All you need is love

("All You Need is Love" - Lennon-McCartney,  1967)

Arguably the most important skills children learn as they grow up are the ones that help them get along with others.  They learn to show respect for others, how to resolve a conflict, and how to have empathy for others.  Developmentally, children are very selfish until they near adulthood and begin to see the world from a more mature perspective.  They are actually unable to put other people ahead of themselves in their brains, but they are still able to be nice to others if someone teaches them how important it is.  Reminding them that they like it when others are nice to them helps them to understand.

As an adult, I am shocked at the number of my peers who seem to have missed learning this skill in their childhoods.  Certainly none of us is perfect, but I have worked for people who lack even the most basic politeness in speaking to their subordinates.  While it mostly makes me angry to be treated with less than the respect every person deserves, it also makes me think that teaching these skills to children is as important as ever.

When our focus narrows to include only one goal (reading and math test scores, for example) we must remember what we are leaving out in order to devote all of our energy to this one thing.  I will never say that reading or math is unimportant, but surely empathy is even more important.

Can we all ignore the people in charge just enough to be sure we teach the next generation to care for one another?