Nurturing persistence in children for success

The difference between a successful individual and a failure is the ability to persist at a task, till success is achieved. ‘Task persistence’ is the fine line between success and failure.

When you persist at a task you do two things:

1.    You don’t give up

2.    You think of new ways of reaching your goal

Both the above are qualities that need to be nurtured in children, from early childhood till adolescence. The growth window to nurture persistence in children is from two to twelve years.

Erik Erikson the master of socio-emotional development defines it as the period when power, purpose and competence are developed in children.  

Between the ages of three to five, parents can either help kids develop autonomy or develop a sense of shame and doubt! Parents need to understand and analyze their parenting styles to focus on ensuring that they are nurturing autonomy and independence in the child and not instilling a sense of shame and self-doubt in their children.

Kids will want to do things on their own and their attempts need to be praised and not criticized. Criticism at this crucial and delicate stage will lead to a sense of shame and doubt, in the child and lead to a lack of initiative. Give tasks to kids in which they get a sense of achievement. For example at this age, kids like to dress themselves but are unable to complete the task on their own. Therefore, parents need to support kids by letting them to do what they can. Followed by gently helping complete what they cannot. This gives a sense of achievement to the child and a feeling of ‘I can’ instead of ‘I can’t’.

When kids are playing with toys like blocks or jigsaw puzzles and are unable to fit a piece correctly it is very tempting for adults to immediately complete the task for the child. But No! Parents need to resist this temptation and instead support kids to learn ‘trial and error’. When kids use ‘trial and error’ as a part of learning it becomes a self initiated activity in which kids will continue to play for a longer period of time. This increases attention and focus in a child.

As kids grow older and move towards puberty, they are developing a sense of ‘industry v/s inferiority’. Therefore, avoid using vocabulary that ridicules, doubts or criticizes them, as it would coax the child to give up due to the fear of humiliation and defeat. Instead, focus on discussing with children about what works and what does not, thus helping them develop the essential thinking skills required for ‘trial and error’ and ‘task persistence’.

To develop task persistence in children focus on these famous five-

1.    Comment rather than criticize

Tell your child ‘you scored 7 out of 10 in dictation, that is quite good’, ‘how do you think you can increase the score next time?’ Do not tell your child ‘inspite of teaching you every day you scored only 7 out of 10’.

2.    Make them independent rather than dependent

Allow kids to do their homework on their own; do not hover or linger around like a jailor. If you want them to increase their speed, then put a timer that they can compete with.

3.    Compliment rather than compare

It is so easy to compare your child to another sibling or friend, resist the temptation. Instead, make each child aware of their own potential and how they can develop more potential.

4.    Pay attention to attention!

This simply means that parents need to be aware of the attention span of their kids. Is it growing with age or remaining the same or diminishing?  In the early childhood years kids have an average attention span of eight to ten minutes. As they grow older, it should increase to 15, 20, 45 and 60 minutes. Board games, jigsaw puzzles all help nurture attention span.

5.    Children do as you do and not as you say!

If your kids see you giving up too quickly or getting agitated and irritated at tasks, then they will learn the same and no amount of motivation will help.

Persistence is an essential ingredient for future success whether in school or life, so cultivate and nurture it today in your child. Persistence is a natural phenomenon in children, do not diffuse it. Instead, nurture it and let your child blossom.

A HEART TO TEACH

Teacher presence—being vibrant, interesting, involved, interactive

Teacher presence is about being vibrant, interesting, involved, and interactive. Being there is the soul of teacher presence; when you are not there, what teacher presence are we talking about? Teacher presence is all about being there in the mind, body and soul.

Good teacher presence can make students more interested and also cultivates a passion for the topic being taught. I know presence is abundant when my students ask me questions, when they maintain eye contact, and I know when they start yawning, or give me the ‘glassy’ stare that the teacher presence may be waning.

Teacher presence—connecting with ‘live’ examples

I cultivate presence by peppering my sessions with humour, more examples that they can connect with and' of course by consciously cultivating my physical presence and voice modulation. Whenever I give them ‘live’ examples or act out a situation I find they connect. When I end the session with these I find that the knowledge lingers more with the students and they recollect better and then also understand ways to implement it. If students cannot see your eyes, they will not connect. Without a certain grace a teacher tends to be a distraction. Sometimes touching can be distracting and sometimes it is required, but touching students with your words and making them connect is truly required in presence. Mystery, awe and wonderment are important when you enter an encounter. Presence is highest when I am entering and disengaging from an encounter, it is ‘maintained’ steadily when in the encounter.

