Cornerstones of character

My sons' school has an annual tradition of giving each child a "character rock" at the end of the school year. It begins in preschool and continues through the end of fifth grade, so in the natural order of things, we can look forward to a total collection of 21 character rocks by the time Little exits elementary school. Just thinking about that day makes me shudder for any number of reasons, not the least of which its role as the turning point on the path to...middle school.

In the meantime, we have the rocks to anticipate and gather and ponder. TH was the first recipient of a rock, acquiring one last year as a kindergarten graduate. His rock, a smooth, roundish, hefty riverbed stone, bore the word "Honest." As his teacher often told me, TH simply was incapable of duplicity. This rock became the cornerstone of TH's collection of character rocks, and really, I don't think we could have gotten an adjective that would have been more pleasing. We want our children to be honest. We encourage them to trust us enough to tell us even when they've done something wrong, made a bad decision, gotten on purple or yellow or red at school. And they do. Often, it's the first thing out of their mouths, preceding any good news that often overshadows the "bad."

This year, we collected two more character rocks because Dubya received one as a graduate of pre-K and TH received his end-of-first-grade stone. This year's character adjectives also are quite fitting for our sons.

Dubya's was "Innovative." And it's true. He looks at problems and comes up with creative and inventive ways of solving them. He's a builder, a creator, an artist. It's the perfect cornerstone for building his character.

TH's rock this year bore the word "Curious." Again, it's true. That child is nothing--except maybe honest--if not curious. Yesterday, we had a lengthy discussion about George Bush, Iraq, Hitler, war, and oil, evaluating whether or not one can just walk away from the consequences of a "bad decision." His questions just kept coming, as they always do. "Curious"? Yep.

So we have a rocky wall that we're building, currently consisting of three rocks, the character cornerstones of honesty, curiosity, and innovativeness. They're the material manifestations of what I keep telling our poor children we're trying to do for them; what I tell them as I insist that they clean their room, do their homework, practice the piano, take their dishes to the kitchen, be kind to one another, and say yes m'am instead of "what?!": building their characters, one stone at a time.