 The year is 1951, and Linda Brown is a third grader in Topeka, Kansas. Now, like all other third graders, Linda Brown likes playing hopscotch with her friends. She enjoys playing jump rope, but her mom and dad are worried about her. Her mom and dad are worried about her because Linda isn't able to go to the same school as her peers. As a black person in 1951 in the United States of America, black people weren't able to go to the same schools as white people. And Linda, her parents, were worried about her because when they saw their child, they saw their future. They wanted their child to have the best shot at success. And so her parents ended up suing the Board of Education in Topeka, Kansas. And this was a landmark moment in the United States of America. It was known as something called Brown versus Board of Education. This ended up going to the Supreme Court. And this was important because this specific ruling in the Supreme Court is the reason why schools in the United States of America were desegregated. But Linda Brown and her parents had approved something. They had approved that discrimination is bad, which sounds silly in 2022, but in that time they had approved that this act of discrimination was bad for children. So there were two researchers at Columbia University who devised a study. They called it the Dahl Test. They worked with five to nine-year-old black boys and girls and provided them with two dolls. And then these researchers would ask the children a battery of questions. Questions like, which doll is good and which doll is evil? Which doll do you want to play with and which doll don't you want to play with? Which doll is beautiful and which doll is ugly? And after asking these questions, the researchers would then ask little boy or little girl, which doll looks like you? And what Kenneth and Mamie Clark discovered was something staggering. 70 percent, seven in ten of these five to nine-year-old black boys and girls would describe the negative characteristics with the black doll and the positive characteristics with the white doll. Which doll is beautiful, the white one? Which doll do you want to play with, the white one? Which doll is good, the white one? Which doll is evil, ugly, the one that you don't want to play with? The black doll. And after asking all of these questions and answering them, when the researchers asked which doll looks like you, after saying the black doll was evil and ugly and that they didn't want to play with it, they would pick up the black doll and they would say, this is the doll that looks like me. These researchers discovered something incredible. In an environment steeped in discrimination, the issue wasn't how the rest of the world was looking at the black community, but instead how young black boys and girls began to look at themselves. So they discovered what was termed as internalized oppression. Now, this story and learning about this struck a chord with me. I'm the author of Nori Kids. Many of you may have heard of Nori Kids before, but what you probably don't know is that growing up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, I went through a great deal of challenges. I remember, for example, when I was in middle school, it was a point in time when I wanted to fit in because kids were teasing me and I started telling my mom to pick me up 15 minutes after my baseball games were finished because I don't want anyone to see my mom. I don't want anyone to see her wearing a job. I just wanted to fit in. Now, in 2016, when my wife and I were here in the Bay Area doing our masters, we wanted to investigate this. We wanted to understand what is the impact. In 2016, 2016 was a very unique climate. There was a lot of things happening then, but we wanted to understand how young five- to nine-year-old Muslim boys and girls were internalizing their identity. And so we devised a very interesting piece of research. There were three parts to this research. One part of the research was a in-depth interview. It was about 30 minutes long when we would interview five- to nine-year-old Muslim boys and girls and we'd share statements with them and they'd say, yes, no, maybe, or I don't know. Statements like, I am a Muslim. I am an American. Muslims are good people. Americans are good people. Muslims can be Americans. Americans can be Muslim, so on and so forth. We would also give them a performance task where we would ask them to ascribe characteristics to two different people. There was a woman version of this and also a male version of this. This one's a little bit more dramatic. That's why I'm sharing it. But we'd ask the children to point towards which person has a lot of friends. Which person belongs in her neighborhood? Which person is good at sports? Which person is smart? Now if you look closely at this, what you'll see is they're both actually the same photo. One is a person wearing hijab. One is a person who's not wearing hijab. Now we did this research not just in the San Francisco Bay Area. We actually replicated it across five major cities in the United States of America. And we picked these cities on purpose to try to get a little bit of diversity. We did it in Los Angeles. We did it in Phoenix. We did it in Dallas. We did it in Atlanta, Georgia. And we did it in the DC, Maryland, Virginia area. Now in general, the population was relatively diverse. When I say diverse, what I mean is it was a subset that was African-American. It was a subset that was Asian. It was a subset that was Middle Eastern. It was a subset that was that identified as being white. Additionally, there was diversity in terms of whether children were first and second generation in terms of as American. And we can, inshallah, talk about some of this in Q&A as there's discussions about it. But I want to share with you the top line headlines from that research. What we discovered was that one in three of these Muslim boys and girls, oh by the way, one other thing, pause, we were thoughtful about finding diversity specifically with respect to schooling. About half of the sample went to full-time public school but attended a weekend Islamic school. About half of the population went to a full-time Islamic school or they were homeschooled. Okay, so that was built into the study. And we can talk about some of those nuances as well in the discussion. But headlines, one in three of these kids responded that they did not want others to know that they are Muslim. 