Caring for People from Birth to Death

James E Hightower Jr

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780789005724
• eBook ISBN: 9781135024178
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Discover the manual that will help you teach ministry students and effectively minister to people in all developmental stages!Caring for People from Birth to Death is a helpful resource for people who care for people. Each chapter describes a particular stage of development in the human pilgrimage from the preschool years to senior adulthood--from the cradle to the rocking chair. Guidelines and usable suggestions for a caring ministry are included in each chapter. In Caring for People from Birth to Death spirituality as it relates to the developmental process is explored by the contributors with a new section in each chapter that concerns the growth and decline of a person's spirituality throughout his or her life. Some of the issues you will explore in this new edition include:

• developmental theories and spiritual issues for every stage of life
• caring for the elderly through a team effort
• ministering to confused adolescents
• expanding your parishioners'feelings of self-worth
• the fundamentals of teaching preschoolers about Jesus
• working towards spiritual growth in adult malesCaring for People from Birth to Death is for seminary students studying developmental psychology and ministry, for CPE training programs, for pastoral counseling training programs, seminary professors, pastoral counselors, and church staff ministers. This concise handbook will help you quickly grasp the developmental issues people face and give you ideas on how the church can effectively minister to these folks. This book is updated from its original publication, and each contributor's intrinsic style has remained intact for you as you explore and learn from this complete manual on ministering to your community members. Caring for People from Birth to Death offers you practical, ready-to-use strategies for understanding, taking care of, and ministering to people of all ages.

Chapter 1

The Preschool Years: Foundations for Life

Cos H. Davis Jr.

Several years ago, in a church where I served as pastor, a young child drew a picture of me. The picture showed me standing behind the pulpit, gesturing with one hand in the air. I was obviously preaching! I was startled to think that the young child’s only perception of me was the activity he saw me doing most often. But his experiences were limited, and as he got to know me in other relationships, his perception broadened.

The same holds true of the clergy’s many ministers’ perceptions of preschoolers—children who have not yet reached age five. Our ideas about them are often based on fragments of knowledge and experience. As we learn more through reading, observing, and experience, our understanding of them increases. As our understanding of preschoolers grows, we will be able to minister to them more effectively.

This chapter is designed to help broaden our understanding of preschoolers. Why are preschool years considered foundational? What are a preschooler’s developmental tasks? Can a preschooler learn about God? How do preschoolers learn? What are some basic needs of preschoolers? What are some practical ways a minister can relate to preschoolers?

PRESCHOOL YEARS ARE FOUNDATIONAL

The first five years of life are highly significant. What children learn and feel during this time, particularly about themselves, will be foundational to the rest of their life. By the time a child turns five, he or she should have a pretty good idea as to his or her worth to parents and other important people such as teachers. A child will have acquired some basic feelings about what parents believe is important. If children can be helped to feel good about themselves, a good foundation for relationships with others can be built.

The preschool years are an excellent opportunity to lay the foundation for a child’s spiritual life. This foundation is important for Christian conversion and spiritual growth. Good learning experiences at church are a great place to start.

Christian conversion and growth do not happen in a vacuum. The person who makes a willful choice to receive Christ as Savior does so out of a background of experiences that have prepared him or her for this decision. The better job we do in the preschool years, the better the child will be able to relate positively to God.

The men and women in our churches who teach preschoolers are doing important work! They, along with parents, are building the foundation necessary for Christian conversion and growth. There is a real sense that a preschool teacher is just as involved in a person’s conversion as the children’s, youth, or adult teacher who actually leads him or her to accept Christ at a later time. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 3:6, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God was giving the increase” (NASB).¹

The Needs of a Preschooler

Your work with people has proven that they act or react according to some need in their lives. Often, people do not know why they do what they do or say what they say. A need, though unrecognized, still clamors for attention. God has made us with certain needs—some of which can be met only in relation to others.

Preschoolers have needs, too. Understanding what those needs are and how to meet them will enable you to minister more effectively to children and, in turn, help parents and teachers meet their needs.

