A close friend had always this thing to reject the usual bedtime stories for her kids … Infact she created her own characters and would weave them around the cultural and religious values …
At that time , we the inexperienced felt that , it wont make much difference value wise and also the kids will feel left out when others talk cinderella and hers wouldnt know who cindy was !
Now years later , her kids are mashallah in their early teens and somehow they are much stronger in their religious mindset and have a clear understanding of their culture and dont confuse it at all wth the british culture …
Do you guys think its a good idea and helps in better upbringing of the child?
bedtime stories don't always have to be about cinderalla,etc.....there are some really good books for kids that have stories of our prophets and they're very interesting. I still remember the stories my nani-maa used to tell me from hadiths when I was young. :)
It is important for kids to know their religion and values.....but they should also know the traditional Western culture which is quite compatible with Islamic values if they live in the West and also they should be taught the classical literature from around the world, Islam and Quran should be the priority though.
I believe we can even draw morals from Cinderalla's story.
Traditional English rhymes and stories are important for their literacy skills and I doubt if those kids gonna take English Literature as a subject, they'd most likely choose Science subjects.
But when it comes to modern literature then I'm quite against it because modern kids' literature is like the junk food with no right nutritions (moral values), you can finish reading it quickly but it won't improve your literacy skills, logic and critical thinking.
I believe bedtime stories do influence us but as for your friends' kids, I don't tihnk only bedtime stories made all the difference. If she was so particular about the stories she told her, she probably incorporated her values and morals in everything else too, like in everyday conversations etc.
But bedtimes stories alone can influence a childs' young mind too.
For us kids growing up it was a little of both! My mom actually did the same thing as your close friend did in regards to creating her own characters and weave them around cultural and religious values. But she also read us western classic story time books as well .... those that she felt had a good moral behind them! Stories such as any of the Aesop Fables, Little Red Riding Hood, The Emperor's New Clothes, Cinderella, etc!
After she would finish with a story, she would ask what the moral behind it/ lesson learned was.....sometimes we would get it right away and other times she would go into further explanation so that we fully understood the meaning behind the stories.
I think it was great that my mother did this (and is still doing this since my youngest brother is 9 yrs old). It was a good balance that she struck by incorporating both western and her own islamic/cultural stories ... with the mindset that good morals should be learnt by us kids.
ok I have a related question.. I would like your input.
I am teaching Seera to my children at Sunday School.. y'day they were telling me everything they have read so far and this is how it went, "prophet mohammad (saw) married khadija, they kissed (everyone in the class going hawwwww they kissed) I just ignored it and said ok then and the kid went on saying " and they had six children" now these are 5-7 years old and of course they go to school here, watch TV, read about stories where prince n princess kiss and live happily ever after.. when I was telling them the story, they had the same reaction.. as soon as I said "Mohammad married khadija"one of them responded by saying and they kissed? while some students went hawwwww..I ignored.. what woudl be the appropriate reaction to it?
Mind it they have a very good imagination as I noticed y'day.. to make the story interesting I had told them about angel jabriel (he is made of light,his wings are huge etc) so y'day while reading tehs tory back to me they spent quite a while explaining angel jabriel to me as they imagined it to be.. so I can see what they think and how they visualize things! very creative mashaAllah!
my concern is by ignoring it am I letting them do this on and on or sould I make a point.. if yes what and how? or if I dun respond to their haw.. would they actually just get over it?
^Weird kids. I think they've been fed Disney's version of stories, ignore their remarks and teach them to say (salallahu alaihi wasalam) each time they say Prophet(SAW)'s name.
hareem please don't call them weird.. they are just very young kids who see these things around and pick them up.. all I want them to learn is to differentiate between Islamic Studies and regular school studies and what's appropriate to say or not... by the way, they do say sallalahu alaihi wasalam even though they can't pronounce it right.
Chicken B - by the bedtime roles around my creative juices are at a bare minimal. It’s easy to do bedtime with a story book but now there wonderful islamic and non islamic books that you can read. i love the illustrated ones about the prophets.