15%, about one in six responded that sometimes they pretend not to be Muslim. So Amina, who's five, she says something, they, the kids in public school, they don't know that I'm Muslim. And I don't want them to know. So at five, this child is articulating this feeling of, hey look, I don't want these children to know because she believes that there is a negative perception of that. One in two responded that they didn't know whether they can be both Muslim and American as if there was a conflict. By being Muslim, maybe they couldn't be American or Americans maybe can't be Muslim. Serena, who's nine, she said some Americans, they don't like Muslims. They say like, oh, you can't eat here. You can't do things because you're not American. You're a Muslim and you're a terrorist. They say that maybe. I want to pause real quick for a moment. A nine-year-old or a five-year-old is not bleaching their hair blonde. They're not going by mo instead of Muhammad. They're not leaving the faith. Why does it matter what a five to nine-year-old thinks? I don't know if you guys normally make this interactive or if I just do this rhetorically. But truthfully, like, who cares what a five to nine-year-old thinks? Why does it matter if a five to nine-year-old is articulating these attitudes? You guys, we can't all participate at the same time. That will be a problem. Yes, why does it matter what a five to nine-year-old thinks? Masha'Allah. Takbir, Allahu Akbar. Let's do it like, because you guys act like we want to be here and we're excited, okay? And let's breathe some energy into this room, okay? So we'll say Takbir and we'll all say Allahu Akbar together. Takbir, Allahu Akbar. Thank you for your contribution. Yes. So the prevailing theory is that by the time a child is nine years old, a significant part of their identity, their self-concept, their understanding of who they are has been established. Now, can that change? Yes, it can change. But you think about it almost as roots of a tree. Once the roots have been planted, they've been established and it's a little bit difficult to move. That's when we get almost the highest return on investment with respect to education is in those early years when we're planting those seeds. So the issue becomes if a five, six, seven, eight, or nine-year-old is articulating attitudes like this, at this age, what happens when they then go to middle school or high school and are carrying these beliefs with them? That's why it matters. So after doing all this research, it took us like a fair amount of time. I remember my wife and I like we would travel like, wow, we had like a little baby. We would do these interviews. It took so much work and I remember once we finished it, I was at the dinner table with my dad and he was like, so mean, what did you find? And I said, dating, the headline of this research is that many of our children don't feel like they belong. And then my dad said, okay, so he's like, I mean, come on, first world problems, let's be honest, they don't feel like they belong, boo. Ooh, I mean. And he's like, I mean, are you serious? This is the issue that you're worried about, the kids don't belong? How would you respond to my dad? Does it matter if a child feels like they don't belong within their American environment? Does it matter? Who cares? How would you respond to my father? Who, by the way, I'm joking a little bit, but I'm using this as an important moment because we might also be thinking, okay, belonging, touchy-feely, seriously, why does it matter? Why does it matter? Someone who wants, yes, over here. Because so what the sister said is she said, look, this is the community that the kids are living in, they don't feel like they belong here, that's a problem. Mashallah, thank you, yes. She said, I don't want her to feel any less than her peers, as if belonging is related to self-esteem. If I don't feel like I belong, maybe that influences my feeling about myself, my self-esteem. That's one exceedingly good argument and we're going to talk about it. I want to position three specific reasons why belonging matters. And then after we talk about these three reasons why belonging matters, I want to share some of these specific things that we can be doing to help build this feeling of belonging among our children. But if you really want me to tell you why belonging matters, I'm going to say taqabir and I need you all to say Allah Akbar. Taqabir. Man, it doesn't seem like you guys want me to do it. It's not Iranian, I'm leaving, you do this, no? Alright, let's try it again, taqabir. Allah. Mashallah, mashallah. You know, I do kids programs for a living, right? So I got it, you know, alright. So one of the reasons why belonging matters is because it's tied to agency. I want everyone to say agency. One more time, agency. One last time, agency. When something belongs to you, you then care about it. What do I mean, okay? If, for example, I said that there is a Tesla outside that has its lights on, if a Tesla belongs to you, you might then reach for your phone and say, oh, maybe that's mine. I also don't own a Tesla, I don't know how it works, you probably don't leave your lights on, right? But let me give you another example. When I go to a masjid, for the people who come to the masjid all the time, and they feel like this masjid