SUGGESTIONS FOR BUILDING ASSETS

Asset # 17- Creative and Cultural Activities

(Young people are involved in music, theater or other arts at least three hours per week)

To Build Asset # 17 Parents and Extended Family Can . . . 

* Do an activity with your child. Learn a musical instrument, karate, model building, dance, woodworking, or ceramics together!

* Attend your child's performances or exhibits.

* Support your children's choices for creative activities, even if they are not your choice. Let them discover their own gifts.

* Limit TV watching. Help your child get involved with making, creating, or building things.

* For birthdays and other gift-giving occasions, choose gifts that stimulate creativity (games, tools, craft kits) rather than passive entertainment (videos, electronic games).

*Be tolerant of the learning process, not critical if it's not perfect.

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19% of youth surveyed by Search Institute have this asset in their lives.*

*Based on Search Institute surveys of almost 100,000 6th to 12th grade youth throughout the United States

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Words of Wisdom

Creative activities is an asset that is based within the category called Constructive-Use-of- Time. Who would argue that the young people who have "nothing to do" too often find themselves doing things that they would rather not be doing?

* How do the kids in your life spend their time?

* What could you to help them "do something" that will build assets in them? Remember, it is not what we do to kids, or for kids. It is what we do WITH kids that makes the biggest difference.

When I hear a teen say, "There is nothing to do." I hear it as, "There is no one to do 'nothing' with."

When is the last time you did 'nothing' with a teenager in your life?