I saw this recently - I thought It was a great book for children with all types of values - work ethic, money management, time management, sharing etc all rolled into one with illustrations.
hareem please don't call them weird.. they are just very young kids who see these things around and pick them up.. all I want them to learn is to differentiate between Islamic Studies and regular school studies and what's appropriate to say or not... by the way, they do say sallalahu alaihi wasalam even though they can't pronounce it right.
I don't think it's possible. You're right, It's not kids' fault of course. I don't know how I'd handle this problem if my kids were in school and they were watching TV and reading Books without any supervision.
My mum use to tell me hadiths when I was little and I'd read Surahs/Kalimas before going bed.
Inshallah we plan to purchase those lovely children's books that tell stories from the Quran in language suitable for younger children. We will also read them fairystories, but we'll attempt to balance them all.
It's a fantastic way of introducing religion to children at a young age.
A close friend had always this thing to reject the usual bedtime stories for her kids ... Infact she created her own characters and would weave them around the cultural and religious values ...
At that time , we the inexperienced felt that , it wont make much difference value wise and also the kids will feel left out when others talk cinderella and hers wouldnt know who cindy was !
Now years later , her kids are mashallah in their early teens and somehow they are much stronger in their religious mindset and have a clear understanding of their culture and dont confuse it at all wth the british culture ...
Do you guys think its a good idea and helps in better upbringing of the child?
I like this idea. Will attempt some time. Unfortunately, I have such a bad imagination that even my 4 year old rejects my made up stories :( She prefers me to read from books.
Although once in a while, I do a make-up story based on her behaviour (or anything else we may have observed) so that the point can be driven home. For ex. if she threw a tantrum over something, then after the time has passed...even days, I make up a story about a child who did a similar behaviour and then she realises it was not a good thing. Also works for any postive behaviours. But a skilled story teller would be able to make such stories more interesting and inspiring than I can. I used to be really good at it, dont know what happened....
I don’t know how I would respond… I would probably ignore it like you did
These days my daughter wants everyone to get married… all her stories end in marriage, yesterday she even said I wanna marry papa, which I found cute but these kind of comments (the ones your students said) are so hard to deal with :hinna:, one never knows how to respond.
I think you should go "hawwww" with the kids. LOL. Just cover your mouth and wink at them.
They are children with innocent minds. When you ignore this reaction from them you are definitely instilling the right value, however, you are creating a distance between yourself and them by suggesting that their reaction is wrong or to be frowned upon. In my opinion this makes you appear strict and intolerant of their perspective. It separates you from them.
The lesson that I think you want to teach is one of respect.
Respect for things that adults do and the importance of not making fun of something that we don't understand. By sharing in the "hawwwww" you are bringing yourself to the kid's level and then communicating with them on a completely different frequency. When you are at their level they will be more likely to listen and accept your advice to be respectful.
I don't know if I am explaining everything that I want to say but this is what I would do.
I think you should go "hawwww" with the kids. LOL. Just cover your mouth and wink at them.
They are children with innocent minds. When you ignore this reaction from them you are definitely instilling the right value, however,** you are creating a distance between yourself and them by suggesting that their reaction is wrong or to be frowned upon. In my opinion this makes you appear strict and intolerant of their perspective. It separates you from them.**
The lesson that I think you want to teach is one of respect.
Respect for things that adults do and the importance of not making fun of something that we don't understand. By sharing in the "hawwwww" you are bringing yourself to the kid's level and then communicating with them on a completely different frequency. When you are at their level they will be more likely to listen and accept your advice to be respectful.
I don't know if I am explaining everything that I want to say but this is what I would do.
the bold part is exactly what I am afraid of.. I don't want them to feel intimidated by any means neither do I wish to be so frank which allows them to say whatever they want to.. I think I will just ignore it without making any issue out of it.. if the problem remains then I would just gently explain that we have to respect Quraan, Mohammad (saw) by not talking about irrelevant things in class. InshaAllah they will be fine.
I thought evne many traditional fairy tales aren't popular with parents these days......
Beautiful girl = sad and miserable til man rescues her.
Nah.
its a great discussion on girlpower though, isn't it?
i'd read these to my daughter (if i have one) just so we could have a discussion on the subject matter and she could understand that while its nice to have men around and iA one day she'll be married to one and all that, its not a necessity to depend on one to "rescue" you from whomever/whatever.
