raising respectful christian children in a disrespectful world

Hello. I am a Mom of three girls ages 14, 12, and 5. The school systems and communities in today's world are a pretty scary place to be raising children if you ask me.

If we go to a local park, the children must keep their shoes on at all times no matter how hot the weather. There are hypodermic needles and used condoms all over the ground.

One boy at age 9 trashed a whole classroom; the teacher's desk, smashed computers, broke student's desks in half, etc. Two teachers and a principal could not stop him so they called the police and everyone watched him continue to trash the classroom until a policeman came to take him away. They did remove the other students from the classroom right away so they wouldn't get hurt, but they sat in the hallway where they could still hear and see all the commotion. How can 3 adults not be able to stop a 9 year old and everything get so out of control for so long? I know you can't spank them, but what about gently holding him still to prevent damage or injury to the child until a parent or police officer arrive or until the child calms down?

At age 11 my daughter's started coming home from school telling me who is sleeping with who, who does what kind of drugs, who is straight, gay, or bisexual. They knew what kind of drugs you can buy from a person who has just the left pant leg rolled up or just the right pant leg rolled up. They know who'll sleep with anyone if they have a pair of shoes tossed over the telephone wires near their house.

I do allow my children to go to public school as scary as it's become. I teach them old fashioned discipline and respect at home. I know from their reactions to their peers via our discussions we've had at home that they think that most of what they hear and see going around their schools is disgusting to them and that I can still trust them at this point to be their own person and make the right choices away from my supervision. I can only hope and pray that they will continue to be this way as they grow older…so far so good.

The new way of raising children in today's society is definitely making our communities and schools unsafe as time goes on. I believe the only solution for this problem is to go back to more old fashioned morals and values when raising children.