The most important things parents can teach their children

Peter’s first day in kindergarten. He’s got his hair cut, he’s wearing a new red coat and he’s scared to death. Peter’s mother does not understand this because she is sure that Peter is well prepared for kindergarten for his five years. “Well, of course,” she says to the teacher, “he knows the alphabet, counts to a hundred and can write his name.” But, as the teacher soon discovers, Peter was not ready for life in a new environment. He seemed stiff, did not play with other children, and spent much of the day huddled in a corner sucking his thumb.

Michael, who was brought into kindergarten at the same time as Peter, didn’t know as much as Peter did. He could hardly count to ten and confused many letters. But when his mother left, he hopped into the room, smiled shyly at the teacher, walked over to a group of children playing with cars, and asked: “Can I be a mechanic in the garage?” The teacher was delighted with how confident Michael felt and how easily he connected with the children, and she thought to herself: “This child is ready to learn to read and write!”

In the 40 years that I have consistently studied preschoolers, I have become increasingly concerned about parents who think pre-kindergarten preparation is all about memorizing letters or counting. It’s not like that at all. I have nothing against learning these essential skills, but I have found that they are best taught and easiest to learn only after a good start has been made in developing other skills.

Too early concentration on theoretical problems can slow down the normal development of the child. We sometimes forget that nature has its own timetable for human development. Trying to teach a three year old to write is like teaching a three month old to walk. You can cause irreversible damage.

If a child goes to kindergarten, feels happy, self-confident, optimistic, inquisitive and friendly, I am sure that he will study well and with pleasure. But, if he is nervous, frightened, irritable and burdened with unfulfilled needs, he will poorly absorb the initial knowledge that will be given to him. In my opinion, a child cannot be considered truly prepared for kindergarten—or for life—until he or she has learned the following ten things.

1. Love yourself

Self-love is the most fundamental and essential of all abilities. Until you are able to appreciate your own life, you will never become active, you will not be able to realize your own potentialities. Given how much we love our children, it would be easy for us to convey to them a feeling of love for ourselves, but, apparently, this method is not very reliable.

Try to remember what you thought about yourself when you were five years old. I guess most of us thought we were stupid or ugly. We were angry with ourselves if we were afraid at night, we were ashamed of ourselves if we did not want to share our new doll with our little sister. We were disappointed in ourselves if we were awkward, shy or clumsy, while my mother hoped to raise a ballerina.

Sometimes we can’t help a child love himself until we re-evaluate some of our own attitudes — the burden that we carry with us throughout our lives. Perhaps such self-knowledge will be painful, but as a result we will be able to say: “Yes, brown eyes and olive skin really disgust me. My parents made me feel inferior because I was like their Italian ancestors and they wanted to be XNUMX% white American. Now that I have this olive-skinned, brown-eyed baby, can I act like an adult and see how beautiful she is and let her know that?

The irrational prejudices we instill in our cradles are just one of the barriers to helping our children love themselves. Many of us also find it difficult to distinguish between «being bad» and «being human.» It makes a big difference if, instead of «don’t act like a baby,» we say, «You’re not old enough to be quiet in a restaurant. We’ll try to go there again when you’re a little older.» It is also completely different things — to say: «You are selfish» — or to remark: «It is very difficult to learn to share with others, but that’s okay, I’ll help you. If you let Donna play with your bucket, she’ll let you play with her truck.»

The Puritan assertion that everyone is either good or bad, and that children should therefore be taught to be good, has probably brought more misfortune to mankind than anything else. We are all born as angels and devils in equal measure, and we need to learn how to live with this truth. Sure, we say, “No, you can’t hit the kid,” but we also say, “You’re too small to hold back when you’re angry. I have to help you.» Learning to admit that you have anger, jealousy, and antisocial impulses is part of growing up. We must also learn to control ourselves, but without denying that such urges exist and without making our children feel like sinners. A child who is told that he behaves badly develops a dislike for himself, and this interferes with learning, life and love more than any other psychological problem.

Once a child feels protected and valued, he begins to develop empathy for others. One of the earliest experiences of this kind occurs with pets. A kid who has experienced tenderness and care is able to carefully hold a homeless kitten in his arms or call his parents for help when someone offends a dog. Any five-year-old child who can spontaneously exclaim at the sight of a bird with a broken wing, “Oh, you poor thing!” has already acquired one of the most fundamental abilities needed to change the quality of all life on this planet.

2. Interpret behavior

The child who comes to kindergarten thinking that he is a wonderful creature may nevertheless not get involved in learning if he does not know how to interpret the behavior of others and his own. For example, he might get so caught up in the two girls in the front row who teamed up against him that he can’t focus on adding two to five. Or, if the teacher yells at him one morning, he may become so confused and frightened that he will not be able to pay attention in class for the rest of the day.

