This may be a familiar refrain around your home, and if it is, it’s one that typically frustrates parents.
Around age 4, kids start to understand the concept of FAIRNESS, but—as with many things—they’ll probably need lots of discussions on what it means.
Understanding fairness fosters empathy
Helping children understand fairness is an important part of growing up and practicing empathy. When we understand what others need and perhaps what WE don’t, we recognize our differences and think a little beyond ourselves. We get to step into someone else’s shoes for a moment and consider their life.
He has told you, mortal one, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God? Micah 6:8
Samantha Song, an elementary school teacher from San Diego, has a great lesson on fairness (or equity) and equality. She asks for volunteers and puts something high up on the board or a shelf and call on two students to reach for it. She specifically calls on a taller and smaller volunteer. When the taller student reaches for the object, they’ll get it. But when the smaller student makes the attempt, the object will be just out of their reach. Then I ask the class for ideas – How can we help them?
“Give them a chair!”
“I can help them because I’m taller!”
“______ can’t be put up that high because the shorter kids can’t get them.”
Bingo.
So this nicely leads into a discussion of fairness vs. equality vs. equity. The two volunteers cannot have equal treatment, because that truly isn’t fair or even necessary. It’s obvious that they don’t need a stool or someone to help them reach. The other child, however, requires some accommodation to have an equal opportunity at success.
Equality has to do with sameness, just like in math. An equal sign tells us that both sides of the equation are exactly the same (3 + 2 = 5).
Equity is different. Equity means everyone gets what they need, based on visible gaps in opportunity. And sometimes people will have different needs because we are unique individuals.Equity is related to outcome.
Fairness is more hands off. It means not treating people with bias or discrimination. Oxford English Dictionary definition of fairness: impartial and just treatment or behavior without favoritism or discrimination.Favoritism is the stool or a boost to reach the shelf. Discrimination is blocking access to the shelf or swatting away the student’s hands because of a quality attributed to the student. I.E. swatting the tall student’s hands. (merit, skill, knowledge, ability can preclude equal access)
For example:
- Some children wear glasses and some don’t. That’s not equal, but it’s fair because not everyone needs glasses to see and learn best.
- Some children may receive a different lunch in school because they have food allergies. That’s not equal, but it’s fair. It’s what that child needs to be healthy and safe.
Fairness at school and at home
Understanding the concept of fairness is critical in a young person’s life, but is especially important in school where they are amongst peers that they can compare themselves to. In the classroom, some children will receive accommodations to help them meet their academic or behavioral goals. Some children will inevitably receive more adult attention through special services. They may even need an individual behavior plan with built in incentives that seem special or “not fair”. As children become more exposed to the concept of fairness or in other words equity, they will grow to be more considerate of others’ needs and more aware of their own.
At home, this is also applicable to sibling relationships.
Sharing is one way to demonstrate fairness. Everyone gets a turn. Everyone gets to wait.
A younger sibling or a baby will need more attention because they are less independent and need more adult care. This is an opportunity to remind the older child that although it feels unfair, you are trying to give everyone what they need to be well. You can remind the older child about some of the opportunities they receive, because of their own individual needs and capabilities.
Older children have typically earned more freedoms and responsibilities as a result of being trustworthy and morally & developmentally capable.
**This is why it’s important to not simply grant your younger children freedoms that the older ones already have simply because it’s easier or less work for you.** The older ones will naturally have their “fairness meter” sound the alarm and rightfully so. (Firstborn vs. lastborn complaints)
Fairness & Comparison
Sometimes the complaint or feeling of “that’s not fair” comes from jealousy or as the result of comparison…
Some kids have more than others; some kids might be smarter or have more friends or more athletic. That feels “unfair.”
This is a teachable moment. Each of us is gifted in unique ways. We’re wonderfully made, with different purposes and paths.
It doesn’t benefit you to compare your beginning to someone else’s middle/end. Gratitude for what we ARE given and appreciation for differences is important.
We don’t all REALLY want to look, act, and be the same—cardboard cutouts of filtered images.
Fairness and Forgiveness
From Focus on the Family: From our youngest years, most of us have a deep understanding of what we perceive to be fair. (Try giving a Popsicle to one child and not another.) This internal sense of fairness affects our response to offenses against us. We may not say it aloud, but our feeling is something like: If someone hurts us, shouldn’t we hurt them? It’s difficult to be a good forgiver when we want to retaliate.
