WEEKLY TIPS
If you have any question about parenting
particularly concerning the understanding and/or use of the the information provided in the
"Effective Islamic Parenting" article, please ask us.
Questions and answers will be posted in Islamic-World.Net Parenting Pages, so as to assist
as many other parents as posible.
WEEK ONE
Try to notice as many good things your children do as possible!!!
As soon as possible after your child does something good comment on that thing (be specific
as to what the good thing was), and give your child praise for having done that good thing.
Example - Your young daughter falls, hurts her knee, and begins crying. Your son seeing this
goes over to his little sister, helps her get back up, and comforts her. Having observed all this
take place you go up to your son right away and say something like,
"I saw you help you sister get up after she fell and then tried to make her feel better.
That was really nice of you to do. I feel good to have a son who loves his sister so much."
Also say to your son,
"Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala will be very pleased with you for helping your sister."
Things to remember...
- Give the praise as soon as possible after the good deed.
- Say specifically what the good deed was.
- Give the praise sincerely and in a loving manner.
- Have variety in how you give praise, don't always say the same thing.
NOTE – Notice how in the above example the praise given had three parts. First the mother
told her son what he did was a nice thing to do, second she told him how it made her feel good,
and third she took the opportunity to let him realize how much he loves his little sister.
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WEEK TWO
Don't punish your children very often or very harshly!
Punishment is always harmful to the child even if it seems to achieve the parent's goal.
It is impossible to punish your child without harming him/her. Research studies in child
development have consistently shown that among the undesirable side effects of punishment are:
- The child will try to escape from or retaliate (fight) against the punishing situation.
- The child will have negative feelings toward whoever punishes him/her.
- Punishment usually remains effective only when the possibility of punishment is
clearly present.
- And, very importantly, punishing a child teaches the child that using punishment is
the right way to raise children so they are likely to use punishment with their children - thus
perpetuating (continuing) forever the use of punishment in society.
The alternative to punishment should not be permissiveness (meaning to let your child do
anything they want), if there is anything more harmful to the child's development than punishment
it is permissiveness. The right alternative to punishment in raising a child is called "directed
positive influence." Directed positive influence means to reward (with praise, your positive
attention, or an occasional small gift) your child after they do things that are good and right,
while gently providing correction when your child does wrong.
In Islam if it becomes necessary to correct your child for some wrongdoing this must be done
according to a certain rules:
- First, you should explain to your child in a gentle way how they have overstepped some
limit from rightness into wrong, explain how their behaviour is not consistent with the Will of
Allah and offer them guidance as to what Allah has told us is the right way to act.
- Second, if the gentle instruction does not result in the child correcting their wrong
behaviour, you should indicate your disapproval of that wrong behaviour by withdrawing your
favour (for example, do not give smiles, hugs or kind words to your child at such times).
- Third, and only as a last resort, your child can be physically punished (beaten) if
they do not correct their wrong behaviour.
In Islam, while you are allowed to beat your child it is most certainly not encouraged. If it
becomes necessary for you to beat your child there are specific rules and limitations:
- You may not hit your child on the face or stomach.
- You may not hit your child more than a maximum of three times.
- And, you may not hit your child hard enough to leave a cut or bruise on the skin.
Additionally, You should never hit your child when you are angry. Not only are you then more
likely to become excessive in your punishment, but doing so will teach your child that it is
right to hit people when they are angry.
It is important to realize that if you reach a point where you feel it is necessary to beat
your child then something has gone badly wrong, and you previously have not done all you could
have done to avoid this becoming necessary.
Since it is a fact of learning that you cannot punish a child without harming him/her, so
punishment can only become necessary if you have no positive alternative, and the good that comes
from being punished will outweigh the harm you do to your child.
Remember, the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) never once in his life hit a child, a woman
or a servant.
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WEEK THREE
Always be prompt as you reward or punish your children!
 Both
reward and punishment work best if they are given as soon as possible after the
child's action that you want to increase or decrease. Research has shown the ideal to be about
one half second after the child's response. Of course this is often not possible or practical for
many reasons. The reason reward and punishment should happen so soon after the child's response
is because both reward and punishment have an effect on the action that comes just before them
regardless of what action you are intending to reward or punish. So if you saw your child hit his
sister then a half hour later you decide to punish him for that wrong action, but by then he is
sitting quietly with her teaching her to recite Qu'ran, it is actually the response of helping
his sister that is being punished, not the hitting. So in the future you would expect to see no
reduction in how often the boy hits his sister, but you would expect to see him help his sister
learn to recite Qu'ran less often. This is exactly what you don't want to see. Now few of us
(hopefully) use reward or punishment so badly, but the purpose of this example is only to show
why promptness is important.
