The start of a new school year brings a mix of feelings. As a kid you wonder, will you fit in with the other kids? Will you make friends? Will your teacher like you?
As parents we wonder, will the other classmates accept our children? Will their teachers understand them? Will our children be kind, caring and generally good humans?
When my oldest first started pre-kindergarten, I was nervous and, frankly, so was she. We were new to the school district, so we didn’t know any of the teachers or school staff. I was a self-employed, work-from-home mom, so we’d basically spent every day of her life together. I knew she needed to be around other kids, but I was hesitant just the same. That’s when I remembered a family story.
As a young girl, my mom and her older sister were sent to a week-long summer camp. They had fun, but by the end of the week, Mom was ready to come home. Then a phone call from their parents came, telling the girls they had been enrolled for a second consecutive week of camp. Feeling homesick and not as quick to make friends as her sister, Mom was pretty upset by this news. Changing the subject during the phone call, her mom asked how the other girls at camp were doing. “Well, there’s this one girl named Amy who’s having a hard time making friends,” my mom told her. “Okay, then! Next week, your mission is to focus on Amy. Sit with her at mealtimes, offer to play games and do activities with her,” her mother said. “Be a pal to Amy.”
This phrase became an often-repeated motto throughout my own childhood. Any time I went somewhere and felt self-conscious or nervous, my mom would tell me, “Be a pal to Amy.” Although the real Amy had grown up long ago, the name became representative of the child who wasn’t fitting in – on the first day of school, at the public park, or at a summer camp.
Remembering this story, I had a shirt made for my daughter that read, “I Will Be Your Friend” to wear on the first day of school. When I dropped her off, I reminded her that there would be other kids in her class who might feel sad or homesick – it was her job to find those kids and be their friend. This took her attention away from her own feelings of insecurity and gave her something good to focus on. By the time she got to class, she had forgotten that she was nervous. Instead, she was ready to make some new friends.
That was six years ago, and now both of my girls wear these shirts on the first day of school every year. The shirts do two things: first, they let other kids know that if they’re nervous to reach out to someone, my kids are a safe bet. All they have to do is say “Hi!” and they’ve got an instant buddy. Second, the shirts help to remind my girls to focus on the needs of others (which makes them less self-conscious themselves) and the impact we can have by extending friendship without any conditions.
I wonder sometimes what the world would be like if everyone bought into this idea. As an adult, imagine showing up to a party or the first day at a new job and people were wearing “I Will Be Your Friend” shirts. You’d instantly know who you could approach without fear of rejection. Friendships would form a lot quicker, connections would be made and positivity would spread.
I know, a social movement in which kids and grown-ups alike wear these shirts is a little idealistic. But what if we all adopted the idea of “Be a pal to Amy” – seek out the people who need a kind word, sit next to the person who looks a little lonely, welcome the newcomers?
At the very least, we adults can work to instill this idea of becoming “friendship ambassadors” in our children. By encouraging friendship and kindness now, imagine what our world would look like in a few years.
Imagine what could happen if we would all “Be a pal to Amy.”