belongs to me, when the program is over, they feel compelled to help clean up. They'll say, oh, let me grab the seats, let me put them where they belong. Let's fold up the things. Because when something belongs to you, you then care about it. You feel like it is your responsibility. Are you following? Similarly, if our children don't feel like they belong within their community, they don't feel like they have a responsibility over it. The issues of their city, whether they be homelessness, whether they be issues of the environment, whether they be issues of pollution, they think to themselves, oh, they don't belong, I don't have responsibility over it because this community doesn't belong to me. One way you can talk about this in layman's term is being kind of a second-class citizen. This feeling of, oh, I don't get all the privileges of being a citizen of the city of Pleasanton or something like that. I'm just here, I'm transient. This isn't mine. Of course, we don't want that. We want our children to help build a better world. And if we want them to be actively involved in their communities, they have to feel like their communities belong to them. One of the reasons why belonging matters is because of agency. A second reason why belonging matters is because of what's called antisocial behavior. I want you to say it after me. It's a long antisocial behavior. One more time. Antisocial behavior. One last time. Antisocial behavior. When I say that, what I mean is when someone doesn't feel like they belong, it can often lead to two different consequences. One is assimilation and one is resistance. When I say assimilation, it's similar to that experience that I articulated before. Remember the one when I was talking about baseball? About how, for example, my mom, I would tell her to pick me up 15 minutes after my baseball games were finished because I didn't want anyone to know that I was a Muslim. This could be someone saying, oh, hey, my name's Mo instead of Muhammad, or someone bleaching their hair blonde. I mean, not to say, I mean, you can. There's different rationale why people do different things. But this assimilation is not ideal because we want our kids to feel comfortable in their own skin. We don't want them to feel like they have to be someone who they are not. A second reason why it matters is because of resistance. The opposite side of the coin is when someone doesn't feel like they belong, they begin to kind of dig their heels into an opposition against the majority. And this is something that we observed, I mean, in extremes. So for example, when we were doing this study and we went to Phoenix, we heard about an unfortunate situation that happened. It was a must shit. Now Phoenix was very unique. There was a point in time when a must shit in Phoenix had armed protesters who brought machine guns and they surrounded the must shit. Now this is actually the funny part of this. Let me tell you a funny part of the story. These people knew such a little bit about Islam. They came to the must shit on a Sunday and they surrounded the must shit and they were like holding these guns and they're like, yeah, we're going to get these Muslims. And no one showed up. And they're like, what's going on here? Crickets or tumbleweed. And then someone went on Wikipedia and they're like, oh, they come on Fridays. Oh, we don't even know. So anyways, they come on Friday. They had this situation. This was a big deal. This was a big deal. And imagine your young child at this point in time. You see this. Now, Alhamdulillah, by the way, the good news, the amount of support. Yes, on Friday this happened. But on Sunday of that same week, there were so many interfaith allies that came into the must shit that there was no space. It was literally standing room only, right? So I share that to say that this, what I described is not normal. Like this is, you know, these are, you know, extreme people with extreme points of views who treated these people this way. And this is not common. But regardless, it was a 13 year old boy who, in Phoenix, at this predominantly Pakistani must shit, where this occurred, afterwards there was an event where people were depicting our Holy Prophet, peace and blessings be on him, in a very negative way. And he thought, you know what? I'm going to give them what they have coming. That, of course, is not ideal. That is not a situation we want any of our kids to be in. Right? But this is a result of, it stems from a feeling of belonging. Okay? So, I said belonging matters. One, because of agency. Number two, I said it matters because of anti-social behavior, which can be assimilation. It can also be resistance. We don't want our children to feel like they have to force themselves to be in one of these things. We just want them to feel comfortable in their own skin. A third reason why belonging matters is because of what our sister said earlier. Self-esteem, right? We want our children to have a positive feeling about who they are. We don't want to feel like they're lesser than other people or that they have to change who they are such that they can fit in or feel like they belong. Okay? Pause. As I'm talking about this, among us, there's at least a couple of people in the back of their mind who are thinking, but brother and me, do we really want to belong as Americans? What has America done? America has participated in some grave crimes. Crimes against some Muslim countries. Do we want our kids to be American? And what's unique is we actually found this in the research. We found what statistical significance that Arab children had less favorable attitudes towards America, Americans, and being American than any other ethnic group. The rationale is simple because they see and Pakistani children are much better than Arab children. I'm kidding, that was a joke. No one laughed. That didn't land. Okay, that was not