Crises

Crises come in different forms and can either bring a family closer or break a family apart, depending on how the family deals with the crisis. For example, some crises are external, some are internal, some are cumulative, and some are isolated. The type of crisis and how personal it is to the person experiencing the crisis, influences on how much the crisis affects the person. Crises can also affect people and families depending on the way they deal with crises.Some families turn on each other and get into fights over the stress and crisis. Other families choose to support each other and become closer through trials.It's important to be conscious and aware of how you handle a crisis if you want a positive outcome.

Transitions in Marriage

This week in my family relations class we talked about transitions in marriage. We talked about important factors that keep a marriage strong such as communication, intimacy, and trust.We also talked about how planning a wedding can prepare couples for marriage. When planning a wedding couples need to communicate with each other, their parents, and their future in-laws, which is also very important in a marriage. Couples also usually figure out finances together for the wedding, which is also important in a marriage. Another thing we talked about was what usually happens with marital satisfaction when a child is born. For many couples marital satisfaction decreases when a child is born, because stress goes up, the parents tend to be more tired, and sometimes the husband feels neglected by his wife. Couples can usually prevent a decrease in martial satisfaction when a child is born, if they are aware of these factors and go out of their way to communicate and make sure each other are still getting their needs met.

Gender Roles and Differences

In my Family Relations class this week, we learned about differences in gender and the different gender roles that there are. In preparation for one of our classes this week, I watched a video about some people’s views on how there shouldn’t be differences in gender roles.  Some of the people interviewed in this video said that they thought that society happened to create gender roles, and that they did not think differences in gender roles were important. Studies have shown that even as little children, before they are influenced by society's views, that boys tend to be more rough in their play and girls tend to be more caring and nurturing in their play.  In The Family: A Proclamation to the World, it states specific roles for each gender. The proclamation states that “by divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children.” I love how at the beginning of this quote is says that we were given gender and these roles by divine design; gender roles were not made by mistake. Even though each gender has certain roles, that doesn’t mean one gender is better than the other or that males and females are unequal. Because men and women have different roles and abilities, we are able to complete and complement each other.

This week in my family relations class, we have been discussing culture and class. One of the things that interested me was the many different point of views of classmates on how class in society is determined. Some ways my classmates thought class was determined was by money, their lifestyle, the location people live, education, connections, appearance, and where people work. I came to the conclusion that not just one of these things play a role in deciding someone's class, but all of them play a role in someone's class in society. I also found it interesting how culture and class mix in the views of people. For example, many people have the view that certain cultures are ranked lower in class while other cultures are viewed as upper class.

Another topic discussed this week was if all cultures were equally valid. When I first read this question, I thought that the majority of cultures are equally valid, because all cultures have good values and all cultures have things that could be worked on or fixed. As we discussed this topic in class, I came to realize that no, not all cultures are equally valid. We discussed in class that one of the definitions of the word valid means "to have legal force". We discussed that with legal force there are rules, and that God has set standards for what is right and what is wrong. There are cultures that have more values that follow God's standards than others, thus having me come to the conclusion that not all cultures are equally valid. This week I enjoyed learning the different views on how culture and class, and how these to things play such a large role in each of our lives.

This week in  my Family Relations class, I learned a lot about family trends. I didn't realize how many recent trends there are that are changing the views of the family unit. Some of the trends are divorces, cohabitation, lowered birthrates, same sex parents, and people are also getting married at and older age. The trend that interested me the most was the lowered birthrates. There are a lot of people now that don't put having kids as a priority. If couples do decide to have children they tend to only have a couple. I found it interesting, some of the reasons why people don't have very many kids or just don't have kids at all. Some of the reasons were: the cost of having kids, their parents didn't have very many kids, having kids made it hard to have a career. I find it sad that less and less people are deciding not to have the joys of having kids.

Intro

Hi! My name is Sidney Acor and I created this blog for my Family Foundations class. The purpose of this blog is for me to be able to share what I learn in my class and share any other insights I have on the subjects taught in class. I'm excited to start sharing what I learn in this class! Enjoy!