by Kimberly Schimmel

Created on: December 19, 2010   Last Updated: December 20, 2010

Extended family relationships are an important part of a close family.  Children who grow up with extended family in their lives may experience connections to the past, understand complex personal relationships, and have better support in tough times.

Connection to the Past

Through personal visits and family pictures, children can learn about how their own household came to be.  Questions like “Where did I get my red hair?” or “What did grandma’s farm look like?” help a child understand that every one of us has connections to people who came before us.  Cousins and old family friends can tell stories about youthful exploits or explain how mom and dad met one another.  A child who feels like a misfit in her nuclear family may feel better when she meets a cousin who looks just like her or enjoys reading the same books. 

Understanding of Relationships

Children love to belong to something and someone.  Extended family relationships help the child understand himself as part of a larger entity.  In the Hebrew Scriptures, family relationships were important enough that many genealogies are recorded and people are often identified by their tribe as well as their name.  The traditional stories of many cultures emphasize family and tribal relationships as well.  People today have the same need to belong to something bigger than themselves.

Among extended family members, children are bound to find some people who are different from those in their own household.  By learning about diversity within their own family, children will be better able to graciously interact with those outside their family who may be “different.”  Practice within the extended family prepares people for relationships in the workplace and community.

Support in Tough Times

Everyone will experience hardship at some point in life.  An extended family takes some pressure off parents who may feel the need to be everything to everyone.  Having cousins to help occasionally with a new baby or a sick grandparent lightens the load for everyone.  When one member of a family experiences a medical or financial emergency, there is a good chance somebody in the extended family has the resources to help out temporarily.  Keeping family connected means there is a way to give and receive help within a large network of people.

Keeping Connected

Getting in touch with extended family today may mean using a computer rather than running next door, but keep those connections somehow.  Children will be enriched by knowing their great-aunts, second cousins, and other relatives outside the immediate family unit.  Try to make some in-person visits as well.  Extended family is a gift that makes for a bigger and closer family.

Learn more about this author, Kimberly Schimmel.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.