the point. That didn't land. Okay. The reason why was because of American foreign policy. When we asked these children, why did they articulate these attitudes? They said, how can I love being American? Look at what they did to my people in Lebanon. Look at what they did to my people in Iraq. Look at what they did to my people in Palestine. So on and so forth. This was actually something that we observed within the data that these children that came from countries that had American foreign intervention, they had less favorable attitudes. But we have to understand for a moment when we say that we belong as an American, what does that really mean? Does that mean that I'm co-signing every action that every American has done? When I say that yes, I'm an American, does that mean that I co-sign every action that every American does and says yes? And by the way, if I say that I am American, does that mean that I can no longer be Pakistani like it's citizenship? Like, oh, you're American. You can't be Pakistani anymore? Absolutely not. This is a very important piece of the discussion. But I don't think you guys are ready for it. Just kidding. All right. Let's bring some energy into the room. Okay, I'm going to say Takbir. I want you to say Allah Akbar. Takbir. One more time. Takbir. One last time. And you guys, you can feel like you say loudly, okay? Takbir of Allah Akbar. Mashallah. So sometimes we think about identity and these various facets of our identities being mutually exclusive, or I can be Muslim, or I can be American, or I can be Pakistani. Sometimes in our mind, we think about it this way. My kids are Pakistani. They're not American, you know? But that's just not the way it works. Our heart is big enough where identity is intersectional. It's not mutually exclusive. I can be Muslim, and I can be American, and I can be Pakistani, and I can be a father, and I can be a son, and I can be a brother, and I can be a Minnesota Vikings fan, and I can be an athlete, and I can be and and and and and. Do you see that? We need not make this artificial choice to say I can only be this. No, I can be both. Number one. Number two, if I say that I identify as a Muslim, does that mean that now I am co-signing every decision that every Muslim has ever made? Absolutely not. Right? And in the same way, if I identify as being American, that doesn't mean that I co-sign every decision that every American makes. It simply means that this is an environment within which I feel like I have responsibility. This is an environment within which I feel like I belong. So I hope I've established thus far that belonging matters, why it matters, and also that belonging as an American is actually a pretty good thing. It doesn't necessarily mean that we are co-signing everything bad that every American has done. And also, it doesn't mean that we're giving up other parts of our identity either. So now the question becomes, how do we solve this problem? How do we help our children feel like they belong? This is not a rhetorical question. I want to get audience participation. If you were tasked with trying to solve this problem of helping our children feel like they belong, what are one, two, or three things that you think we could do to help develop this feeling? Yes. Please. So what the sister said is she said, hey, does schooling matter, right? The environment within which our kids grow up and does it matter. And I would take it a step further and I would actually assert that in fact, the community that our child grows up in matters a great deal. And this is one actually of the ways that we can help facilitate belonging. The sister came up with it. This is her second time contributing. She is getting a gold star. The rest of you, I don't know, bronze at best. Okay, bronze at best. But one of the key things is a community of practice. I want everyone to say community of practice. I want to say one more time, community of practice. One last time, community of practice. So if I were to do a summation, sum, and all of my child's social interactions on a consistent basis, that is roughly what we call our child's community of practice. So what does that mean? It means where they go to school. It means where they go for Sunday school. It means where they go for karate. It means where they go for hives. It means where do they go for soccer. It means who comes over on Friday and Saturday nights. If I were to sum all of these various things together, it makes my child's community of practice. And what we know is that as parents, we can be extraordinarily strategic in designing the community of practice that our children are growing up in to help stimulate belonging. So how do we design it? There are two key things that we know are valuable when we design the community of practice. One of the things that we know is valuable are mirrors. Say it after me, mirrors. Now when I say mirrors, I don't literally mean like a mirror that you're able to look at. But what I mean is a community within which when my child comes, they see other individuals who kind of mirror their identity. They mirror that. So what does that mean that could mean, for example, going to a full-time Islamic school? Or it might mean being actively involved in the masjid. Or it might mean having a close circle of Muslim friends where my child might see some people know to asterisk in this conversation, I'm specifically talking about Muslim identity, right? There's other types of identity, you know, racial identity, ethnic identity, socioeconomic status, so on and so forth, right? But I'm specifically talking about Muslim identity. So number one, we want to cultivate our community of practice, be diligent, thoughtful about crafting it such that there are mirrors. It is also valuable to have windows. I want everyone to say windows. Now when I say windows, I don't just literally mean windows that, you