A friend of mine, a kindergarten teacher at one of the poorest schools in San Francisco, has a student fighting cancer.  That’s a terrifying battle to face at any age but at five years old, it must be especially frightening.  Naturally, the little girl wants her mother with her as much as possible, but that’s hard to do when you work for a living.  Nonetheless, her mother, who actually works in the hospital, is doing her best to be there as much as possible.

Staying with her daughter, however, means the mom can’t work and, as far too many of us know first-hand, if you can’t work, you can’t pay rent.  To help out, my friend organized a dance-a-thon fund-raiser at school along with an online campaign to get donations to help the family out.  Naturally, we contributed.

So when my son asked about getting an agua fresca, I told him about the little girl and her situation.  Then I asked him if he wanted to get a drink or help her out.  He chose to have some water and donate to the girl.  We then talked about the idea that if everyone just gave up one drink or coffee or treat each week and instead donated the money, it would make the world a much better place for an awful lot of people.

If you would like to help out Harmonie, you can donate online.

Take the milk industry, for example.  There are, basically, four types of milk: whole, reduced fat (2%), low-fat (1%), and non-fat.  Now, the caps on these are always red for whole milk, blue for low-fat, yellow for 2%…  or is it blue for whole milk, red for low-fat…  The problem is, there is no standard across brands and stores.  It’s even possible to be standing in a store looking at two jugs of milk with identically-colored caps and labels, and have them be different types of milk.

Now, imagine you’re a harried parent, in the store with a couple of kids trying to convince you that donuts are actually a vegetable while you’re mentally calculating whether or not you have enough money or if you should put the chicken back when you find yourself in front of the milk case.  You need two gallons of low-fat milk but they’ve rearranged the shelves again.  Instead of being able to just grab two jugs with light-blue caps, you have to stop and read labels to figure out which bottles are the ones you’re looking for.  While you’re doing that, the baby has run off and the middle child has managed to open the box of cereal and pour half of it on the floor.

Okay, so maybe that’s a little extreme, but not by much.  And how hard would it be, really, to come up with a standard color scheme so that yellow caps and labels always meant non-fat milk and blue caps always meant 2%?  It wouldn’t cost a thing and it would save parents a lot of time and frustration — and, after all, who are the biggest purchasers of milk?  Parents.  So, are you listening, milk producers?  Do your customers, and yourselves, a favor and standardize your colors!

Sure, wicker, metal, or wooden trash bins are more stylish, but the basic cheap plastic bin is a necessity around our house.  It’s not just that they tend to fit in well with the kids’ decor (a style known as “toys strewn about”), it’s not only that they can survive the abuse they suffer as hats, step stools, chairs, and so on, and it’s not solely that they are cheap enough that I don’t care should they get broken.  No, the primary reason I like plastic wastebaskets is the stomach flu.

The last few days around here have been filled with a lot of unpleasant substances coming out of nearly all of us and not always with much notice.  As an adult, I can usually make it to the bathroom in time when my burrito decides it wants out the way it came in, but the same is not necessarily true of the kids, especially if they’re asleep at the time.  So rather than having to buy new carpeting on a regular basis, we make the trash cans do double duty.

Positioned next to — or even in — a child’s bed, a plastic can makes a good substitute for the toilet and is easily emptied, washed, and ready for more in no time at all.  We use cheap ones from Ikea, but any home store — or, for that matter, thrift shop — will have something suitable.  Just make sure it’s all plastic and easily washable.  And get one for each kid — chances are, if one kid gets it, they all will.

So before you decide to go all designer and pick up a fancy brushed aluminum or cloth-covered waste basket for your kids’ room, think about those carpets and take another look at the good ol’ cheap plastic trash can.

Rather than score their schools on a traditional “A = 90-100″ sort of scale, the department assigned the top 10% of schools an “A” — meaning that a score as low as 75 out of 100 got the top grade.  A rating of 50/100 still garnered a “C” rather than the more traditional “F” grade.  Department Secretary Hanna Skandera explained the reason for the new grading system: “Last year we had 87 percent of our schools failing according to … No Child Left Behind,” she said. “I don’t believe 87 percent of our schools are failing.”  Of course, never mind that students aren’t learning — that’s not the problem, the grading system is.

The state apparently needed to set a benchmark for all the schools to shoot for and, rather than going for “teach the darn kids”, they decided to fudge the grades.  Instead of setting the bar high, they went the other way.  “Our bar is the top 10 percent,” Skandera said. “That’s how we’re measuring success. I think that’s an excellent starting point for asking, ‘How are we doing?’ And let’s benchmark against that and go forward and aspire that every single one of our schools is in the top 10 percent.”

I’m not so sure I agree.  It seems to me that one should shoot for the absolute top, not simply as good as you’ve got.  Admittedly, educating kids is a challenging task, but shouldn’t those who do so be setting the example of trying their best and working towards perfection?  It feels as if the New Mexico PED is setting up a loophole in order to get out of having to fix the problem of failing schools.  What do you think?  Is the best of what they’ve got good enough or should they try to better all the schools?