The teacher should be wise enough to ignore student behaviour that can affect teacher presence and, in turn, the presence of students in the class.

Teacher presence—connecting with the topic

My view of presence changed after I attended one particularly famous speaker’s session—there were witty jokes, great quotations and a lot of voice modulation etc. At the time I did enjoy it but there was a nagging feeling of dissatisfaction, something that I was able to put a finger on. The next day I realised it was an enjoyable session, but a waste of time because the topic was hardly touched upon! This is what I keep in mind and see to it that I do not call this as ‘teacher presence’ in my sessions.

Including Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket in your everyday parenting

Two boys kill their grandmother for her cash and jewelry, as they had to pay some betting debts. A young boy plots and kidnaps his cousin, who is then killed for ransom money to fulfill gambling debts. Both these are real life cases- recent cases that have shocked everyone.  There are hundreds of such cases where young adolescent boys from so called ‘safe happy, well educated and well to do families’ are committing such heinous crimes.

My question, didn’t the parents know their kids? Were they unable to see this coming? Were they never aware of such deadly ideologies lurking in their kid’s personalities? All these kids started as innocent young boys, so then when did they cross over? Why did not their parents notice it in their talks, discussions or behavior? It went unnoticed and then it was too late. Parents rarely talk to kids - they only lecture them! Parents rarely discuss, instead only question them. Parents try to change behaviors of kids only by threats, bargaining and bartering. Such kids behave well in front of their parents, but are completely opposite in their absence.

Moral values, morality, ethics and truth are qualities that are not nurtured in our kids today. Parents focus more on excelling and succeeding, at any cost and buy their kids ‘co-operation’ with materialistic bribes. Thereby, nudging their kids towards a lifestyle and mindset that focuses on material gains at any cost.

Motivation is extrinsic, behavior is extrinsically controlled and nothing is intrinsic any more in our kids. They have lost their ‘moral compass’ usually called the conscience because it was never awakened, they never saw it being used, talked about or practiced.

Parents must learn from Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket. Pinocchio had a quirk, every time he would tell a lie - his nose would grow longer. Learning from Pinocchio, parents must observe their kids from childhood – only then they would know exactly when their child is lying, hiding things from them or just being secretive or evasive. Some kids fidget, some don’t look you in the eyes, some start clutching their hands and some lose appetite when they are breaking a rule. It’s easy to spot if you know your child and this is important for parents because just teaching about rules is not the goal. Ensuring that your child wants to follow the rules and equipping your child with ‘something’ that would make your child aware when he is breaking the rules. This ‘something’ for Pinocchio was Jiminy Cricket, his conscience. So, similarly till your child develops his conscience you will have to be his Jiminy Cricket and guide your child. Be an alert parent, be there as a guide and mentor not a police officer.

Being your child’s Jiminy Cricket, teach your child how to think through problems and how to select the right from the wrong even when the wrong looks right at that moment. Teach your child decision making under stress. Teach your child how to counteract temptation, bullies and more. Imply this with games and discussions. Be open to your child asking questions. To know what your child thinks, play ‘what if’ games with your child and you will know whether your child is a pessimist, an optimist or a dreamer, who will get carried away.

In the above cited crimes had the boys thought through their actions, they would have realized that committing the crime was not the easy way out. Instead confessing to their parents would have been the better path to take. In their wrong decision and choice they have now landed in jail. So when you read about such crimes, talk to your kids and discuss with them, ‘where do they think the boys were wrong’, ‘what would you have done differently if you were in their place’. Have heart to heart talks with your children.  

As your child nears adolescence pay close attention to his talks, his likes, dislikes, friends etc. Do not spy on them, they hate it. Instead show interest and when you do it from childhood they will not resent it in adolescence. But if you wait till puberty and suddenly start showing interest, then they will not only resent you but rebel too.

Every child has beauty and a beast in his personality. It is up to us as parents whether to use the beast in us and try to get the beauty in them and fail or alternatively, use the beauty of our parenting techniques and tame the beast in our kid’s personality and bring out the beauty.

It’s time for parents to think of Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket, if we want our youngsters to be healthy and happy and not commit crimes. As Jiminy Cricket taught Pinocchio, just whistle when you are in doubt, let’s teach our young children that “when you are in trouble and don’t know right from wrong give a little whistle and let your conscience be your guide. When you make a mistake or feel like breaking a rule or work hard and don’t get the marks, give a little whistle and let your conscience be your guide.”