know, bring in the breeze. I mean windows into people who are also not Muslim. And me interacting in those spaces and feeling comfortable in my own skin, okay? So how does that practically manifest themselves? It could mean my child is part of a homeschool co-op in which they are with other Muslim families. But we're in karate and karate is in the city of Pleasanton where there is other people who may not be Muslim. That is, for example, cultivating my community of practice such that there are mirrors and also windows. Now there's other things that we know here that like generally speaking, if my child is in environments, now this is like not study, this is like educational theory, if my child is in an environment where there is a greater level of diversity that generally is a good thing because a child feels less like those differences are less salient in an environment. So for example, I grew up in Maple Grove, Minnesota. A sea of gory loge that means white people. And I was the only brown guy who stuck out like a sore thumb, right? Now if I was in an environment that was diverse and now I'm Muslim, my differences are not as salient. Do you see that? So that's also part of that community of practice and being thoughtful about it. We can talk in greater detail about specifically what our research showed about Islamic schools, but I don't want that to be the point of the discussion. So one of the things we talked about was community of practice. What is the second thing that might be valuable? Yes. Lead by example. What is your name? Javed. Okay, I'm going to say Takbir. I'm going to do Allah Akbar for Javed. Takbir. So I want to first, before I talk about this, head on, I want to talk about this which is similar. This is the idea of role models. I want everyone to say role models. Say it again, role models. One last time, role models. Thank you. So the most basic way which each of us have learned actually like the pedagogy that we learn faith like how Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala teaches us is through role models. Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala sent us prophets. Prophets that were not angels. Prophets that were human beings. Such that we could see these human beings and attempt to emulate them. Think to ourselves, Allah Akbar, I want to be like him or I want to be like her. This is natural. This is ingrained within us. We look to role models as a source of learning. Similarly for our children having access to role models that help showcase what does this integration look like? What does it look like to practice Islam in America and be unapologetic about it is valuable. Now oftentimes we think about these role models in two forms. One is what's called an aspirational role model. The second is what's called a relational role model. An aspirational role model is someone who they see. Maybe someone who they've never met could be like Ibtihaj Muhammad right? A fencer who's a Muslim woman. Or it could be Salman Khan the one who made Khan Academy. I'm happy I qualified that. The Pakistanis in India loved that joke. Everyone else was like I don't get it. Because there's another actor named Salman Khan and he might not be the best role model. Okay we'll move on. So that is what's called an aspirational role model. Okay? There's value in that. Then there's a relational role model. That's someone that our child is able to touch, feel and see. It could be a teacher. It could be a boy scout or girl scout troop leader. It could be their teacher in Sunday school. Okay? Both of these role models are very valuable and as parents we can seek to try to provide them to us. Finally. There's a third thing. Now there's more than that. I'm simplifying. I want to talk about three things. Community practice, role models and the third thing is what Brother Jawad said. Now I'm going to share you something in the research but before I share it I need you to promise that you do not throw tomatoes at me. Does anyone have tomatoes in their bags? Don't throw them at me if you have them. And before you cast judgment on me and everything I've said allow me to explain this as well. Here's what we found with statistical significance in the study. We found that children whose mother wears hijab those children demonstrated more confidence in their identity than those whose mothers do not wear hijab. Now hold on pause. A simplistic look at this will say oh well if all the women wear hijab then that's going to solve our problems. That is not the point here. The point here is something different. Think about this. A mother's decision that literally has nothing to do with the child. It has absolutely nothing to do with the child. Empirically has a association with how a child feels about himself or herself. Now hijab is one very easy question we can ask in an interview. But think about the thousands of decisions that we as parents make on a daily basis. Do I myself as a father or do I myself as a mother do I exhibit the identity that I wish my child has? Do I exhibit the relationship with prayer or the Quran or with Akhlaq? Do I observe that character? The single most important variable that impacts a child's understanding of who they are. It is not living in California. Sorry. It is not where they go to school. It is not how much money they have. The single most important variable is the quality of the relationship they have with their parents. Do you see that if you send your child to here but I'm not involved that's not going to solve our problems. I want to articulate this with an example. I talked about my father before and I share this example not in any way to demean my father but I use this as an example and may Allah bless my father. I remember when I was a kid in Minnesota we would go on road trips and when we were going on road trips I've already established that I'm Pakistani because you know