The role of communities in raising children

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The role of communities in raising children
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When we have children, we assume they will be just like us. They’ll share the same drive and passion, and they’ll act like us in every situation. The problem is genetics is far more complicated than that. They may end up with having the same personality as difficult Aunt Maud who owned seventeen cats and used to hiss at dogs on the street. Ok maybe not THAT bad, but close enough.
We can teach our own children an awful lot about live and success, but one of the true sanity savers for parents is to discover you really don’t need to do it alone.
Find people around you that have similar interests as your children and encourage them to connect. You may not have a single artistic bone in your body, but your child loves to draw. Find a babysitter that is also at design school for them to talk with before bedtimes on your going out evenings. Get their aunt or grandmother to take them to an exhibition if it’s more their thing than yours.
This has several benefits. First it’s teaching your child that they can resource people to meet their needs. They learn that there are other people out there who feel the same way as them.
It also helps them to take their interests deeper and see if it is something they feel is worth progressing.
CASE STUDY
Simon wanted to be a designer. Problem was neither his mother nor father were in the slightest way artistic and didn’t really know how to help him besides taking him to the odd class. Simon’s mother Maggie heard of an old friend who was working in design and arranged for Simon to spend a day with

him. Simon came home from the day exhausted but happy and has since started working for the man one day after school in his studio. He’s learning and motivated, and on the way to success.
To be honest, most successful adults are no accidents. It’s the collected work of parenting, education and time that creates someone who wants to make the best of themselves.
One of the best flow on effects of wanting to have a successful child is you learn along the way too. And should you become a little more successful as well? Well that’s got to be good…right?

Teaching Social Skills
It used to be that the most important attribute we were meant to have was our IQ. It was something we were born with, though of course a good education and a positive home environment does also affected IQ scores.
More recently people have looked at Gardener’s theory of multiple intelligences and started to value all the different ways people can be clever. A mathematician may be fantastic with numbers for example but not great at writing a literary essay, or vice versa.
It’s very important to give our children a wide range of opportunities to discover what they are good at early on so they can decide what they want to focus on. However one thing no one can really get away with anymore is having poor social skills.
Of course some of us are better than others at being good with people. If you’ve got a wee chatterbox who finds it easy to smile at strangers, and interact with others, then you’re sorted. However all children need to learn to interact with people, so they can use this skill later on in life.
If you’ve got a shy child it s still important they learn skills in communicating. Talk to them about overcoming fears, embracing fear and using it. Even children as young as five and six can understand this. If you’ve been nervous speaking in public, share your own experiences.
Never force your child into a situation where they feel unsafe, but offer to share it with them. Refuse to be curtailed by their fears however. If you are naturally exuberant and cheerful, let your child see the way you interact with others, rather than you

opting to stay at home because new social settings makes your child nervous.
Use a wide range of tools to help your child become more confident with others. You can role play with toys, and teddy bears, or make a conscious effort to invite friends over. Interact with other parents, and get your child into situations where they already enjoy themselves and feel relaxed such as a soccer team, or a drama class.
Teach them manners and help them learn tools to self manage difficult situations. Talking to an adult for most children can really be a last point of call.
CASE STUDY
Mary had two children who she would often take out with her as she worked. As they sometimes needed to be unsupervised while she walked into a meeting she taught them several tools to ensure world war three wasn’t erupting by the time she got back.
First she ensured they had all their basic needs met, such as food, drink and something to do. Then she talked to them about how to deal with any disagreements in her absence. The two children were taught how to apologise and ask for forgiveness, and then have that forgiveness accepted if a disagreement arose. She was only to be interrupted if the person refused to accept the forgiveness for the wrong.
In the vast majority of times she was not interrupted and people to this day still comment on how beautifully behaved her children are to each other and the people around them.

Money, Money, Money
Giving your child a good education in money is one of the key preparatory steps to success.
Start small. Give your children money to as part of their contribution to the team of task contributors in your home. You can also give them pocket money that has no jobs attached to it as well if you like.
Encourage your child to use the money after it has accrued a little rather than blowing it every time on lollies.
Even if you can afford it, don’t buy them everything they want. Give toys and DVDs and games as rewards for hard work, or get them to work towards them by earning extra money with you.
If you are self employed or a wage earner yourself and you find your child wants to do a lot of activities or have a lot of things, explain the time it take to earn that particular thing. Give them the option of more hours away from them for you to earn the money, or more time with them. Children find it an interesting decision and they will often make a different choice each time.
The earlier you can teach your child to make money away from a salary or wage earning method the better. Talk to your children about passive income and provide them was ways to learn about how they can earn it. While many children are not officially allowed to register for online money making plans such as registering for click bank, or online selling, they can do it through you.
Also consider other methods of earning for your child. If they are creative, they may want to design jewellery or something similar. There have been children as young as thirteen who have patented cool inventions, or become the chief designer of their own fashion label. That’s a definite sign of success!



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