. So you've hosted playdates for older children. It's not that you not watching it, and I don't mind doing that at all, but that's like on my turns, like I invite them for a playdate, not like I mean, if somebody asked me for help you write with an older kid, it would be a lot different thing. But the idea of like standing over someone's baby and putting somebody else's baby to bed, like, I just feel like I have a hard enough time. I don't know, Oh, I don't know. I'm just I'm coming off as terrible as I answer this question. But I guess this is to say that it's not everybody's cup of tea to watch other people's children, and I hope that that friend would respect that, and I would hope that you could say, like, right now, that's you know, when I have a break from when I want to take a break from babies, I want to go out, and then when I want to be with my baby, I want to be able to focus on my baby and not worry about an additional baby. So now is probably not the time for this. However, we'd love to have you guys over for a playdate, dinner, bring your baby, we can all hang out together. Like you don't want to sever the friendships, maybe maybe it makes sense to organize some more group activities that involve the kids that would make them feel like they can have some adult time where they're also present around their kid. Maybe you could recommend some babysitter so that they get the hint like, oh, I have this fantastic No, seriously, especially if you're comfortable sharing, great babysitter RECs are gold. And so if someone does share that kind of thing with me, I'm usual like, wow, that was really really nice. So I don't know, I just don't think you should feel pressure, especially in this time after you've had a baby, that's a stressful time for you as a couple. If you want to do this, great, If you don't, please give yourself permission to opt out. All right, good advice, All right, Well, this has been best of both worlds. We've been interviewing Diane Tavner, the founder of sum at Public Schools, and we will be back next week with more on making work and life fit together. Thanks for listening. You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together.