“Perseverance is steadfastness in a course of action despite difficulty, setbacks, or delays in achieving success. It is an attitude, a mind-set that does not quit but is determined, disciplined, and creative in working toward solutions.”
That’s how I defined PERSEVERANCE in Knights in Training. Our kids need to develop this skill. We need to hone it ourselves. As parents, we are in a powerful position to encourage our children to chase their dreams, do the right thing, and never give up – even when life gets difficult.
This month, we will focus on the 9th aspect of the historic code of chivalry as we seek to challenge our boys (and your girls too) to embrace the challenges that come their way and seek to conquer them!
We live in an insta-everything world and it can be easy for our children to develop this idea that if something is difficult than they are doing it wrong or worse, it’s not worth doing at all. With all the distractions we face between devices, a crazy number of extra-curriculars, and the pressure to keep up with what you feel everybody else is doing, it’s easy to try to do a little of everything and quit when something starts to get hard. We need to challenge our kids to “fight for focus.”
As we head into the busy holiday season and start to look forward to a new year coming up, this is the perfect time to talk to our kids about perseverance. This is a season when we need to make choices about what we can do and what we can’t. It is a time when we start to look forward to a new year and make choices about how we will live.
Perseverance doesn’t mean doing ALL.THE.THINGS. until we kill ourselves. As adults, we can struggle with this temptation, yet {hopefully} we have the wisdom and the maturity to know when to walk away and when to buckle down. Imagine the challenge our children face. That’s where this month’s challenge can be a game changer. It opens up a conversation in your homes about what really matters and what you are willing to invest to make it happen!
But HOW do we do this?
- We point them to Scripture.
- We model it.
- We talk to them about it.
- We READ about it!
- We look for it in action – in life, in books, in movies, etc.
- We encourage them to keep on and praise their progress.
Now would be the perfect time to re-read chapter 14, grab your printables, and issue the challenge! You’ll find a Scripture poster, a definition of perseverance, a knight’s charge, and more. Hey, you might find that you are challenged right along side them so that none of us become weary.
You have a powerful opportunity to help your kids embrace a growth mindset by changing the way they talk about and to themselves! ➷ ➷ ➷
Here’s the outline of the chapter, in case you want to skip to a specific part:
Perseverance Chapter – Knights in Training
- Intro (narrative idea from St. George and the Dragon)
- Why Perseverance Matters
- Weathering the Storms of Life
- Preparing to Persevere
- The Pitfalls of Praise
- Foundations in Perseverance
- Equipping Kids to Succeed
- Building the Habits of Attention: Play and Work
- Building the Habits of Attention: The Power of Focus
- Throwing Down the Gauntlet
Reading Inspires Perseverance
In addition to Scripture to discuss in this free printable, you will also want to read stories of perseverance to your kids and/or encourage them to read some of their own. Biographies are perfect for this! But really, you can tie in perseverance when talking to your kids about anything you are reading (or watching). My younger two learned about Westward Expansion this year. Talk about having to persevere through all kinds of hardship. We watched How the West Was Won this weekend. It showcased lessons in perseverance over and over again. My older two are doing Ancient History and we just finished learning about Egypt. Reading about the challenge of building the great pyramids and how they kept building, kept investing to perfect the shape as they overcame daunting obstacles in the process inspired them to want to keep trying with their own challenges, even when they initially fail in the attempt.
Here are some great book suggestions to get you started!
- With Thanksgiving right around the corner, grab some books and talk about how they persevered! My favorite chapter read aloud is Stories of the Pilgrims. We plan to listen to the audio next week as we drive back to Texas. (You can find all my favorite Thanksgiving books here.)
- Saint George and the Dragon – all of the books about knights that I recommend highlight perseverance in one form or another. But this is my favorite and where I found the illustration that I mentioned in Knights in Training. Victory was secured for him and safety for the people, only when he persevered for THREE days in battling the dragon. Our kids find victory when they persevere through challenges.
- Biographies of people who overcame setbacks or persevered: Thomas Edison, Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford, any Olympic athlete.
- The Little Engine That Could – This was my mom’s go-to when we were young!
- Bubble Gum Brain: Ready, Set, Mindset… GROW – Such a powerful picture of adapting!
- The Most Magnificent Thing – In praise of creativity and perseverance.
- The Hallelujah Flight Beautiful true-story picture book!
- The Crystal Mountain – More medieval inspiration!
- Boys in the Boat (youth edition) – So very amazing!
- My Side of the Mountain – One of my favorite books as a middle-schooler and now a fav with my boys!
Want help FIGHTING FOR FOCUS? Utilize the power of brain breaks, with my book, The Ultimate Guide to Brain Breaks. Here’s how we use brain breaks in our home.
New to the Chivalry Challenge? Read more about it here . Each aspect of the code is broken down into bite-sized chunks.
Want to find out more about Knights in Training?
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