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Encourage Your Child’s Participation in Ramadan

Childhood and the tween years before adolescence are a valuable time for teaching your kids about Ramadan. While adults are fasting from dawn until dusk, children may not yet be expected to do so, but there are plenty of other ways they can participate during the Holy Month. Here’s how you can make Ramadan even more of a kid-friendly, fun, and interesting learning experience.

The Meaning of Ramadan

Ramadan is a time to refrain, not only from food, but from negative thinking, words and actions. Encourage your children to take this month to think about how they treat their peers, teachers, and family, and make a special effort to be cooperative, generous, and empathetic to others. Relatedly, Ramadan is also a time to help the less fortunate, and engage in charitable acts. Ask your kids to make a short list of two to three good deeds they would like to complete and help them do so. This could be a small zakat donation from their spending allowance to their favorite charity, or helping out at a local soup kitchen for a few hours.

Ramadan Rituals

Even if your children are not old enough to fast as yet, there are many rituals they can start following, such as rising for morning prayers, and ending the fast with the family. They can also help with meal preparation for iftar by setting the table and distributing dates to family and guests.

Practice Fasting

It’s a good idea to introduce your kids to formal fasting with practice fasting so that they have a sense of what they experience. There are lots of partial fasting options for kids that can help them prepare. For example, your child could rise for suhoor and then fast until noon. Or, if they are a little older, they could try fasting as adults do once per week, or refraining from food, while only consuming water. Present some of these options, and allow your child to choose, while helping them set reasonable goals for refraining from food.

Reading the Quran

Many adults read a chapter from the Quran every day, and complete the Holy Quran by Eid. Involve your kids by getting them to read passages that relate to fasting, and then have a short, fun quiz to test their knowledge, or start a reflective conversation with them about what they have learned. It’s a great idea to follow Quran readings with your kids with a reward, such as favorite food item for iftar.

At School

As one of the leading American schools in Dubai, protecting the health and wellbeing of our students during Ramadan is ASCS, Al Barsha’s top priority. Following Dubai's Knowledge and Human Development Authority regulations, our school hours will be reduced, fasting students are exempt from physical education classes, and out of respect for the former, there are designated areas for food consumption for non-fasting students.