When my four-and-three-quarters-year-old daughter states a problem, like, “Moooomm, I’m hunngreeee,” I ask, “Hmmmm, I wonder what we could do about that?” if I’m in a patient or silly mood. Otherwise, I just say, “Please offer a solution, not the problem.” Or, if my patience left on the school bus, I say, “And?”
I have often wondered if I’m expecting too much of her at this age, but an experience with my writing students last week reinforced the importance of the lesson I am trying to instill: There is at least one solution for every problem, and life is about solutions, not problems.
I started our writing class last week by saying, “Think of something you’re angry about. Stomp around. Growl. Be angry. Be really angry. Keep walking. Now, sit down and write, vent, spew, put it on paper.” “Will anyone see these?” “No. Write what you would not dare to say. Go. For five minutes. You can toss these later.” I turned and wrote, “Letter of Complaint,” on the board.
More students wrote that day than in the previous five sessions we had worked together. The room was quiet. Focus fumed. Complaints cascaded from hand to paper. This was going to be a good class, I thought.
Half an hour later, we were still stuck on complaint. “What if I’m so mad I can’t see a solution?” asked one brave and honest student. “You are not ready to write this letter,” I averred. “I can’t turn this in – it’s too vulgar,” ventured another student. I asked the class, “Would you read a vulgar, spiteful letter?” Rhetorical question, of course. I turned, crossed out “complaint,” and wrote “request for change” above it.
I remember being 16 and liking how powerful I felt when angry. I remember unleashing on my parents without restraint. Luckily, they don’t remember it, somehow. I think they have erased the memory on purpose. I remember being so mad at a friend that I was certain I would never speak with him again. It didn’t last long. But I wonder if, as teens, we need to experience that angst.
What if, all of our lives, we have been taught how to be in the anger, listen to the complaint, then move past it, and get creative? School Board member Marty Hollinbeck was sitting in on the class that day, and she suggested to the students that they separate the issue from the person. That person could still be their friend, and together they could work on the issue they were angry about. The image of building a bridge between people, over the “troubled waters,” came to mind. Marty suggested that it is not really about the problem. The solution is what’s important.
My complaint? I can’t believe our teens got so stuck in their complaints! My solution? Support the problem-solving curriculum that’s happening at Prime Time, starting in the infant classroom. And, no more complaint letters: I am going to teach “Letter of Soulution” from now on.