Want to give your kids and grandkids the BEST family Christmas? Let’s skip the drama and focus on the fun. Yes, I think fun is a sacred part of life, especially when we’re celebrating a baby boy’s birth.
Today, Anna and I talk about how theater productions — even at home — can give your kids and grandkids servant-heartedness and a love of history.
Who wouldn’t want servant-heartedness in your nearest and dearest?
Imagine the lights of the theater as you study the billboards outside in cold, crisp air. Then, as you settle in your seats, programs in hand, the lights go down and the stage curtains open. Let the show begin!
Inspiring a love of drama in your most imaginative little ones is easy this time of year. Whether it’s a free production at church, a family talent show, or fancy tickets to a ballet or play. Performances are everywhere. Kids easily catch a vision for acting out favorite classics in the winter months ahead.
❤️ Merry Christmas from our family to yours! ❤️
❤️ Happy Birthday, Jesus! ❤️
Drama: Acting or Acting Out?
“When I misread your email at first, I thought, ‘Oh this is going to be an interesting conversation,’” Anna laughs, “When I read drama, at first blush, I thought, ‘Does she mean, like we tell our kids, “Okay, we don’t need this much drama”?’”
Hahaha! Even our miscommunications are funny! But actually, she’s got a point. Most families have way too much drama. Especially this time of year. So, how can we direct (see what I did there?) all that drama into something joyful?
Let’s face it, some kids are simply more prone to overstimulation and acting out—drama. Every family has one; the kid who is passionate and, yes, loud about it. Heck, sometimes it’s a grown up who makes you cringe in anticipation of drama at family gatherings.
In those cases, I have great news. Fortunately, the person most prone to disrupt is also the one most likely to respond with gusto to directing family productions. In addition, family drama productions are a great way to instill a love of history.
I know, I know. Some people groan when it comes to history. I confess I’m a history geek. Anna is, too. Stay with us anyway.
Drama and Passion = Energy
If you’re raising passionate, dramatic kids, I don’t have to tell you that drama and passion equal energy. They can be exhausting!
“I also think kids who are prone to drama—kids who use their outside voice all the time or describe something with big hand motions—their passion leaks out everywhere they go,” Anna says.
Still, she points out a happy thought for parents, “They are also the ones who engage with other people’s stories once they learn to see them as real; to see beyond themselves.”
Oooh, I love it when Anna goes all profound about kids! Then she adds something very personal.
“Drama—in the sense of being dramatic in our interactions—and passion are intricately linked. Periodically I get dramatic with my husband and I have to go back and apologize for my drama,” she says, “But I also remind him it’s a good thing he married someone passionate. It gets stuff done. It fills our life with laughter and creativity.”
And in the moments when the rest of us don’t have energy, their passion or drama so to speak, gets us through the tough moments all families experience, according to Anna.
Drama and Being Servant-hearted
So, if you can teach a kid to see beyond themselves, other people’s stories will be real for passionate kids. That means they are a short step away from being passionately servant-hearted, empathetic people. Wow!
Camp Krafve Definition of Servant-hearted: The person willing to be last in line for goodies and first in line to step up to work and sacrifice.
So much of our shared heritage in this great country called the United States of America has to do with sacrifice other people have made. Same with our own family history. We are a blessed and grateful people indeed.
Yes, especially in Texas, we feel the blessing. Each and every time we enter the Alamo with each new batch of children and grandchildren, I thank God for those willing to stand (and die) for freedom for the next generation.
In our current culture, making sacrifices to give the next generation something beautiful is a crucial discussion.
How Can Drama Look at Home?
Staging a family production does not have to be a big undertaking.
Even the silliest, most fun production will install stories, characters, and history into your children’s hearts. It can be silly and fun.
“I remember every play we did as children, Mom, and we were by no means thespians. We were just playing. It was fun. It was a way of engaging with history, lightweight, in bathrobes and bedsheets. But even at that level, I remember every play we did,” reports Anna.
And stories can be fiction, still teaching Kids facts about a time era. In our homeschool, we acted out Shakespeare and some Greek tragedies. And apparently, some others I forgot about.
“We did a play based on a Sherlock Holmes book. My little brother couldn’t read yet, so we told him he had to do the non-speaking parts. He was a dead body. It was perfect!”
She adds, ”He was so game; he loved being the dead body.”
Just for the record, their baby brother turned out pretty wonderful in spite of playing the dead body.
Lifelong learning is so much more than checking big ticket topics off an academic list, like the American Revolution, suffrage, Prohibition, WWII, and Civil Rights. But if you want a quick history lesson on all those topics, check out the Bob Bullock Museum in Austin. Or, if you happen to be in East Texas, don’t miss the the American Freedom Museum.
