1. The Challenges of Parenting
Do Now: What are some characteristics of a good parent?

2. Parenting: A Learning Process
Parenting: caring for children and helping them grow and develop
Parents Should
Have reasonable expectations
Develop parenting skills
The Stages of Parenthood
Image making (pregnancy)
Nurturing (Becoming attached Birth-2)
Authority (Determine rules 2-5)
Interpretive (Deciding on values 5-13)
Interdependent (Adolescence; establish boundaries)
Departure (Child leaves home, empty feeling)

3. The Changes that Parenthood Brings
New responsibilities and role conflict
Changes in lifestyle (sometimes suddenly)
Emotional adjustments (stop being selfish)
Changes in relationships
Employment
Irreversibility

4. Making Decisions About Parenthood
Emotional Maturity
Desire for parenthood
A child cannot create miracles; saving of marriage, low self-esteem, attention issues, etc.
Health Considerations
Financial Concerns (can you afford a child)

5. MOTHERHOOD Intensive Mothering Ideology What mothers ought to provide:
Full-time attention
Self-sacrificing devotion
Expert guided
Labor-intensive involvement with the child
Child’s needs are more pressing than those of mothers
WHAT MOTHER COULD LIVE UP TO THIS EVEN IF SHE STAYED AT HOME. WHAT IF SHE WORKED?

6. FATHERHOOD Changes in sexual relations.
Anxiety about abilities, baby, money.
Witnessing birth is a positive bonding experience with child.
“Nurturing father” is able to participate in all parenting practices – child benefits.
Fatherhood is changing fast.

7. WHAT IT TAKES TO BE A FATHER
Some Facts:
½ of all children will spend part of their childhood in a father absent home.
32% of all children are born to unmarried women. Among African American it is 68%.
Children raised in two-parent families rarely experience poverty.
Data has linked growing up without a father to:
Under achievement in school
Mental illness
Drug abuse
Youth suicide
Delinquency
Crime
WHAT IT TAKES TO BE A FATHER

8. Parenting Activity Parenting License Create Requirements (at least 10)
Income, age, home, car, education, etc.
Create a Test (at least 10 questions)
What courses would you have parents to take?