If a child has learned something about the moods of people and their shortcomings, if he has been taught to interpret certain types of behavior, he will not be inclined to be upset in such situations. He will understand that maybe the two girls are scared by the new kindergarten and they need a common enemy to feel more secure, that his teacher is just in a bad mood: she had a fight with her husband or got into rush hour on her way to work and maybe tomorrow she will ask for forgiveness.

In addition to the fact that the child needs to be able to interpret the behavior of others, he needs to learn how to explain his own behavior. This can have a strong impact on the child’s future attitude towards learning activities. If a child yells at his mother at breakfast, if at the sight of an omelette he says: “You know how I can not stand him, I will now throw him in the trash!” — and then flies out of the house, one of two things will most likely happen to him today. He may be so overwhelmed with guilt and horror that he will not hear a single word spoken by the teacher. Or he may ask himself what it is that has come over him; consider whether he is still angry with his father for yelling at him last night and decide that he will apologize when he gets home. In the latter case, he is able to forget about the incident while he is in kindergarten. With a mind free from anger and confusion, he well perceives all the explanations of the educator.

3. Communicate with words

After children can explain the true meaning of their actions, they need to learn how to help other people understand them. If a girl can tell the teacher, “I was so afraid that I wouldn’t succeed that I just couldn’t think,” the teacher can understand that her fear is interfering with learning and can calm her down properly. If a child can say to his father, “You scare me when you scream so loudly,” hopefully the father will try to negotiate calmly with him instead. Any five-year-old child who can calmly and naturally express his feelings, saying: «I’m afraid» or «I love you very much!» ready to ride a two-wheeled bicycle» has already acquired the ability that will give him the necessary freedom to think, be interested and learn.

4. Understand the difference between thoughts and actions

Without this skill, which is fully developed by the age of five, it will be extremely difficult for a child to concentrate on classes. For example, Gregory looks out the window and imagines himself as a pilot, while the teacher explains the basics of arithmetic to the class. He does not hear what the teacher says at all, because he is very angry. His parents had just divorced, and if his feelings could be brought to the surface, they would most likely be, “I hate them both. I want them to die.» These are such terrible thoughts that Gregory has to concentrate with all his might to keep them out of consciousness.

If, in the first five or six years of his life, Gregory had been helped to understand that thoughts are not the same as actions, and feelings, properly expressed, do not harm anyone at all, he could give them free rein. And all the energy that was expended in avoiding one’s own feelings could be turned to other purposes, including the wonderful powers of addition and subtraction. He certainly needs help to get through this very real crisis, but he should have explained that it is natural to have terrible feelings when you are suffering, when you are anxious, when life is full of torment. It is impossible for a child to concentrate and learn if he has hidden feelings that he himself considers dangerous and bad.

5. Be interested and ask questions

All the popular books and talk about what kind of activities and skills we should teach preschoolers have relegated to the background and almost nullified natural, instinctive curiosity. We often get so carried away with counting sticks that we stop listening to the wonderful questions that children ask themselves: “Why do leaves change color? .. What makes grass grow? .. Where does snow come from? .. How does an egg make a child?. What does it mean to die?.. Why am I growing up?.. How does milk get to the store?.. Why are some children starving?.. How can a submarine stay underwater and not sink?..»

If we are to maintain this instinct of curiosity, we must ensure that by the time a child is five years old, he revels in his questions and knows that there are ways to find answers to them. He must also learn that some questions have not yet been answered, others have many different answers, and that sometimes he will have to try to find his own.

In her book The Learning Child, Dorothy Cohen, professor of education, makes a crucial distinction between giving a child a fish to eat and teaching a child how to catch a fish. If we give him cooked fish, then we can satisfy his momentary hunger, but what happens if we are not there to feed him? The same thing happens with knowledge and information: if we always present them to a child ready to use, he will never learn to extract them on his own. Children should be taught how they can fish for their own answers.

When we say: “I don’t know,” “I’m busy now,” “Ask dad,” or “Don’t talk about this,” we discourage the child from “catching” knowledge himself. If, on the contrary, we encourage his curiosity and help him find answers, we contribute to the development of his intellectual ability, which is most essential for a person.

6. Understand that there are no easy answers to complex questions.

The generation of our children will be forced to face the most serious questions. There can be no simple solutions to such problems as the loss of ecological balance, the population explosion, the proliferation of weapons that can destroy all life. In order to become wise and mature adults, children must begin to understand that simple solutions never solve a problem, that in fact you have to dig deeper to find the most optimal answer to a particular question.

We need to teach children to look at the root. «Well, maybe Joe is mad today because he came to kindergarten hungry.» Or, “If Sarah keeps breaking the clay things you make in kindergarten, we better talk to the teacher. He can talk to Sarina’s mom and find out why Sarah is unhappy and what we can do to help her.» This is a difficult path, but it gives the child much more than when we say: «I think Sarah is a bad girl and you better stay away from her.»

