Parents! Learn to unlearn.
Did you ever suggest your kid to change his/her method in the middle of any task?
Ever grabbed the pencil of your child to write/draw something on their behalf since they are taking time to do it?
Did it ever happened that you grew impatient with the fact that the child is not able to perform a task in the way you do it?
If you are contented that you are boosting the child’s confidence by letting her know how to complete a task, you are certainly under a misconception. You are not doing anything more than making the child happy with the satisfaction of acquiring the end-result.
Adults have a problem that they want to teach children the way they themselves had learnt or the way they had already known. It is very rare that one consciously allows children to do/learn something in the way they tend to. We are somehow more involved in raising happy children than proficient ones. And this is frightfully alarming for the fact that we are seizing opportunities from their lives to experience the possibility to dig solutions on their own.
All this has been a very sub-conscious process for the grown-ups- to rescue a child when she is lost. Now all the sub-conscious processes are nothing but habits which are hard to let go of. It requires a lot of rigidity to unlearn some traditional methods of parenting/teaching to not fail in nurturing an independent child who can face her own challenges and solve her own problems.
“Children must learn how to think, not what to think” says Margaret Mead. The first thing you should stop doing is- stop teaching the ‘hows’. Let them try, whine, struggle and figure out how! It is definitely not going to be easy but will surely be worthy when you realize that you no more have to work on a 25-year old’s decisions. Applaud the child’s efforts in a task, not the result.
As a teacher/parent, you are your child’s emotional and behavioral coach. They will become what you are, so be what you want them to be. Learn to unlearn to let your kids learn.
