Rebuilding Family Bonds
In the family life, love is the oil that eases the friction, the cement that binds closer together; and the music that brings harmony.
Hi my name is Hannah Smith and I am currently serving as the Vice chairperson of the Nebraska Family leader SPOT team and today I am here to talk to you about my project rebuilding bonds.The bonds that I am referring to are the bonds between families. The family that I grew up with consisted of two older brothers, my mom and my dad. I have a pretty stereotypical family but the thing that makes my family rare in this day and age is that my family is very connected to each other- we like to spend time going to each other events and doing activities together as a family. Sadly this is not common in families today.
Through the Families First National Program youth gain a better understanding of how families work and learn skills to become strong family members. Families First has five units- Families Today — Understand and celebrate families; You-Me-Us — Strengthen family relationships; Meet the Challenge — Overcome obstacles together; Balancing Family and Career — Manage multiple responsibilities; Parent Practice — Learn to nurture children. Various aspects of my project will focus on different units of this program.
To kick off my project, I worked with other FCCLA members to advertise our Family Movie Night on Social Media. We also made flyers and hung them around school. We choose to show Hocus Pocus as it is a fun movie for the month of October. I helped my FCCLA adviser purchase candy and prizes for the event. We had approximately 50 people attend our event and we collected 157 canned food items that we donated to the Overton Food Pantry. On October 2nd and October 16th I traveled to the District 4 and District 10 Leadership Conferences where I presented sessions to students from across Nebraska about various things you can do to strengthen your family regardless of how big or small your family is or who the members of your family are. This was a fun experience because I got to encourage not just my school and community but others from other areas around the state to get in contact with their family’s. I also got to know some of the other people in this great association that I consider a second family.
Soon it was November and I created a document to be sent home to all elementary students that promoted my school lunch visitor contest as well as encouraged family members to do things together at home over the holidays and share those on social media. I created the hashtag #familyfun for them to use so I could track these posts throughout November and December. I emailed a similar document to all 7-12th grade students as well. This encouraged them to also do activities with their family and it also explained the conversation starters that would soon be in the napkin holders on the lunch tables. The first week of December I found conversation starters on the Family Dinner Project’s website and printed them off. Our library aide laminated them for me and I put them in the napkin holders along with the help of my mom who also works in the school’s kitchen. On December 9th, I began this part of my project by encouraging FCCLA members to share their thoughts and ideas to the questions on the cards during our FCCLA Holiday Party. I left these conversation starters in the napkin holders throughout December.
I have been tracking the number of visitors each class has had at school lunch since November 1st. As of right now the ( grade with the greatest number ) is leading this race. We have a popcorn and movie party planned for the winner class at the end of January.
I think that families are something that people need to appreciate more and give a little more effort into. As the world is going now I don’t think that people will rely on one another as they once did. The world today is turning into an I world instead of a us world. But we have the power to change that we need to change it for ourselves. We can work to reconnect our families through Families First projects such as mine. Remember family isn’t always blood, it’s the people in your life who want you in theirs. The ones who accept you for who you are, the ones who would do anything to see you smile and who love you no matter what.