There are no easy solutions to social problems, and we will do our children, ourselves, and the future a disservice if we mislead the little ones about this. We put children on the wrong track when we focus on questions that actually have right and wrong answers (how many are three and six? What is the third letter in the alphabet?). Children need to first experience the complexity of life situations so that they are prepared to face the confusion, uncertainty and volatility of real life.

7. Not being afraid of failure is a necessary condition for growing up.

To learn anything, you must not be afraid to make mistakes, even fail. The first book you turn to may not contain the answer to the question why birds migrate, you will have to look for the answer in some other book. The first wooden table you make may be ugly and lopsided, but if you are able to learn from your mistakes, you will make the next one much better. Children need to be helped to understand that learning is a long, slow process of trial and error. No great invention or scientific discovery has ever been made without a large number of trials and failures that preceded it.

We must make it very clear to them that success and failure is not what learning is all about. I quote the words of one wise primary school teacher: “In fact, the school should teach children to be players! The only way to find out what you know and what you don’t know is to take a little risk. We scare kids to death. Who wants to try to answer a question or try to learn something new if success or failure is measured instead of trying?

8. Trust adults

A five-year-old child needs to have true trust in adults if he is to focus all his attention on learning tasks. And it’s hard to trust people if they deceive you, they say that they won’t go anywhere, but when you wake up, you find a nanny in the place of your parents; they say the doctor won’t hurt you, but he does. We pay a very high price for the games we play with our children to keep them from crying. If you want to be believed, it’s best to say, «I’m going to go out for a few hours while you sleep,» even if you have to endure a painful goodbye. And the doctor: “You may be in a little pain, but it will pass soon. You can sit on my lap and cry if you feel like it.»

Many adults think they can build trust if they are consistent, but I think this is a big mistake. There is a very thin line between consistency and rigidity, and I believe that it is important to trust people, even if their feelings and intentions change. People change with age, and we are all subject to mood swings. Consistency in one thing is important for a child: in our attempts to be honest with him, explaining as best as possible where we are inconsistent, and apologizing if this inconsistency is not justified.

It is quite possible to help a child understand that not all people are kind, and at the same time create in him the feeling that most contacts with adults will be good. Cultivating confidence in this partly depends on how willing we are to share the child’s feelings about people. We have to be frank with children, sometimes saying, “Yes, you are right, your teacher really makes too much noise about washing hands” or “Yes, I understand what you mean about my aunt, she is too bossy when we’re coming».

Distrust arises from the feeling that only you see unpleasant qualities in other people, and for children this feeling is not uncommon. We will not break a child’s trust if we acknowledge human imperfection.

9. Think for yourself

To say «no» is really to say «I exist». This begins as the child has some idea of ​​himself, a feeling that he is in fact an independent person. Many parents are frightened and angered by this possibility, when they should be glad about it. A sense of one’s own uniqueness and ability to choose is a vital part of human existence.

If a child has some idea of ​​who he is, he will inevitably have his own opinion by the age of five. This ability is very easy to teach — you just need to encourage the child to express his judgment without fear of being punished. None of us wants to raise a person who is weak in spirit or intellectually weak, we want our children to make serious decisions, have common sense and inner convictions. And we can’t wait for a child to go to college to develop these abilities.

These principles are already at work when we say, «Now that you’re almost three years old, I think you can decide whether we buy you a blue jumpsuit or a red one.» Or, «While we’re eating cornflakes for breakfast, you can make yourself a butter and jam sandwich.» Or: “Well, our neighbor does not annoy me, but you have the right to your own opinion.”

When we demonstrate respect for the child’s personality, for his emerging views, likes and dislikes, we prepare him for situations in which he will have to make a decision on his own, for example, whether or not to join a group of children who decide to explore a destroyed house, or whether or not to go with a stranger who said he knew his father. When we lose our temper over “no” at two and a half years, we should keep in mind that there will come a time when we will be grateful that our child is able to say “no”. Judgment is corrected by practice.

10. Know what you can rely on an adult

​​​​​​​By the time the child is five years old, in my opinion, he should know that there are many situations that he simply cannot manage. He cannot cope with the company of older children, with teenagers who impose drugs, with the wild behavior of the class in the lessons of an inexperienced teacher. Part of trusting adults is knowing when you need help and being able to ask for it. It may seem simple, but surprisingly few children come into kindergarten or classroom able to do it. As a result, many of them quickly find themselves in situations that frighten and overwhelm them so much that learning becomes impossible. We need to explain to children that we can be friends, help them, without treating them like small children, without excessive guardianship, we can understand their world. We say that we attach great importance to the rights of the small and weak, but often do not include our children in these idealistic constructions.

Learning is much easier if the child does not have unsatisfied needs in early childhood. If we pay more attention to deep human values, we can raise a generation of wise and loving people who will be able to change and can make the world a better place.