With every word we utter, with every action we take, we know our kids are watching us. We as parents are their most important role models.

More from Michelle Obama

• Because when you have the nuclear codes at your fingertips and the military in your command, you can’t make snap decisions. You can’t have a thin skin or a tendency to lash out. You need to be steady, and measured, and well-informed.
• No, this election, and every election, is about who will have the power to shape our children for the next four or eight years of their lives.
• When someone is cruel, or acts like a bully, you don’t stoop to their level — no, our motto is, when they go low, we go high.
• What you have to understand is, four days ago he was only my brother in name. And this morning we had pancakes.
• It just seems that you and me have been mad at each other for so long.
• Dad’s voice was a midnight school, teaching deep fathom hours, and the subject was life.