It’s time to revive Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket and include them in the upbringing of our adolescents.

The Great Indian Kids Divide

I recently saw a news coverage on Times Now of a parched village in Madhya Pradesh where mothers send their little children down steep wells, right down to the almost 20-30 feet deep bottom, scaling the inside wall of the well, to fill water in buckets. It is dangerous and risky and all they get at the end of it is maybe 2-5 litres of unclean water. It is an arduous climb down and up with a risk to life and limb. The mother stands above and instructs the kids about filling more water. It is almost a scramble as kids try and get the most water from the depths of the dried well. And this after they have trekked sometimes 30 kms. 

My window overlooks a swimming pool of a neighboring building and I watched kids jumping into the pool as mothers stood by the pool side shouting instructions to swim faster, dive deeper.

The first mother pushes her kids in the well to help the family survive. The second mother pushes her kids in the pool to survive in the rat race of achieving excellence at any cost. For the first set of kids water is a precious life source and for the other set it is a source for entertainment. Ironic isn’t it?

At a traffic signal I watched as young street l kids did the balancing act. Jumped through hoops, balanced on a tight rope as their parents played music and collected money from the bystanders. Soon the cops came and herded the kids away to a juvenile home; I presume and told the parents they can be arrested for child labour. 

I switched on a channel and saw kids as young as 3, 5 and 9 years ‘gyrating’ their hips to lewd songs all the while being cheered by an audience and so called celebrity judges. I saw their parents standing in the wings shouting encouragement. The parents had a sick expression on their face and in their body language, that of making their kids fulfill their dreams at any cost and after all childhood does not cost much. I am sure the same cop must be sitting at home watching this show with his family and even sending a ‘vote’ from his cell phone for the kid participants. His sense of justice about child labour? Nowhere in sight. 

The first set of parents were using their kid’s skills to feed the family the second set were using it to feed unfulfilled dreams and desires. Both at the cost of childhood. Ironic isn’t it?

This is divided India for kids. Poor kids fight for food, water and the basic necessities and the rich abuse those very basic necessities. What is our role as parents and educators? Maybe instill empathy in our kids? Maybe try and do our bit for these kids? Or maybe ensure that our kids do not misuse basic necessities for their use and entertainment while more than half the kids in this country fight for it. 

How do the local authorities give permission to builders to have swimming pools in societies? In fact now you have homes with private swimming pools for each flat. Is this a necessity or a sheer waste and lack of empathy for human suffering? Today half of India is reeling under drought, severe drought. What is urban India willing to sacrifice to support them? We can’t make it rain but we can stop ourselves from extravagant use of water can’t we?

As a sociologist I am worried that this great Indian kid’s divide will not augur well for the mental and social health of our country. Here I would like to quote author and educationist Lilian Katz from her book ‘Intellectual Emergencies’- “I believe that each one of us must come to care about everyone else’s children. We must come to see that the well-being of our own individual children is intimately linked to the well-being of all other people’s children. After all when one of our children needs life saving surgery, someone else’s child will perform it; when one of our children is threatened or harmed by violence in the streets, someone else’s child will inflict it. The good life for our own children can only be secured if it is also secured for all other people’s children. But to worry about all other people’s children is not just a practical or strategic matter; it is a moral and ethical one; to strive for the well being of all other people’s children is also right.”

Let’s try, at least try and reduce this great India divide. Any thoughts?

Flight Of Fright Or Flight Of Fantasy? Choice Is Yours When You Take A Flight With Your Toddler!

Taking a flight with toddlers can be nerve wrecking. The accusing looks from fellow passengers and flight attendants add to the burden. Although everyone hates to be on a flight that has kids on it - people do not admit it. But as soon as they see a kid on the flight- eyes roll up and you can almost hear them say, ‘Oh god, no’. The flight attendants have the same reaction.

Here are some pointers to make your flight more of a fantasy flight then a flight of terror!

1.    Everyone hates a kid on the plane. So, as soon as you find your seat, introduce yourself to your fellow passengers and ask for their co-operation.

2.    All airlines first board the business class passengers, then moms with kids, followed by seniors. Therefore, do not board first. Yes, if you board first you would be on the flight for 30 minutes before takeoff. That is 30 minutes of extra torture for your kid- avoid it. Instead be the last to board.

