Family Story Telling

Tell your family's stories. The Godly Play Foundation has collected some great resources on the importance of not only sharing stories of God at home, but bringing your kids into the family's narrative. Family storytelling can:

• Promote literacy - it's a great supplement to reading books.

• Increase self-esteem and help form identity - kids become connected to their  “inter-generational self," a part of a family and culture that is bigger than just them.

• Help build resilience - include both ups and downs as you build your family's narrative, and kids will begin internalizing ways to face and overcome adversity.

If you need a place to start, psychologists Duke and Fivush found that kids' familiarity with 20 family-oriented questions predicted their overall emotional health and happiness. You can find the questions that formed the basis of their "Do You Know?" scale here.

Kids do not have to be able to answer all of the questions accurately; what's important is that the conversations are happening. In fact, whether your family includes young children, older children, or no children at all, this kind of storytelling is a wonderful way to bind your family together! For further reading on the topic, check out the links here.