When the subject of marriage came up between her and her three-year-old daughter — after Mrs. van de Geyn suggested that the cartoon character Handy Manny ought to marry his friend Kelly — she laid down the law on same-sex marriage:  “Girls don’t marry other girls.  Girls marry boys and boys marry girls.”

She goes on to say that it’s not a religious or political matter for her, or even her own personal beliefs, but instead that the “conversation totally came out of left field” and she simply wasn’t ready for it.  Now, I’m not going to fault her for panicking and saying the wrong thing when she was put on the line by her kid — the girl asked if Handy Manny and Mr. Lopart should get married — even though she did bring up the topic.  She could, very easily, revisit the subject, letting her daughter know that she made a mistake and that boys can indeed marry boys.  Instead, it’s what she said at the end of her article that I want to call her out on.

Mrs. van de Geyn ends her piece by saying that “I don’t regret telling her that boys marry girls and girls marry boys. I don’t feel it’s a topic appropriate for her age.”  Why isn’t same-sex marriage a suitable topic for a three-year-old?  I can understand not wanting to discuss, for example, the use of bondage for sexual gratification or the meaning of the word santorum, but same-sex marriage is a problem?  Seriously?

What Mrs. van de Geyn is really saying is that boy-girl marriage is okay but boy-boy or girl-girl marriage is icky-poo-poo.  And that’s not an okay message for parents to tell their kids.

There have been far too many suicides and murders because of this precise point of view to let it continue for another generation.  There are far too many wonderful people being treated like second-class citizens to let this go.  There are too many loving couples who can’t legally say “I do” because of people who feel this way.  You don’t get to perpetuate bigotry simply because talking to your kids makes you uncomfortable.  If you have kids, you have to deal with the difficult stuff along with the cute stuff.  You can’t weasel out of it at someone else’s expense.

In her article, Mrs. van de Geyn asks “what would you have told your kid?” and my answer is what I have already told my three-year-old — that marriage is when people love each other very much and want to become a family, they may choose to get married.  That way, they know what’s important about marriage — love.  There are no judgments, no limitations, no prerequisites, other than love.  What matters is what’s inside.  That’s a lesson it seems some adults need to learn as well.

Scrolling down through the new photos dripping with cuteness, the desperate pleas for post-bedtime booze, and the occasional political or activist alert, I stumbled on a succinct review of the book It Happened on the Way to War by Rye Barcott.  The wonderful and amazing Karen Walrond of Chookooloonks wrote that the book is “one of the best books I’ve read all year, no lie.”  I read the blurb that went with the link she posted and thought that this was something important and significant.

It is a memoir of a college kid who, prior to joining the Marines, spent a summer living in a slum in Kenya so as to “better understand ethnic violence — something he would likely face in uniform.”  The author, Rye Barcott, went on to found the non-profit group Carolina for Kibera (CFK) which works to “promote youth leadership and ethnic and gender cooperation in Kibera through sports, young women’s empowerment, and community development.”  He continued working with CFK even while deployed with the Marines.  It sounds like an inspiring tale of an amazing person.

And then I saw the next post.  From one of the parenting websites I used to write for, the blurb asked “What’s your kid’s favorite after-school snack?  Tell Us to Win a Prize…”  It struck me that, had this followed any other post, I likely wouldn’t have given it a second thought.  It was an entirely frivolous topic and, yet, there is was on my screen with exactly the same urgency, significance, and seriousness as Karen’s link to Barcott’s book.  The problem is, the two are not equals.

The organization that Barcott founded works with children and families living in almost unimaginable poverty and sees providing access to education as part of their mission.  The children they’re trying help may not have enough to eat at all, let alone the luxury of being picky about an afternoon snack.  We here in America and, I suspect, other first-world countries, spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about our kids’ clothes, whether or not they’ll get the right teacher, and whether they should take violin, karate, or French lessons when, perhaps, what we ought to be doing is teaching our children to care about others.

I know that, sometimes, I forget how lucky we and our children really are; I’m not sure my kids know at all.  Perhaps, however, it’s time to let them know and to figure out how we can make sure every child has nothing more serious to worry about than what snack they want after school.

The study [PDF], conducted by professors at Harvard University and Bocconi University in Italy, has found a correlation between childhood attendance at Fourth of July celebrations and political views in adulthood.  By using the absence or presence of rain on the Fourth as an indicator of likely participation, the researchers found that “the likelihood that an adult at age 40 identifies as a Republican increases by 0.76 percentage points for each rain-free Fourth of July during childhood, where childhood is defined as the ages of 3-18.”  Furthermore, the researchers found the effects to be permanent and most significant at ages 7 to 10, the age range, I suspect, when parents are most likely to take kids to such events.