If, as is sometimes the case, you have to wait some long period of time before you can reward
or punish your child you can make that reward or punishment most effective by recreating in the
mind of your child the full circumstances of the behaviour that is being rewarded or punished.
When doing this you should be sure to say very specifically what the response was that is being
punished, and try to bring as full a picture as possible of that event back into the mind of your
child. In the example given above the conversation might go something like this:
"About a half hour ago when you and your little sister were playing in the yard I saw you hit
her on the arm so hard it made her cry. That was a bad thing to do. Allah wants us to show love
and kindness to others, particularly within our own family. So I feel I have to punish you (in
this case only by giving gentle advice as to what he did wrong) for hitting her to help you learn
that hitting people we should love is a very wrong thing to do, and is against the Will of Allah.
But now I have scolded you for what you did wrong a while ago, I also want to tell you that what
you are doing now, helping your sister to recite Qu'ran, is a wonderful thing to do. I am sure
Allah is very pleased to see you doing such a good thing, and I am very happy to see you being
such a good brother."
Note: When giving the scolding (punishment) to your child it is best to keep your tone of
voice and manner neutral, neither harsh nor kind; but, when you are giving the praise (reward) it
should be with a very positive voice and manner, gentle voice and loving actions.
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WEEK FOUR
Introduction to the Khalifah Parenting Tips
Parenting Tip Number 4 is of utmost importance. It will consist of a series of related
tips on how to raise children according to the full and correct understanding of the Islamic
concept of Khalifah. The sequence will be as follows:
- True meaning of 'Khalifah'
- True meaning of 'Jihad'
- How to 'Command the Right and Forbid the Wrong'
- True meaning of 'Beautiful Words and Wisdom'
- True meaning of 'Taqwa'
- The necessity of Love for Allah to be instilled deeply and powerfully into the
hearts of your children.
This series of Khalifah parenting tips will provide a specific and detailed plan for right
Islamic parenting. It will be your responsibility as Islamic parents to learn and understand
these sometimes difficult concepts, and find a way to teach every bit of this knowledge to your
children in ways appropriate to their age and ability to comprehend.
This knowledge is the key to Effective Islamic Parenting, and if
done successfully will absolutely guarantee your children grow up to be good and true Muslims.
A. True meaning of 'Khalifah'
Teach your children to fully understand their role as Khalifah of Allah.
 From birth onwards your
child should be taught to know that Allah created him/her to be His Khalifah. Your child needs
to come to understand their role as Khalifah of Allah in the most full and detailed manner
possible. In English the Arabic word 'khalifah' is translated as 'vicegerent'. Vicegerent means
one who acts in the place of the leader or king. Included in the meaning of vicegerent is the
assumption that the person in that role will act in every instance as the leader or king would
want them to act. This also is the meaning of the Arabic term khalifah. What a glorious and
exciting role to be given, to act as a representative of Allah - even if only within the limited
scope of human ability. It is the highest honour that can be given. Most blessed are we that
Allah, through His Divine and Unlimited Mercy, has chosen mankind to receive this greatest of
all honours.
Until He Breathed His Spirit into Adam, Allah took full responsibility for the progressive
development of His Physical Creation. Allah apparently did not create His physical world in one
instant to be as it is now. Through His Divine Love, Allah's Light first brought the world of
space, time and matter into existence. This light brought into being tiny bits of matter that
in science are called sub-atomic particles, the electrons, protons and neutrons that are the
basic building blocks of all material things. These sub-atomic particles form all the different
kinds of atoms, and these atoms form everything else. Following Allah's Will, these tiny particles
of physical matter were directed into more complex and larger groupings - until they became
stars and planets and water and rocks and grass and trees and tiny one celled living things and
fish and reptiles and birds and all the many different kinds of mammals until He created animals
so complex that some of them bear many similarities to human beings. At every level of physical
existence, from the simplest basic particles to the highest of the animals, these forms of
material creation did as they were directed to do by Allah. They all acted in accord with the
Will of Allah not because they chose to, but because Allah caused them to. They did not have
the free will to decide for themselves what to do.