Love

Love is the most basic need of preschoolers. They sense they are loved as adults express gentleness and patience in relation to their physical needs and their inability to do many things for themselves. Loving a preschooler means doing what is best for him or her. Loving means understanding the child enough to know what is best and being willing and unselfish enough to meet the child’s needs. Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train up a child in the way he should go; and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (KSV). Loving a child means taking responsibility to guide his or her life in ways that will help the child be a well-adjusted, contributing member of society and servant of God. The attitude of such love is expressed in the words of Sybil Waldrop, “Every child needs someone who is just crazy about him.”²

Self-Worth

Preschoolers need to know that they are important to people who are important to them. They learn to value themselves only as those closest to them treat them as persons of worth. If this need is satisfied, they will learn that others are valuable too. The child’s future, in terms of relationships, basically hinges on whether or not he or she feels important to significant people. Such a sense of self-worth is not taught through a relentless barrage of gifts or the absence of rules or regulations, but by the kind of love that deals patiently and purposefully with the needs of the child.

Acceptance

Love is expressed and self-worth is taught as preschoolers sense that they are accepted by significant adults. Children need to know they are wanted and deeply appreciated by others. Parents must consciously attempt to instill the feeling that they are proud of their child and that the child does not have to do anything to be loved. Children are loved because of who they are, not because of what they do! Before a child is born, some parents need to be helped to accept the child as a gift from God and be happy if the Lord gives them a daughter instead of a son or vice versa.

Trust

Preschoolers are almost totally dependent on adults to meet their basic physical, emotional, social, and spiritual needs. A baby learns trust by the way he or she is cared for—if hunger and comfort needs are met in a loving manner. Young children need to be assured through experience that they can depend on their parents and teachers to meet their needs and do what is best for them. The words “Johnny, I love you” are confusing to Johnny if his parents or teachers say the words but do not meet his needs.

A young child’s sense of trust is also a good foundation for faith in God. Without trust, faith in God is more difficult. There are several biblical references of Jesus’ use of family relationships to describe the believer’s relationship to God (Matthew 5:9; 6:6, 8-9; 7:8-11). Such verses emphasize that appropriate trusting relationships with the Heavenly Father are fostered in the context of trusting relationships in the earthly home!

Security

Preschoolers need to feel safe. Apart from proper care, they can get into some dangerous situations. They may put something unsafe in their mouth or try to put the end of an object in an electrical outlet. They may climb on top of a table or chair. They need adults who will recognize the limitations of their judgment and will do whatever is necessary to keep them as safe as possible.

Parents and teachers who set limits to protect the preschooler are building the child’s sense of security as well as an appreciation for some rules. However, caution should be used so as not to stifle every attempt to do something new. Also, judgment should be used so as not to protect the child from the minor scrapes that come as a part of normal play activities. If the parent or teacher is too protective, the preschooler will feel scared to try anything new! Balance is the key!

Guidance

Preschoolers do not come with an understanding of how to get along in a world of people and things. This means they must be taught by parents and teachers. Guidance for the preschooler should involve: (1) teaching the child the proper use of toys and other objects without hurting himself or herself or others, or destroying the object; (2) teaching the child to gradually become more concerned for the rights and needs of others. This is quite difficult with young children who focus primarily on their own needs. However, by the fourth or fifth year, children should be able to play cooperatively with others and “take turns” with the use of toys. Meeting other needs related to self-image and love helps free the child to be more cooperative and focus less on what the child wants.

Independence

Growing preschoolers need to develop a sense of independence within their capabilities. Of course, some things are well beyond their limits, both mentally and physically. Parents and teachers need to be aware of the child’s limitations so as not to frustrate him or her with a task that is too difficult. To be able to do this one must understand that preschoolers are not “little adults” and cannot reason as adults. However, there are many things preschoolers can do, want to do, and should be allowed to do for themselves.

How a Preschooler Thinks

Several years ago while teaching a seminary course on child development, a student related how his son had come home from school without his cap. The father threatened him by saying, “If you do that again, I’ll knock your head off!” The next day, his son came home with two caps—his and someone else’s! This story illustrates some of the characteristics of thinking of young children—they take you literally, and morals do not seem to influence their conscious thought.

