When young children join a family, it’s essential to create a strong family culture that includes them. There are many different ways a family can develop familial ties with young children. The cultural foundation you build for young children will stay with them for the rest of their lives.
Having a strong family culture can create positive memories, build strong relationships between members of the family, and help children develop their personal identity.
Share Your Values With Your Children
One of the most important things adults can do to build a family culture is to share their personal values with the children in their family. These values can come from personal beliefs, family history, and religious backgrounds.
Values will differ from family to family depending on many factors, including religious and cultural backgrounds. But there are certain values that children benefit from across cultures. Some common values to instill in young children:
- Respecting others
- Fairness
- Being responsible for what you say and do
- Caring for those in need
- Honesty
Incorporate Your Cultural Heritage Into Family Life
In addition to personal values, familiarizing your child with their cultural heritage is a great way to build a strong family culture. Cultural heritage is anything unique to the culture of the family. People share their culture through food, music, dance, storytelling, clothing, religion, sports, and more.
Food is a great way to help young children feel connected to your family’s cultural heritage. Tell them about the cultural foods your family enjoys. Allow young children to participate in preparing these foods and encourage them to taste them.
Here are some other great ways to share your family’s cultural heritage with young children:
- Teach them songs or nursery rhymes common in your culture.
- Play music that your family enjoys.
- If dancing is important to your family, spend time dancing with the youngest members.
- Tell stories about older generations.
- Spend time doing activities that are important to your culture, like arts and crafts or playing sports.
Spend Quality Time Together
To instill a strong family culture in young children, adults can demonstrate that they value quality time with their family. Make sure to spend quality time as a family and include young children. Put electronic devices away, turn off the TV, and do something together. By making quality time a habit, young children will see the value of spending time with their families.
Here are some fun ideas for quality family time:
- Go for a walk outside.
- Cook or bake something together. Make sure to give everyone a job to do.
- Have a family game night.
- Snuggle together and read your favorite books.
- Play outside.
Create Family Traditions
If you’re sharing your personal values and cultural heritage with your children as well as spending quality time together, you’re probably starting to create some family traditions. Traditions are any event or activity your family does at regular intervals. This can be weekly, monthly, or even yearly.
Common traditions are linked to holidays and birthdays. These traditions can be really memorable. People tend to hold onto their family holiday traditions for their entire lives. Many of these traditions include eating special foods, attending special events, exchanging gifts, or just spending quality time together to celebrate.
But your family can create traditions that happen outside of holidays as well. Consider having a special meal together once a week, such as Friday or Sunday nights. Make time every day to read stories together. It can be a bedtime tradition! Or maybe your family has an annual vacation or place you enjoy visiting together.
When you call something a tradition, you’re creating memories for your child that will last a lifetime. They’ll always remember trips to your favorite museum, fireworks on July 4, or weekly picnics. Whatever your family’s traditions, don’t hesitate to start them early and create memories with young children.
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