To let your children become independent, you have to gather the zest you need to let go. To make this fun, you need to let your take charge slowly but steadily, with his/her little palms and feet. You need to motivate your child with the patience to carry on his day-to-day chores independently. Following will help you to start simple:
1.Wake up with an alarm
Waking up the child need not be on your to-do list. Your child rising to an alarm, stretching his arms and smiling, sounds much better than you saying, “Wake up, its time. Can’t you hear its time? We will get late…” It gives you a lot of peace to find your child awake on time while you are tied up in kitchen or are just back from an early morning walk.
2.Prepare the night before
In the late evening or just before sleeping, make sure your child is checking his/her bag for the stuff that needs to be added or removed. Keep the uniform and shoes ready. If they need polishing do the same; if there is any repair work like broken buttons, or a stain, point it out and get it sorted. Sounds small, but these are the small things that clutter your morning and leave you breathless by the time your child leaves for school.
3.Morning assistance
Trust me, you are not asking for much. Little helplike placing foil in the lunch box, putting ketchup if needed, filling their own water bottle or applying butter to a bread slice—the day you are late, all this comes handy, and like Snow white’s little dwarf they will help you get the work done faster. Gradually they move on to doing bigger, better tasks as well and they take pride in doing the same (if put in routine from an early age).
4.Self–hygiene
Brushing, bathing and combing should be totally self-managed. Beyond a certain age you doing this mundane work is pointless. When will the child learn, how he/she will become responsible, smart, neat and well groomed if you don’t allow him/her to take charge?
5.Remember the little things
Almonds and walnut for a healthy brain, ID card, project folder, badminton racket…so many things to remember. In fact, many a times a warm goodbye gets missed in the chaos. If we let them remember, and let them face the music if they don’t, chances are they will learn to get ready 10min before time with all the stuff in place.
6.After-school discipline
He/she has not cut trees or carried weights in school. They have worked hard, but that is what life is meant for. Once they are back from school show interest not compassion, show excitement not pampering, and if need be show empathy not sympathy. Let them sit, sip water and then ask them to keep the right things at the right place. Post doing that, they can unwind and chill.
7.Self-timing
Half of a mother-child journey is spent pin-pointing that he/she has exceeded his play time, her TV time, his mobile gaming time etc. If the child learns to self-time, there are many other growth elements that can be given time to, like academics.
Being available 24×7 or hiring a maid who runs behind your child all the time hampers their self-growth. Teach them to manage their own time and put their energies to fruitful use.
The key here is patience to see them do it slow, to resist the urge to pitch in as watching them struggle is hectic as compared to doing it on our own. The rewards however, overpower the rigidity!Created by Neha Gupta Mittal