flights are very expensive. So when we would go on road trips a time would come when it would be time to perform prayer and so we would go to the rest stop and then my father would look to the left he'd look to the right he'd make sure that no one was watching and then he would say ok Bismillah let's pray now. Now that was a tiny action. Do you see how tiny that action was? But me years later still associates that somehow this prayer that I'm doing is weird. I shouldn't do it when other non-Muslim people look at me. Do you see how that small decision impacted the way I feel? This is what I mean when I say the parents play the most critical and central role in the development of our children's identity. Now I want to pause for a moment. I want to talk about a couple of things here and I'll inshallah speak for maybe three to five more minutes and then we'll pause to give time for any questions you might have. We must realize and I start with myself when I say this our kids are getting older and I think about especially dads when I come home and how my little boy costume looks at me and he says daddy I want to play and I am I'm tired and I think there's nothing more than I want than to just sleep and take a nap and I know that each of you have been there and felt that but I want you to remember this a day will come when we pass away just like a day will come when our parents pass away and what lives on our legacy the ceaseless benefit the sadkha jarya that we have the best thing we can do is our children and the reason why I think about this is because my mom passed away when she was 52 my mom passed away and I remember when my mom passed away I'm going to tell a story and it's going to be about moms but before I tell that story I want to say that like dads play a very important role super important role sometimes when we think about parenting we think oh it's all moms absolutely not the best role model the walking grand he would play camel not horse he would play camel and his companion would walk by and he would look at the grand children what a great camel you have in our holy prophet how much peace and blessings would be on him would look and say no what great riders do I have at a time when dads wouldn't kiss their children he would be seen kissing his children when his daughter fought them I would come in the room he would stand up okay when my mom passed away my dad told the story it's my favorite story he said once upon a time there was a king and that king wanted to find the person in his kingdom that king was good and for that person he would give his crown and his entire kingdom so one by one each person came and they said oh look this is what I've done and there were three five of us first person was a doctor she said look I'm a doctor I've healed so many people I've created these medications I've researched these vaccines and when she finishes everyone gives her a round of applause and there's one person at the front an older woman smiling bigger than everyone and she was clapping harder than everyone and then the person goes off then a second person comes on it's an engineer the engineer says look at these bridges that I've made they've connected our society together they're amazing and again everyone gives this person a round of applause and again there's this old woman who's clapping harder than everyone else smiling bigger than everyone else finally there's a third person a teacher a teacher says look I have done so much for teaching our society and again everyone gives a teacher a round of applause and there's this woman who is clapping harder and smiling bigger now the king has a tough decision he goes into his quarters and he thinks ah how am I going to pick the doctor the engineer the teacher how should I pick things maybe I'll ask that old woman who is clapping so loud smiling so maybe she has an idea she invites her says oh woman who should I give my kingdom to and the woman says oh king I can't pick I can't pick the kingdom says what are you talking about what do you mean you can't pick the person who you pick is going to inherit my entire kingdom why can't you pick and the old woman says no king I honestly can't pick because all three of these people are my children and the king knows who that person was that person who had done the most for his kingdom he invited the mother he put the crown on the mother and the people celebrated I share this because subhan Allah we live in a funny time a funny time we're in we have established value based simply on economic value if someone makes a lot of money and is able to generate a lot of economic value masha Allah that is success there's value in that there's no doubt about it but the role of parenthood this lofty role is one that we as a society and as a community have kind of said oh you're just a mom oh you're just a mom just a mom are you kidding me Allah Akbar just a mom lady mariam was just a mom lady fatima was just a mom just a mom we have to seriously recalibrate look at this idea of parenting because we as parents play the most important role and remember the asterisk I said yes I talked about the roles of mothers and so then I don't want it to feel like oh but then fathers don't play no fathers absolutely play a role as well right there's not to wash our hands of it and one of the things we can also do is we I mean we play a role insha Allah we have about 10 minutes left I'm gonna pause and insha Allah will allow for conversation for 10 minutes yes you heard that story so do you love your mom how much a lot you know how you can show your mom that you love her the best thing you can do for your mom it's not to write her a card it's also not to get her a flower it's also not to get her a trophy the best gift you can give your mom is to be a living trophy to be the best version of yourself and insha Allah by doing that it will be something your mom