Teach your kids that true forgiveness is incompatible with our sense of fairness. When we forgive, we relinquish the right and the need to get even. We release the anger we feel toward someone else, recognizing that God will handle the matter in His own way. And His ways are not driven by the human sense of fairness. Indeed, the ultimate “unfairness” was when Jesus endured the punishment for our transgressions against Him.
Forgiveness is our freedom. When we release the hurt and the anger, it is our own burden that we drop, our own barrier we demolish. Relationships move forward. Friendships deepen. As the radio counselor Bernard Meltzer once put it: “When you forgive, you in no way change the past — but you sure do change the future.”
This made me think about the parable of the prodigal son. The younger son insulted his father by asking for his inheritance while the father was still alive. This was basically saying to the dad that he was now as good as dead. Then he went off and squandered the inheritance through wild living.
When the father greeted the prodigal son with open arms, the older “obedient” son was not happy. He refused to come in and join the party. This turn of events didn’t seem fair. He was the “good” son who believed he was entitled to his father’s favor. Wouldn’t HE be entitled to an extravagant party because, after all, he had never strayed and he had worked on his father’s land, every day for years?
The younger child became an alien by leaving home, by leaving behind a relationship of such generosity that we can hardly imagine it. Maybe the kid didn’t really repent. Maybe his motives weren’t entirely pure. Maybe he would break his father’s heart again some day. But it didn’t matter. There was way more than enough love to welcome him home that day.
And what of the older sibling?
Luke 15
“The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. 29 But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’
31 “‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”
Renee: I always wondered if the older brother ever ASKED for a young goat to celebrate with his friends. The older brother seems unaware of all the benefits of family life available to him day in and day out. And he doesn’t want to be associated with this sibling who has brought shame and disgrace on his family. By staying away from the party and refusing to be reconciled with his brother, he remained alienated from the Father who loves him.
When the older son is talking to his father, he refers to his brother as “this son of yours” (Greek: ὁ υἱός σου οὗτος). This is a very interesting way to refer to your brother. You would expect him to use the closest relational descriptor, which would be “brother.” But the oldest son does not want to be associated with his younger brother. Through his choice of words, he is distancing himself.
But then he refers to the younger son as “this brother of yours” (Greek: ὁ ἀδελφός σου οὗτος). The older son created distance by calling his brother, “this son of yours.” The father quickly closes that distance by reminding the older son of his closest relationship to his younger brother.
Together the phrases have a kind of parallelism. The two constructions are in the same form with only the change from “son” to “brother.” This strongly suggests that Luke wants the reader to notice the two phrases and the change that happens between them. He wants you to see that the father has brought together what the older son wanted to hold apart.
There are lessons associated with each son in the parable. With the younger son, the parable teaches that God is reconciling sinners to himself in Jesus. With the older son, it teaches that God is also reconciling sinners to each other. Within the body of Christ, we are brought together despite our many transgressions and offenses.
This is not an either/or story. We can be both of these brothers at different times in our lives, when we turn away from God until we feel the longing to go back home, into the welcoming embrace of Holy Love. When we perform for God and wonder why He isn’t noticing more, like the older brother. When we see our relationship with Him as an exchange of behaviors that deserve a reward.
You know, one definition of ‘prodigal’ is one who spends or gives lavishly and foolishly. so in this sense, it’s the father who is the prodigal. It’s God who lavishes love on us – even when we think we’re undeserving or beyond redemption.
In the parable, it is the Father who does all of the saving action – embracing, welcoming, preparing a celebration. Writer Frederick Buechner writes in Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy & Fairy Tale that parables like The Prodigal Son can be viewed as comedy:
I think that these parables can be read as jokes about God in the sense that what they are essentially about is the outlandishness of God who does impossible things with impossible people.
That’s not fair. But it’s fantastic!
Fairness the Other Way Round
It’s also not fair that some children are healthy and others aren’t. It’s not fair that some of children have both parents while others have lost theirs.
The world is not an especially “fair” place as far as that goes.
Children will not always get what they want whenever they want, and if they did, it would be a detriment to their development. Learning and applying the concept of fairness will stretch a child’s ability to be patient and help them develop empathy and sensitivity towards others.