Next Allah created Adam. Allah created Adam with a specific purpose. Allah created Adam (and
all human beings after Adam) to be His Khalifah on Earth. One of the many unique abilities Allah
gave Adam when he breathed His Spirit into him was the ability to choose. When Allah created
human beings He gave us free will. In our role as Khalifah of Allah we have the responsibility
to use the free will given to us by Allah to continue His plan for Creation. Allah gave us the
responsibility to ensure that His Creation continues to progress so that His Attributes will be
more and more perfectly expressed in physical world. Our responsibility as the Khalifah of Allah
has three parts. These are to perfect ourselves according to the Will of Allah, to perfect all
of human society according to the Will of Allah, and to perfect the physical world of space and
time(our planet Earth and the whole universe) according to the Will of Allah. So after perhaps
billions of years when Allah took full responsibility to ensure that His Creation progressed
according to His Will, Allah has now blessed us as His Khalifah and delegated to us some of
that awesome responsibility. The continued progression of Allah's Creation, at the human level
and beyond, has now been placed in our hands. Allah will not continue to cause His Creation to
continue to progress beyond the creation of Adam. For Allah's Creation to fulfill its final
destiny it must be done through the right exercise of human free will. Allah has promised us
that we can have a virtually perfect Islamic world, and He has told us that ideal Islamic world
will be ours as soon as we do what is necessary to make ourselves and our world perfect
according to His Will.
What a glorious and exciting future has Allah provided for us. What a lot of work there is
to be done for Allah. And, what a magnificent reward awaits us.
So, in somewhat simplified but still sophisticated adult language that is a brief overview
of the true meaning of our role as Khalifah of Allah. It is your job as Islamic parents to first
learn and understand all of this yourselves; and, then to teach it to your children in a way
that allows them to fully comprehend the meaning of their role as Khalifah of Allah, that allows
them to feel great excitement about their role as Khalifah, and which allows them to be thankful
for the wondrous future that awaits them.
For young children I would suggest they be told such things as:
- Before Allah made us He made everything else.
- Allah made the sun and the moon and the stars and our planet, Earth.
- Allah made the air we breathe and the water we drink.
- Allah made all of the plants and all of the animals.
- Allah made all of this so that when He made Adam(and all the other people) we would have a nice place to live.
- Allah took a real long time to make all this for us.
- Allah made us different from everything else.
- Allah made us special because He loves us so much.
- Allah made us special because He has a very important job he wants us to do.
- Allah made us His Khalifah, which means we are supposed to do some work for Him.
- Allah knows better than anyone what is good and what is bad.
- Allah wants us to learn from Him what is good and bad.
- Allah wants us to love the good things and not like the bad things.
- Allah wants each one of us to only do good things and never do bad things.
- Allah wants each one of us to help other people to know what is good and bad.
- Allah wants us to make our world beautiful.
- Allah wants parents to help their children learn what is good and bad.
- Allah wants kids to help other kids learn what is good and bad.
- We should be very happy Allah has blessed us with such an important job to do.
- Even if it might sometimes be hard work, it is going to be lots fun to be the Khalifah of Allah.
- If we work hard and do a good job as Allah's Khalifah the world will keep getting to be a nicer place until it becomes like a paradise.
B. True meaning of 'Jihad'
Raise your child to be a powerful jihad warrior for Allah.
There is a name for the process by which we must carry out our responsibility as the Khalifah of Allah. That process is
called jihad. Jihad does not mean Holy War as is so often claimed by the Western news media. Jihad means Holy Struggle.
Jihad is the struggle for good to overcome evil. Jihad is the struggle to make the Will of Allah win against the influence of Shaitan.
That we have been given jihad as a means to overcome Shaitan is a great Blessing and Mercy from Allah.