will love and insha Allah we all pray that you're able to do that everyone say amen thank you any other questions yes yeah that's a great question so we during the research we did two different things one was an in-depth interview and the second was a performance task when we did the in-depth interview we shared statements with the children and they could either respond by saying yes no maybe or I don't know the statements were things like I am a Muslim I am an American Americans are good people Muslims can be American Americans can be Muslim now the research is available and I can share it with you as well but it was through these specific responses to these statements that we were able to create associations between various variables like for example a child whose mother wears hijab and then with how they responded yes to the in-depth interview great question masha Allah masha Allah yeah no I really appreciate it and I think if I were to summarize what you said in one headline I would say quality time right so you here in the MCC are like ruthlessly spoiled crazy spoiled so spoiled because you have people like Ustad Aranya here and you have people like Sister Hina and so many incredible scholars who talk about various things and I am confident that someone has likely talked about the love languages with the community before but if no one has allow me to briefly summarize right love is a big deal love between husband and spouse also love between parent and child now the key thing about love to know is that in the same way that we speak languages love also has languages there is a man who was a therapist whose last name is Chapman I believe his first name was Gary but I forget he penned a book called the five love languages after his entire career working with families and what he believed was the most significant problem in marriages wasn't that people didn't love each other but that they were speaking different languages and so he said that a spouse has to know the language of the other spouse and the parent should also know the language of the children and love them in that language there is five languages one of them is quality time everyone say quality time one of them is words of affirmation words of affirmation words of affirmation means compliments three is gift giving everyone say gift giving and by the way sometimes people think that there might be oh they're showy or gaudy or something no I mean some people just like gift giving there's nothing wrong with that number four is physical touch the fifth one is acts of service everyone say acts of service so now let me give you a practical example my father his love language is acts of service so he shows his love through acts of service I am my dominant love languages words of affirmation so what happens my father will do things for me to show me that he loves me what will he do for example when I was a kid he would pick me up and drop me off to baseball he would spend time playing baseball with me he would help me learn how to drive he would showcase acts of service but he wouldn't really give me compliments I mean you did a good job I mean I love you I mean you did great so I grew up thinking man this dad doesn't love me he loved me but he showed me in a different way you see that now fast forward now when I'm an adult I show my love to my dad I say Masha'Allah you've lost some weight Masha'Allah you look great in that shirt you've done a good job talking but he doesn't really care about that he cares about acts of service I mean my lawn needs to get mowed you haven't mowed my lawn I have this child who does nothing for me but do you see that I said it in jest but this is actually real so what I need to do if I really love my dad I need to show him love the way he wants to be shown love and as a parent I need to show that he or she wants to be loved and similarly with my spouse and one of them is quality time and quality time frankly can't go wrong especially with our children I'm going to pause I know it's going to be time for Isha very soon if there's time for one last question Alhamdulillah so let me pause and just because we have two minutes I'm going to tell you and I want to pause by also saying Alhamdulillah my name is brother Amina I'm one of those that don't know me I run an organization called Noor Kids it's a character building program primarily for kids ages 4 to 9 if you're not aware of our work we have some of our things outside please do take a look we also have a kids program after Isha every month kids get a new book in the mail and every week we do a story time for kids I share that to say realize I am not a sheikh and also number 2 our research is primarily focused on 4 to 9 year olds so while I do have thoughts on this I will put an asterisk next to my thoughts to say I'm not an expert having said that when a child is over the age of 9 one of the most valuable things we can do is to help cultivate that community of practice specifically through friends so now a parent thinks but I can't force who she's friends with no you can't force who she's friends with but you can create the opportunity for friendship to take shape if I can get my daughter involved in various programs where she might be able to develop strong friendships inshallah that might be a successful way to help them develop confidence because once our children get older sometimes the role of parents becomes a little bit more difficult inshallah we pray that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala accepts our efforts allows our children to be the coolness of our eyes allows us to be the parents that our children deserve allow us to establish prayer and also our legacy our generations of children to come may Allah send your blessings on our holy prophet Muhammad peace and blessings be on him upon his family and upon his companions Jazakum Allah Khair, thank you