From A Parent's Guide Chapter 5
There are a great many other things you can do to
help your teenagers have good social experiences and thereby develop
self-confidence and stay out of situations where temptations might
arise. President Spencer W. Kimball said of activities for youth:
“The urge for group activity is normal to the
younger set, when they are not prematurely and immaturely stimulated in
other ways, and the recreational and social activities of the crowd can
be wholesome and entertaining. Physical and moral safety is increased in
the multiplicity of friends. Group homemade recreation activities can
be not only great fun but most beneficial. Firesides may create
friendships, and inspire the spirit and train the mind. Group picnics
can discipline youth in gentle manners and fellowship and extend circles
of intimate friends.
“Sports can develop the body in strength and
endurance. They can train the spirit to meet difficulties and defeats
and successes, teach selflessness and understanding, and develop good
sportsmanship and tolerance in participant and spectator. Drama can
develop talent, teach patience, and foster fellowship and friendliness.
Group music activities have similar effects, and also can soften and
mellow the spirit and satisfy the aesthetic needs.
“The properly conducted dancing party can be a
blessing. It provides opportunity to spend a pleasant evening with many
people to the accompaniment of music. It can create and develop
friendships which will be treasured in later years. Alternatively it can
become a restricting experience.
“Well-ordered dances provide favorable places,
pleasing times, and auspicious circumstances in which to meet new people
and to enlarge circles of friends. They can be an open door to
happiness. In an evening of pleasurable dancing and conversation, one
can become acquainted with many splendid young folk, every one of whom
has admirable traits and may be superior to any one companion in at
least some qualities. Here partners can begin to appraise and evaluate,
noting qualities, attainments, and superiorities by comparison and
contrast. Such perceptive friendships can be the basis for wise,
selective, occasional dating for those of sufficient age and maturity,
this to be followed later in proper timing by steady dating, and later
by proper courtship which culminates in a happy, never-ending marriage.
“On the other hand, for a youth to dance all evening
with one partner, which we might call ‘monopolistic’ dancing, is not
only antisocial but it circumscribes one’s legitimate pleasures and
opportunities. Also it can encourage improper intimacies by its
exclusiveness. Dancing with dates, single or steady, should presuppose
the exchange of partners, which we could call ‘multiple’ dancing” (The
Teachings of Spencer W Kimball, ed. Edward L. Kimball [Salt Lake City:
Bookcraft, 1982], pp. 289–90).
When guiding your teenagers in their choices of
activities, help them avoid activities that emphasize competitiveness,
single dating, or undue concentration on athletic prowess or superficial
beauty. Encourage them to avoid parties that include raucous music,
dancing with the same partner all the time, cliquish groupings, passive
videotape sessions, and other similar activities.
You can best help them avoid these undesirable activities by providing alternative, wholesome things for them to do.
