Finding a perfect equilibrium between all your daily tasks can be a delicate balancing act to pull off; particularly when children are involved. Suddenly, there’s not only the pressure to achieve success but an added pressure to raise someone else to be successful. This responsibility is not an easy one to manage; luckily, we have some tools that will help you with that!
Yes, we are aware that asking your five-year-old to help sweep the floor likely creates double the workload for parents. However, before you disregard this tip, hear us out. Longitudinal studies show that children raised in a household with a regular chore schedule are more successful than children that do not have those same responsibilities. In the Harvard Grant Study, researchers identified two common factors that determined happiness and success; love and work ethic. Of course, children are tired when they come home from school, but a few chores won’t hurt them. As adults, they’ll be acclimatized to conditions of living a regular life. Responsibilities do not simply disappear when we are tired. Unfortunately, this lesson will hit quite hard if the habits have not been engrained in our children from a young age.
Although it is a difficult concept for a child to grasp, it is of value to teach them about money. Once they’ve reached the gates of teenage-hood and early adulthood, they will have a better understanding of this adult responsibility. Looking for some ways to introduce healthy money habits into your child’s life? Here’s a post we wrote about Raising a Financially Responsible Child.Managing money is arguably one of the most significant chapters in the book of “How to Adult,” so start them young and make it fun! Not all responsibilities have to be daunting.
To ensure that our children succeed in school, we make sure to track agendas and remind them of deadlines – and if, for some reason, we’ve forgotten a deadline, we might even end up doing the projects ourselves. Don’t worry; it happens to the best of us! However, it is essential to be aware of the fact that our children will someday have to face these deadlines alone. Children and teens need to have a basic understanding of how to prioritize tasks and meet deadlines. Practicing these skills as children leads to mastering them as adults. Although their grades might suffer for it slightly, giving your children some independence with their schoolwork ultimately benefits them in the long run.
There’s no cute headline for this one, and that’s because we’re about to dive deep. Being a parent is no easy task, and there is no such thing as a perfect parent. Children should be happy and healthy and successful in the long run; this is our primary goal. However, it is essential to recognize that we should not project our ideas of success onto our children. Instead, we should help our children find and build upon their own passions. If you’re wondering how to get started on that, here’s a blog post that we’ve written about Helping Kids Pursue their Passions.Fundamentally, a child’s success is not based on their academic performance. Children being raised to believe that they are only as good as their grades leads to a world of adults constantly striving to outperform their peers, and always make their superiors proud. At the end of the day, before teaching kids about their successes in life, perhaps we should show them that they are valuable individuals regardless of their report cards. Don't ask your children about their exams and homework when they walk through the door, ask about how they’re doing and feeling. We can’t guarantee that you’ll get the most enthusiastic responses, but we can guarantee a child that feels cared for and valued.That's all we have for this week! If you're looking for extra resources, we would love to recommend this great TED Talks by Julie Lythcott-Haims on How to Raise Successful Kids. We enjoyed it very much, and we hope you do too!