History is always the stories; it’s about the people and the challenges they overcame.
Pirates, History and Life-long Learning
“After we did the first play with another family, I went out—because I collected books even as a little kid—I went out and I found, Plays Children Love, Volume 2,” Anna says. “It includes all the fabulous children’s literature made into play format. I’m literally looking at the book.”
Having the right kids involved means they’ll take ownership of plays—and their own learning. Win-win!
When Anna found the adaptation of Treasure Island, she knew she’d found gold. It was her sister’s favorite book.
Who doesn’t love pirate stories? All the neighborhood kids were pirates when Anna and her siblings were growing up.
“There were only four actors who could read, so we had to divide up the parts. And we all had multiple costumes; we had to quick change. We all played girls and guys parts because we only had one guy actor who could read. I got to be Long John Silver, Ben Bones and Billy Bones. I got some really good roles, I was really lucky,” she laughs.
She adds, “But my little brother couldn’t read. But he had to be a pirate, right? Because we weren’t gonna leave him out of the fun. So he got to be a pirate; he walked around (the pretend stage.) His one line was to say ‘Yo Ho Ho and a bottle of Rum!’ just periodically.” Oh, dear!
While we may laugh about swashbuckling kiddos, privateers were an important part of American history. And today, serious, dangerous pirates still threaten trade on the high seas. A perfect example of why history is never boring. And how kids can learn valuable information creatively.
“It’s set in 1760. There’s a whole chunk of history that happens around this fictional thing that was written later by the genius who was Robert Louis Stevenson,” adds Anna.
Benefits of Drama
Drama has many benefits for your family. Here’s some ways acting out history can help your youngsters:
- Dramatization provides a healthy outlet for your children’s natural passion.
- Going to the theater to see real plays helps kids develop a love of healthy, beautiful community culture.
- Acting out history means respectfully embracing and understanding what another person experienced. This process develops empathy in your child.
- Play-acting creates reading readiness and enthusiasm for young readers.
- Life-long learners are less easily deceived and more likely to be humble, compassionate servant-hearted people.
History: Alive with Drama and Servant-heartedness
Why does servant-heartedness matter and what’s it got to do with history? History is not boring; it’s alive with the stories of people who made sacrifices for us. Take Christmas for example.
Jesus’s beautiful teaching about servant-heartedness became epitomized in His life when He sacrificed Himself for our sin. That’s one more important part of history that we want to keep in mind always. His life on earth and resurrection really happened in history.
Anna and I like these verses for showing how Jesus loves:
“Then they brought little children to Him, that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked those who brought them. But when Jesus saw it, He was greatly displeased and said to them, ‘Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God. Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it.’ And He took them up in His arms, laid His hands on them, and blessed them.” ~Mark 10: 13-16
It seems, Jesus didn’t avoid potential drama. Instead, He gently corrected His beloved disciples, by embracing the children they shooed away.
If only we can remember to love like Jesus! For instance, to pull little ones into our lap to calm them down during this exciting time of year. And to lead by example by jumping into fun, tender moments!
The fact is Jesus treats us all, if we choose to be God’s, as His beloved little ones, according to Anna. “He doesn’t just say ‘you belong to Me.’ We’re His children. The context of that verse is powerful.”
In other words, Jesus tenderly embraces us in His love, if we will but let Him!
🙂
cathy
May we pray together?
Dear good Father, we think of Your Son’s arrival as a man and, with the angels, we rejoice! Glory Hallelujah! Yet, we look around our world and see war-torn nations, we see our own nation suffering. We see loved ones suffering. It’s easy to focus on the darkness we see all around. But instead, we turn to You now and cry out, “Have mercy on us, dear Lord!” Thank You for giving us Your own beloved Son. Thank You for the way You love us. Especially during the holidays, help spread Your creativity, tenderness, and joy through our families. Bless us all now because that is Your heart’s desire. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
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What do you anticipate with joy about the holidays? Which Christmas tradition do you wish you could change? Would you be interested in helping us bring communication resources to small churches? If so, keep reading below. ❤️
So Many Resources
Anna and I do tons of fun stuff together. We want to give you lots of tools and resources to have the conversations you really want to have with those you love. So, we also bring in experts who talk about things we don’t usually talk about at church.
I am praying about spending much more of my time speaking in small churches, especially in my own neck of the woods. God has put it on my heart to provide resources to small churches. Contact me, if you want to know more about how to:
- cultivate better communication in your church, or
- sponsor resources for small churches to grow in better communication.
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Cathy Krafve, host of Fireside Talk Radio and author of The Well: The Art of Drawing Out Authentic Conversations and Marriage Conversation: From Coexisting to Cherished. We welcome your stories, ideas, and questions at CathyKrafve.com.
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