3.    Always tele check-in and take an aisle seat closer to the toilet. In overseas flights, the first row is always reserved for parents with kids.

4.    If your toddler is heavy then pay for the extra seat- you won’t regret it. In fact, kids get crankier when they have to share space with you. Therefore, if budget is not an issue then always buy a seat for your child, unless it is a baby in your arms.

5.    For long duration flights, do not take nonstop flights - break up the flight. The kid will appreciate release from the cooped up space and the new airport will keep them interested.

6.    Dress the toddler for the flight. Make your toddler wear comfortable clothes and shoes.

7.    Stock up on food that your toddler likes.

8.    Avoid giving your toddler sugary and salty drinks or snacks as it will increase the activity level.

9.    Check in all your baggage. Try not to carry more hand luggage - only what you will require.

10.  Spend on a porter, right up to the flight.

11.  Cabin pressure during takeoff and landing causes pain in your kid’s ears - make them suck, swallow or chew something.

12.  Most kids scream or howl their lungs out, during takeoff and landing. Screaming helps as it relieves the pain. Just support your child by singing a soft tune and holding their hand.

13.  Carry noise isolating ear buds, not only for your baby but for fellow passengers too. I am serious; you need to support your child. So for that purpose, give your fellow passengers the extra noise isolating ear bud, before takeoff and landing - they will be more supportive.

14.  Be ready for jet lag- yours and the baby’s. It’s going to be crankiness multiplied by two. Feel sad for the father or whoever you will be spending time with after the flight!

15.  Prefer day flights, so that when you land it is night, your toddler is exhausted and sleeps and you can start fresh. The aim is to land at your destination by late evening.

16.  Carry favourite toys at least 2- one book, one soft toy. Take walk up’s and down the airplane with your toddler.

17.  Please do not use video games as baby sitters and do not allow your toddler to run around on the flight.

Travelling with babies and toddlers is never easy. However, with the above pointers you will at least feel more in command and confident. So, have a safe and toddler friendly flight, this summer vacation.

ARE YOU UNKNOWINGLY MAKING YOUR CHILD LEAD A CANCER PRONE LIFE STYLE?

98% of the brain develops in the first five years; this has been proven by brain research. So what does the brain require to thrive? It requires –

1.    Oxygen

2.    Chemicals

Oxygen helps the blood supply be healthy and the required amounts reach the brain to keep it thriving. So how does one supply oxygen to the body? Simple breathe in more oxygen by taking kids to open spaces and gardens and help your kids drink pure unadulterated water. This means reduce mall visits and aerated drinks.

The brain requires chemicals that help it to conduct ‘brain’ functions like focus, attention, memory and retention. Chemicals will be produced from the food your child eats and from the emotional environment that you expose your child to. So if the food you give your child has ‘additives’ or too much salt and sugar then these will kill the good chemicals in the body. Also if you are constantly stressing out your child with threats, punishments, disappointments, hurry and worry then the body produces negative chemicals which can damage the neurons in the brain. So this means a healthy diet and a happy environment.

Now given below is what research says about how cancer thrives. Read, relate and understand what you need to do for your family so that you can help them be more healthy and happy.

Every person has cancer cells in the body. These cancer cells do not show up in the standard tests until they have multiplied to a few billion. When the person's immune system is strong the cancer cells will be destroyed and prevented from multiplying and forming tumors. An effective way to battle cancer is to starve the cancer cells by not feeding it with the foods it needs to multiply.

WHAT CANCER CELLS FEED ON:

a. Sugar is a cancer-feeder. - By cutting off sugar it cuts off one important food supply to the cancer  cells.  

b. Salt is a cancer feeder- Table salt has a chemical added to make it white in color. Avoid too much salt, stick to the limit.

c. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment- A diet made of 80% fresh vegetables and juice, whole grains, seeds, nuts and a little fruits help put the body into an alkaline environment. Fresh vegetable juices provide live enzymes that are easily absorbed and reach down to cellular levels within 15 minutes to nourish and enhance growth of healthy cells.  

d. Water-best to drink purified water, or filtered, to avoid known toxins and heavy metals in tap  water.  Distilled water is acidic, avoid it.

e. Cancer is a disease of the mind, body and spirit. Anger and bitterness put the body into a stressful and acidic environment. Learn to have a loving and forgiving spirit. Learn to relax and enjoy life.