Teach your children well

With it being a rainy Saturday, today was a double-feature movie event for yours truly. Both films I saw I would recommend most highly and give both movies 4 Sally Seals!
The two documentaries I viewed and strongly encourage you to get thyself to the theater are: JIRO DREAMS OF SUSHI and BULLY.

Though completely different movies, both deal in some ways with education and life-learning and ask us if we are following the musical command of “Crosby, Stills, and Nash” to teach our children well and in so doing build a better society for us all.

JIRO DREAMS OF SUSHI, focuses on, you guessed it, Jiro, who is a renowned sushi chef still honing his craft in his mid-80’s. What impressed me was the commitment to learn a trade and continue to build one’s skill. In the vein of the “Tiger Mom” debate, it is “food for thought” (pun intended) to ask if our current American system of everyone gets a trophy, do what makes you happy, coddle and swaddle is creating a disciplined, striving, can-do work force. I for one confess that at my age (it’s the “Maam Stage” of life) having had a steelworker father who taught his children respect, responsibility, and to work for what you wanted is more appealing to me than the “what’s in it for me?” and “do you know who I am?”generation.

BULLY simply is a must-see for each one of us who works with children; has children; knows children, likes children. This cinematic learning lab will cause you to cheer, to choke-up, to curse, and to commit to being part of making a positive difference in our shared community. This is a film to take others to and to discuss and to chart a game plan for action. Who’s with me?

I believe we are both teaching and learning our entire lives. Answering the latter is easy. I’m more about asking myself, “What am I teaching another by my words, my actions, and how I live?”

Class is always in session…..

sj;