(To the tune of “Three Blind Mice”): Love, joy peace. Love, joy, peace. Patience, kindness, goodness. Patience, kindness, goodness. Faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, the fruit of the Spirit will help you grow in love, joy peace. Love, joy, peace.

This year at school we are focusing on two things: The Fruit of the Holy Spirit, and developing a positive growth mindset. We have had a wonderful start to our school year with a great sense of energy, purpose and fun. The excitement of a new school year truly brings out the best in people.

There will be many things taught in all schools across the world during this academic year. There will be teachers spending hours to create lessons that will teach students to read, do math, discover the scientific method and explore the history of our world and community. There will be lessons on famous artists, the rules of basketball, and how to tell the difference between a half-note and an eighth-note. There will be lessons on coding and how to say hello in Spanish, German and French. All of these are valuable, necessary and important lessons to the academic growth of all of our students. But to me I feel the most important lessons on what we will be sharing with our students this year is the Fruit of the Holy Spirit.

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Pretty straightforward gifts, traits, virtues or values. These are the things that our students and our world need now more than ever. These students, our children need to see these in action every single day. Guess what? They need to see these in action from you. You: the most important people in their lives. You: moms, dads, aunts, uncles, grandparents, neighbors, coaches and teachers. In education we always support the concept that parents are the primary educators of your children. So my challenge to you is this: take the list of these virtues (these fruits) and start living and modeling them so that your children can see how important each one of these are in the lives of the adults of their world.

There are nine Fruit of the Spirit, there are nine months of the school year. Why not take a fruit each month and work with your child (or grandchild or even yourself) and set a goal to focus and grow in each one of these virtues all school year long. Trust me, if we grow these traits in our children, their “regular academics” at school will also grow by leaps and bounds. When we instill self-control in our children, they will demonstrate this self-control at school. When we demonstrate patience, love, kindness and gentleness, they will demonstrate these to their classmates and their teachers. When we show love, joy, peace and faithfulness to others, they will embrace that and show it to all those they meet. It is time to make sure our children really know what is most important in life: to be a good person, a person who shows care and love for those they meet; one who doesn’t hold grudges but only wishes the best for one another. A person who sees life as a gift, a gift that we must share and enjoy with every special day that we are given.

Growing up you were always told to eat your fruits and vegetables. These will make you stronger and help you to grow. The same can be said for the fruit of the Holy Spirit. If we let the virtues: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control be demonstrated in how we live our own lives we will grow into the people that can make this world a truly better place. Teach your children the benefits of consuming these “fruits” and making their lives, their school, and community a truly amazing place to live, work and grow.

— Joe Peters is the principal at St. Victor School in Monroe. He can be reached at joepeters@stvictormonroe.org.