The study also found that the effects of the Fourth are one-way — Democrats received no similar boost “indicating that Fourth of July shifts preferences to the right rather than increasing political polarization.”  So if you don’t want to end up with an Alex P. Keaton on your hands, perhaps it’s best to stay home and avoid anything patriotic or, at the very least, make sure your kids are as terrified as I was.

Cars 2 is rated “G” — suitable for children of all ages — and that does carry a lot of weight with many parents.  But if Cars 2 is so violent, why isn’t it rated “PG” or even “PG-13″?  I suspect the MPAA is less concerned with the effects of movie violence on children than I am.  I also suspect that the MPAA doesn’t see Cars 2 as a violent movie since no humans are involved.  I imagine a committee from the MPAA sat in a conference room, thought “oh, they’re just blowing up cars and such, that doesn’t count as violence, right?” and then gave the movie its “G” rating.  Unfortunately, it’s not always that simple.

What the MPAA has perhaps failed to consider is that John Lasseter and his team at Pixar are known for their ability to bring life and personality to inanimate objects and the Cars characters are no exception.  Once you anthropomorphize an object, however, you can’t blow that object up and claim that isn’t violence.  Those cars are every bit as much “people” to little kids as you and I are.  Remember, these are kids that believe a 6-foot talking yellow bird is real and that the Tooth Fairy does magically appear in their bedrooms at night to trade cash for lost teeth.

So clearly, I should not have let my impressionable young children see this film — and yet I did.  Parenting is never easy and it’s certainly never simple.  While I definitely feel that Cars 2 is a movie best suited for teenagers, I also know that my children have been well-prepared to handle exposure to movie violence.  We’ve discussed violence at length and they have had training in stage combat from their work in the theatre, so they can understand that what they see on the screen is not necessarily real.  It was also an outing with their Nana and cousin, an important experience in my book.

Most of all, however, was the pressure exerted by the advertising, by their peers, and, to some extent, by society at large.  You see, in the United States, a nine-year-old (or even a seven-year-old) who hasn’t seen Harry Potter is a social outcast.  At that age, to never have tasted soda pop and thus be hesitant about something likened to soda is seen as odd.  There is much that is expected of kids (and adults) in order for them to fit in and, while I hope they know better than to want to be just like everyone else, I think that being able to fit in with their peers is important as well.

And then there is the advertising — everywhere we turn, it seems, there are the Cars characters and a push to see the film.  By the time Kids-in-Mind had their review posted and I knew anything about the film, my kids had it set in their minds that they were going to see it.  To disappoint them at that point seemed like it would be a hollow victory at best.  As parents, we must always choose which battles to fight and make the rest into learning experiences.  And the latter, for better or for worse, is what I chose to do here.

It seems the Los Angeles Unified School District doesn’t think homework is all that important.  Their new policy limits homework to a mere 10% of a student’s grade, meaning that an A is possible without ever doing a lick of homework.  While I would have loved this idea when I was in school, as a parent, I’m not so sure this is a good idea.  According to the Los Angeles Times, the change is “intended to account for the myriad urban problems facing the district’s mostly low-income, minority population.”  I suspect, however, that it will give a free pass to those students who need the extra practice the most.

As a parent who has fought with a child about completing homework despite the material having been mastered years before, I can see that limiting the influence of such — in our case — busywork has its advantage, but, really, the importance of homework to a student ought to be decided on an individual basis.  As for those who face challenges in completing their assignments — jobs, duties at home, extracurricular activities — certainly some accommodations can be made (and homework for subjects already mastered could be reduced or eliminated), but isn’t it better to teach kids to resolve problems and overcome obstacles rather than simply giving up?  What are your thoughts — would you rather see homework keep its significance or have it relegated to an “if I feel like it” sort of status?

The sandwich that comes with the kid’s meal from Subway — between 150 and 200 calories and weighing in at a mere 3.8 to just over 5 ounces, including bread and condiments — is too small to feed anyone older than, perhaps, a kindergartener and, really, is most suited for a preschooler.  And, yet, the meal comes with promotional materials for a movie that even the MPAA says should be limited to teenagers.  Could it be that Subway disagrees with the MPAA and Kids-In-Mind or are they just looking to get more bodies in their theatres, even if it means using kids to do so?

I suspect that the studio that paid for this promotion mainly wants to get parents to go see the movie but likely would have little to no problem with the idea of filling their seats with toddlers.  So the question that pops into my head is whether or not this is this an acceptable means of advertising to parents.  Frankly, my answer is no.

I certainly understand the need for advertising and, frankly, wouldn’t know what movies I’d like to see were it not for the marketing efforts of the movie studios.  What I don’t like, however, is taking advantage of young children to push one’s message.  I don’t need the hassle of my three-year-old coming to me and begging to see a movie I wouldn’t let my oldest watch but, thanks to Subway, that’s exactly what I could end up with, were I to let him play with the provided materials.

Ultimately, as the parent, it’s up to me to ensure my kids only get suitable and appropriate playthings but I still have to chastise Subway for making my job that much harder.