Many of our community members often describe The Woods Academy as their second home, which makes sense as children spend more than half of their waking hours at school during the school year. Because children spend so much time at school, a collaboration between parents and schools is essential as this partnership can have a profound impact on a child’s growth and success.
Values are at the heart of this partnership, between parents and schools, as they are the guiding principles and fundamental beliefs of a relationship, and influence all behaviors and attitudes and affect our decisions and relationships.
What are values?
Values are basic and fundamental beliefs that guide or motivate attitudes or actions. They help us to determine what is important to us. Values describe the personal qualities we choose to embody to guide our actions; the sort of person we want to be; the manner in which we treat ourselves and others, and our interaction with the world around us. They provide the general guidelines for conduct.
The Woods Academy Values
The Woods Academy is committed to developing the minds, spirits, and bodies of students in a safe, caring community that honors each student as a child of God. Students learn habits of character including faith, morality, independence, responsibility, loyalty, self-confidence, leadership, compassion, personal integrity, and respect for others through the high expectations and examples of our dedicated teachers, administration, and staff and through participation in school and community service activities.
We instill these values within our students through a variety of ways, including:
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Guidance lessons
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Chapel
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Mass
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Classroom discussions
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Athletics
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Collaboration in group projects
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And more!
Family Values
Families with values create a beautiful foundation for a happy and loving household. Shared ideals within a family shape a family's morals, priorities, structures, and traditions. By confirming your family values and sharing them with your children, parents help their children become better citizens of this world.
Director of Counseling and Guidance Dr. Andy Rhein hosted a parent coffee with the theme “Dinner Conversations and Family Values.” He talked about how we as kids, knew what was expected of us growing up, what family our values were. Times have changed and the dinner conversation, where much of these expectations were shared, is different. So, how are our kids today learning about our expectations? Do partners know what their shared values are? As Dr. Rhein said, when your family knows what is expected of them, what your family values are, and what your non-negotiables are as a family, it helps the family, as a whole, move forward together as a team.
To help you and your family confirm your shared values and, perhaps, create a family mission statement, The Woods Academy has created a worksheet for this process - Creating a Family Mission Statement. As Dr. Rhein said during his coffee and mentioned in this worksheet, creating a family mission statement can help clearly declare your family’s core values, what you believe in, and what really matters to you.
Teaching your child at an early age what your family values are and what is expected of them, will help them throughout life as they choose which directions they want to go in.