Teaching children to choose good heroes is best started when the children are very young, but if this was not done, it is essential to get started now. If you have family nights with lessons, this topic can be introduced there, but it needs to be followed up in almost daily conversations.
For a lesson on heroes, you might consider showing pictures of heroes popular with your children or their friends. Fasten each picture to a large sheet of paper present them to your teens and younger children. Ask them to tell you why this person (or television character) is popular. Then help the children evaluate this person’s suitability as a hero. Divide the paper into two sections. Label one” Leading for Good” and the other “Leading for Bad.” Ask the children what bad things a person could learn from emulating this hero, and then have them discuss the good things that could be learned. Fill out the chart as you discuss. (Remember to let your children figure this out for themselves. If they need help, ask leading questions, but don’t give them the answers. Lectures are not as effective or interesting as are self-discoveries.) The most effective way to conduct this lesson is to begin with bad heroes and work your way up to the good ones. If you are religious, end with a religious leader you most want your children to emulate. If not, choose someone you feel best represents the sort of person you want your children to be.
It’s important to remind children and teens that people are not perfect. Even a hero who seems perfect will sometimes make bad choices, or simply make choices that are wrong for your teens. Teens need to understand that only they can decide which path is best for them in adulthood, and only they and their parents can choose the best path now. They should not set out to emulate exactly the life of most heroes. Instead, they should choose those aspects of a person they admire, and work to develop those qualities. They can choose from a variety of heroes at once. They might want to be as spiritual as the Sunday School teachers, as strong as their favorite athlete, as hard-working as their parents, and as intelligent as their favorite teachers. Encouraging your teens to emulate qualities, rather than to exactly emulate specific people, can save them from following a hero into a devastating choice. It can also keep them from complete devastation when the hero falls.
