Talking to the Children

Te Ao Hou, June 1965, Page 50

Talking to the Children Without realising it, a lot of people seem to think there is something wrong with adults talking to children. If I happen to get talking with the kids when I visit many Maori homes, the parents will tactfully but firmly draw me back to the adult conversation, which is probably football, racehorses and local gossip, and I am left with the impression that I've been doing something that just isn't done. Patrick's parents are the exception. In their home everybody talks to everybody else, and all conversations are equally important. There aren't so many Maori families where everyone sits down together to have a good yarn about something, where the kids can join in and say what they think. Does your family do it? How long since the last time? Or maybe you still think education is what happens at school, and that's all there is to it? You've got a lot of wisdom and experience that your children could benefit from. Getting them to think for themselves can be fun, too. Could be that you might even learn something from them. What about that homework that you don't really understand? You never learnt anything like that when you went to school, it was all different in those days?