6.  Did it ever occur to you that “desire” may be diverted, but that it cannot be destroyed?

7.  Is it not best to divert by substitution rather than by prohibition?  Also to substitute in kind as near as may be?

8.  What are you doing in your home to satisfy the desire which takes your boy or girl to the neighbors or the public places?

9.  What share are you taking in the interests of the growing boy or girl?

10.  Parents, are you companionable?  Do you get into the boy or girl’s field of discussion?  Do you talk with them rather than to them?  Do you get into their games, their troubles, their pleasures, their life?

LESSON IX

1.  What certain acts or omissions entitle a boy to be classified as “wayward?”

2.  The first sign of waywardness is the breaking of what commandment, if any?

3.  Under any condition would you let your boy know that you considered him wayward?

4.  Should your regard for, as shown by your treatment of the wayward boy, differ in the slightest degree from your regard for your treatment of the circumspect, dutiful, and obliging boy?

5.  Does the worst tendency of the boy call for any more from us than mere direction?

6.  Is not the boy’s worst offence a bad form of satisfying a good desire?

7.  What is your method of dealing with your boy?  Is it “Never do that” or “Better to do this?”

8.  Do you ever undertake to show the boy how much more of the thing he is after he can get out of a method that is all around helpful than one that is all around harmful.

9.  How would it do to substitute jointly planned “Do’s” for unqualified “Don’ts”?

10.  In almost every instance can you not justly ascribe the boy’s waywardness to an unnatural companionship on your part or to no companionship at all?

LESSON X

SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT IN BOYS AND GIRLS

“Training the Child in the Way He Should Go”

1.  Quote from the Doctrine and Covenants a passage wherein parents are admonished as to their duty in teaching the Gospel to their children.

2.  Give three first steps in religious training in children.

3.  What difficulties and successes have you, as parents, met with in cultivating your little ones? proper habits in prayer, in attendance to Sunday School and in other religious duties?  To what do you ascribe your success or failure?

4.  At what age do boys and girls grow most careless as regards religion?  (Study the statistics of your Sabbath School on this point.)

5.  Is it true that our religious training fails most just at the point where the boy and girl are in greatest need of it?  What are the causes of this failure?

6.  What can and must parents do to reinforce the Sunday School and our other organizations in their efforts to guide the boy and girl safely during their teens? during the critical periods of life?