Literal Minded

It is often amusing to get the interpretation of the mature five-year-old’s understanding of what we say. On a trip with my family I called my five-year-old daughter’s attention to a huge bridge up ahead by saying, “Kristen, we’re going over that bridge in a little while.” Her reaction was unusual excitement—she could hardly believe it! When we crossed the bridge she expressed her dis appointment by complaining, “Daddy, we didn’t go over that bridge.” She had understood me literally to say we were going over the top of the bridge!

This limitation of literal-mindedness often causes confusion to the young child and should alert us to speak in more precise terms. While we cannot divest ourselves of all the “language of Zion,” some terminology is particularly confusing to the young child. Remember how the literal-minded child thinks when he or she hears such statements as “Jesus lives in my heart” or the words of favorite hymns such as “There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood!”

Here and Now

The preschooler is limited to the here and now. If you ask a five-year-old to describe God, he or she may (if at that stage of capability) draw a very large stick person. As adults, we realize that God is a spirit (John 4:24) and cannot be adequately described in human terms. But preschoolers have no concept of a spirit and describe everything according to their experience. For example, a preschooler who has seen only a blue ball may not think that a ball can be red. Therefore, the red ball is not a ball! He or she must be told that it is.

Short Attention Span

To some adults, one of the most frustrating things about preschoolers is their inability to pay attention for an extended period of time. This is one reason why preschoolers learn best through a variety of short-term activities. The parent or teacher who insists on a two-year-old sitting still for five minutes while they tell a long Bible story will not have an audience after about a minute or so! Therefore, teaching activities and materials must be designed with consideration for the short attention span of preschoolers.

Shallow Learner

Preschoolers also tend to be interested only in the shallow or surface facts of an object or story. They cannot deal with the subtle meanings or implications of a story such as the “Good Samaritan.” Only the simplest facts can be related. Likewise, a child looking at a nature object may be impressed with only the color and size of the object while seeming unconcerned with other characteristics. This is why it is important not to expect a preschooler to be able to deal with great detail or intricate facts. The preschooler must be exposed to the same object, song, or story many times before he or she will tire of it. Why? Because as shallow learners, preschoolers gradually understand more and more through repeated exposure.

Saying and Understanding

One final point needs to be made relative to the thinking of the preschooler. Preschoolers can say many things they do not understand. Their physical ability to say complicated words or words with religious significance may be far advanced of their ability to understand what they are saying. For example, a child can be taught to say, “Jesus lives in my heart” and that sounds religious and spiritual. But, does the preschooler really understand the truth of that statement? Can a preschooler really put that truth to use? We must not assume that saying something spiritual means the preschooler has understood what the word or phrase means.

A PRESCHOOLER’S DEVELOPMENTAL TASKS

During the first five years of life an individual is confronted with three basic psychosocial tasks. Erik Erikson identified these developmental tasks as trust, autonomy, and initiative.³ If these tasks do not begin at the proper time, it is doubtful the person will make the proper life adjustments at the other stages of life. For example, the developmental tasks of adolescence and adulthood are related to those of the earliest years. Should a person be deficient in trust, autonomy, and initiative, his or her psychosocial growth at later stages would be adversely affected.

Now, let’s overview the developmental tasks of preschoolers to show the importance of each one. Each task is discussed with a general time frame in focus, although every child will not fit this time frame precisely because of differences in physical, emotional, and mental maturation.

Trust

Trust is the first and most basic developmental task in life. Trust is learning to rely on others for needs to be met. It is learning the feeling of security and well-being about your re...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• About the Editor
• Contributors
• Preface
• Chapter 1. The Preschool Years: Foundations for Life
• Chapter 2. The Early School Years: Finding Acceptance Beyond the Family
• Chapter 3. Adolescence: Stuck in the Middle
• Chapter 4. Young Adulthood: Starting on Their Own
• Chapter 5. The Middle Years: Getting It Together
• Chapter 6. Senior Adulthood: Twilight or Dawn?
• Chapter 7. Toward a Holistic Approach to Caring
• Index