Well, welcome back to the Simplicity Diaries with me, Kim Jon-Pain, a little bit of housekeeping to do before we launch into our episode today about respecting differences, which is the big theme really, but breaking that down, how to help children understand that and coach them into their future lives and how to respect differences. But a little bit of housekeeping, I mentioned last week that the Emotionally Resilient Tweens and Teens Care Professionals Seminar was coming up and now, yeah, the registrations are open. It's on Saturday, November 7th, Sunday, November 8th.
It's three hours on Saturday, three hours on Sunday. I personally lead that together with my dear colleague, Nora Hilogo, and we are hoping to, as we always do actually, have people from all around the world who have that interest, educators, care professionals, all sorts of medical folk, many, many, many people from many unexpected walks of life attend these care professional seminars. They're a part of our overall coaching training where we train Simplicity Parenting Coaches.
I think we have well over, I think it's 13, 14, 100 coaches around the world now and that's just slowly increasing as we go. So registrations are open Saturday, November 7th, Sunday, November 8th. It is recorded, right? So if you can't make one of those sessions or either of them, you can access it via the recording.
Now one little other piece of housekeeping is over at Simple Steps. As people have been appreciating, I let them know the podcast episodes called Simple Steps, which is actually hosted on Simple Family Living, okay? That's where you can find all these different podcast episodes. We do one a month, generally, with a few exceptions, but one a month, which is public facing, which is on Spotify and so on, on Apple.
But there are three, generally, two or three, over at the Simple Family Living site every month. And one of them this month coming up will be how to help helpful kids not be bossy, because they can often cross a line and they want to help, but they can become over controlling with you and with siblings. So there's a podcast episode on that.
And that'll be followed by another episode on children who tend to tattletale, who come and tell stories, who try to recruit you to their side of things, how to deal with that, and how to help them become helpers, how to put things right, how to turn tattletaling around. And that'll be a follow up to a previous podcast, was quite a while ago that we did, but that's a follow up. So that's coming up over at Simple Family Living.
And there's a link right below. So, you know, to go there. OK, so respecting differences.
Gosh, this starts early, doesn't it? Respecting differences. It's not just tolerating, although that's good, too. But really respecting people around us who are different.
And that can begin for very young children with pointing out differences in the natural world. Pointing out differences, you know, when we're walking and we see a softwood tree and a deciduous tree. And gosh, aren't they different? Look at the different shapes of them.
Huh. Or pointing out differences in the animal kingdom. How a male and female cardinal are so different in their color, aren't they? Mr. Cardinal has got such a bright red coat on and Mrs. Cardinal, well, her coat's not nearly so bright, but it's very beautiful too, isn't it? That's for little children where there are differences all around.
And it can even come into people for little children that one of their friends, gosh, Nico really likes to dig big, deep holes, doesn't he? When he plays in the sandbox, he digs and digs and digs. I know you like to play on the swings more than in the sandbox, don't you? Yeah, we all like different things, don't we? As kids grow up and we're pointing out differences in a very gentle way, but in a way that is very much calibrated to them understanding that there are differences, we can even start to move that into different ways of seeing things. So when there's, if you have siblings or if you're an educator within the classroom, is to help a child understand that everyone sees and feels things differently, and that doesn't make them a liar.
There's an earlier podcast on that theme, actually, but just because someone saw a situation, the same situation that you're talking about, because they saw it differently and they felt differently about it, that's okay. In our family, it's really okay to feel different, differently about the same thing. In our family, that is so fine.
That is what we do, don't we? And then there's expressing differences. And this is often the way as kids grow up, they, you know, they'll start noticing as they get a little older, they'll start noticing that some, and they become more aware of their clothing and their appearance. They'll become aware that some kids like to wear sporty clothing and other kids like to wear, you know, car hearts and overalls and work clothing.
And some kids like to have long hair and have it loose and others like to tie it back and so on and so on and so on. It goes that appearances can start to express who we feel we are inside ourselves. And those conversations can happen frequently.
Gosh, isn't it interesting, you know, that Michelle, she really, she has all these scarves and bright clothing, doesn't she? Yes, she's such a bubbly, friendly one, isn't she? That's so different to Jack, isn't it? Who, he's very quiet and he dresses in a very quiet way too, doesn't he? The way he is in the world and wants to dress and appear and be in the world is really different to Michelle. And that can be a conversation for a nine-year-old, a ten-year-old, and you start to stage it that different people express their inner selves outwardly in their own way. And as a child grows into their tween years and then beyond into their teen years, that very much helps them with tolerance and respect of differences and the way in which we all express ourselves.
An inner feeling of who we are expressing itself outwardly in the world. That relates to all kinds of issues, doesn't it? Particularly, that relates to gender issues or transgender issues. It can go in so many different directions that it's really okay that someone feels something inside themselves that you don't quite understand or you don't feel that way.
But they express themselves and put themselves out into the world in that way. And we respect that as their right. That's their right to do that.
You might not relate to it. That's okay too. You're feeling about that of not being like that.
But not all people can be the same. Not all people can be like you. How boring would it be if everyone was exactly the same? And if you raise children from the youngest of ages to understand in a very child-friendly way, developmentally appropriate way, pointing out the differences.
And what I've done in this little episode is given a bit of a walkthrough the ages and the understandings and where that can lead to when they hit their teen years where opinions, often strong opinions, can be voiced. If kids have been raised in a culture of people see and feel things differently, people express things differently, and in our family that is just so okay. That teenager can be friends with many, many people from all sorts of diverse racial backgrounds, gender backgrounds, like all kinds of differences.
If we've raised our child that way, there'll be a much greater understanding, tolerance, inclusiveness, and respect for the differences that they are now quite aware of in the world. Okay. Big theme, isn't it? Hope that was helpful.