There are two types of jihad, the lesser jihad and the greater jihad. The difference between those two forms of jihad was
made clear to the companions of the Prophet Muhammad(peace be upon him) as they were returning home after success on the
battlefield. The companions were proclaiming the victory as a great jihad, to which the Prophet(peace be upon him) replied that
the struggle on the battlefield was the lesser jihad, and that they were returning home to carry out the greater jihad. When asked
what he meant, the Prophet(peace be upon him) answered that the greater jihad was the never ending struggle against evil within
one's self in day to day life to make sure that every deed, every word and even every thought was fully in accord with the Will
of Allah. So important is this inner struggle against the influence of Shaitan that we can never win the lesser jihad unless we are
winning the greater jihad. The lesser jihad is the struggle against any person or thing that fights against Islam, but please never
believe your children must be sent out into the world to use violence in the struggle against evil. While it is true jihad has before
taken place through violent warfare on the battlefield, we must hope that never again becomes necessary. Only if attacked with
violence, and even then only if there is no viable alternative, can violence be used in the fight against evil. In Islam the use of
violence to successfully carry out the lesser jihad may sometimes be allowed, but it is never preferred. We must forever strive to
ensure that we protect our children from ever being faced with that unfortunate necessity.
We must prepare our children to successfully carry out this Holy Struggle of good against evil. Children must be effectively
taught that there is a right way and a wrong way in absolutely everything. The right way is always the way Allah wants it to be,
and the wrong way is always following the influence of Shaitan. There is no possible deed, word, or thought that is not part of
our jihad. Our children must be taught to view their life in this way, as a constantly vigilant jihad warrior.
Children must be helped to understand that just as it is the greatest of possible honours to be chosen by Allah as His
Khalifah, it is equally a responsibility of great honour to carry out jihad as a warrior for Allah. Children must learn that to be a
jihad warrior means fighting successfully against the cunning and never ending attacks from Shaitan, who only wants to lure us
from the path of goodness that Allah has ordained for us. The loss of even one seemingly unimportant battle against Shaitan can
be the beginning of a series of further losses, subtly increasing in importance, that eventually lead to the loss of the ultimate battle
against Shaitan, and to lose that battle is to lose eternity in Paradise.
Now I can not stress too highly how very, very important it is that you as parents give this information to your children in a
way that imprints deeply onto their hearts and into their minds. Our jihad as Khalifah of Allah is to be carried out unwaveringly
at every moment of our lives. Anything less will surely please Shaitan
For young children I would suggest they be told such things as:
- It is important we do a good job as Allah’s Khalifah, so He has given us a way to carry out that job.
- Allah is so kind to us He wants to make sure we will be successful Khalifah.
- The way to be a good Khalifah of Allah is called jihad.
- Jihad means to fight against everything bad and try to make everything be good.
- Allah loves everything that is good and doesn’t like anything that is bad.
- Allah wants us to love everything good and not like all the bad things just as He does.
- Shaitan fights against everything Allah likes.
- Shaitan wants to make us do bad things and doesn’t like us doing good things.
- Jihad is the fight against Shaitan.
- We are Allah’s warriors in the battle against Shaitan.
- Both boys and girls are Allah’s warriors in the fight against Shaitan.
- Allah’s jihad warriors try to fight against the bad things by being real good.
- Sometimes Shaitan gets in our thoughts and tries to get us to do bad things.
- Those bad things can be what we do, words we say, or even thoughts we think.
- We have to fight real hard to make sure Shaitan never gets us do bad things.
- Allah only wants us to do good things, so because we love Allah so much we should always try to do good things.
- Sometimes Shaitan tries to get other people to fight against everything good that Allah wants, so we have to find ways to stop those people who want bad things.
- We have to be sure we are real good inside so we can win the fight against those who want the bad things.
- If other people try to get us to do bad things we have to be sure we are such strong jihad warriors that they can never get us to do those bad things.
- Shaitan never ever stops trying to get us to do bad things so we have to keep watch over goodness all the time to protect it for Allah.
- Even real small bad things are important to fight against because they can lead us to bigger and bigger bad things.
- If we love Allah and do all the good things He wants us to do we will go to Paradise, and that is the very best thing that can happen.
- Shaitan wants to keep us from going to Paradise so that is why he tries to get us to do bad things, because people who do lots of real bad things don’t get to go to paradise.
- We have to fight against Shaitan and fight against doing bad things for our whole life.
- It is wonderful to be a jihad warrior for Allah, fighting against the bad influence of Shaitan and getting to do everything good that Allah loves.
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WEEK FIVE
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WEEK SIX
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WEEK SEVEN
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WEEK EIGHT
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WEEK NINE
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WEEK TEN
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