My daughter was stuck on a maths assignment. I can do maths. This is the moment for Dad to step in and save the day! I read the question, figured it out (pretty quickly actually) and carefully coached her through it. Soon she was doing her homework just how I’d said. I left her to it, walking away in the glow of another acing-it-as-a-Dad moment.

Two days later, in the school staffroom, Mr Lee approached me. “Jeremy, maybe stop helping your daughter with her maths. Thanks to you, she got all those questions wrong.”

Eep! I’d forgotten to shift the decimal place or something. Whatever it was, this was a crisis moment. Not because my daughter had to redo the assignment, but because I had failed as a parent. I’m meant to know what to do when my child needs help. But I had just made it worse.

That was just maths. That’s one of the easier parenting challenges! Children present parents with fresh and original problems all the time. We want to help them and support their growing independence. But sometimes we feel clueless as to how to help, overwhelmed with where to start, or frustrated that great advice is ignored. It’s easy to lose confidence.

We would like to invite all parents to an evening we are hosting with Dr Jenny Brown, on Wednesday May 31, from 7pm. Jenny is a Christian psychologist who focuses on family dynamics, helping parents to parent their children with confidence and navigate limitations. We hope this evening will provide you with helpful insights and ideas while strengthening our parent community as we gather together (It’s helpful to connect with other parents to bounce challenges off each other.) I encourage you to grab some parenting friends and organise to sit together on the night. Visit cedarcollege.sa.edu.au/confident-parenting
for information on how to register for the night.

Pastor Jeremy Wright, Cedar College Pastor