Duty-bound kids

Children should be taught responsibility at a young age to enable them to grow up into conscientious adults
theSun, Tue, 22 Jun 2010

RESPONSIBILITY is something we need to teach our children. It is not something they can ‘pick up’ along the way as they grow older.

A child will not realise that he needs to tidy up his toys after playing if you don’t teach him to do so. He may not understand that it matters to be punctual for a meeting or a dinner appointment if you don’t model the right example.

Young children learn from mimicking us while the older ones may see through our double standards if we don’t practise what we preach.

Do we leave our things lying around in a messy heap? Do we keep our promises or are we always late for appointments? Do we spend our money carefully? Do we procrastinate or do the important things that have to be done even if we don’t feel like it?

Children as young as three can be taught responsibility, starting with simple chores such as picking up their toys and books and putting them back where they belong.

‘A place for everything, and everything in its place’ is a good mantra for everyone in the family to remember and learn to be responsible for their belongings and keep them in neat and good condition.

School-going children can be tasked with the responsibility of making their own beds, packing their own schoolbags or helping out with simple household chores such as sweeping the floor, feeding a pet or washing the dishes. The important thing is that the task should be age-appropriate and need not be completed perfectly.

Provide them with the tools but let them do the job themselves. Do not criticise if the job is not done well. Instead, encourage and praise them for their effort.

Don’t overwhelm them all of a sudden with too many responsibilities. Setting them up for failure with too many tasks will discourage them. Small successes will motivate them to want to carry out all their responsibilities voluntarily without being nagged to do so.

If they are irresponsible, allow them to face the consequences. We may be tempted to make another trip to school to hand over the book he left behind, or we may want to sit down with him and help him do every bit of his homework, but if we did, we will not be teaching him to be responsible.

Children need to learn to manage the situation and deal with the consequences of their irresponsibility. We need to refrain from rescuing them all the time.

Teach your child to manage money. Let him keep his savings (as long as it’s not too huge a sum) and learn not to spend more than he has. Inculcate in him the habit to save and that it is not good to borrow money if he doesn’t have enough to buy something he wants. Encourage him to save until he has enough money to buy it.

Let him participate in team-related activities, or do volunteer work and part-time jobs when he is old enough. These are activities that require him to be punctual, considerate of others and perform certain tasks even if he does not feel like doing them.

Finally, like with all other things we want to teach our children, we need to exercise love and patience. Just like us, they need time to learn and change.

Cartoon attractions

theSun, Tues, 8 June 2010

THIS YEAR, my daughter has cultivated the habit of watching cartoons immediately upon returning from school. She would just plonk herself down on the sofa and grab the remote control after removing her shoes.
In the beginning, I used to chide her for doing that instead of things I considered ‘more important’, such as taking a shower and starting on her homework.

After several failed attempts, I decided this was not a battle worth stressing about. I rationalised that she needed to ‘chill’ after a long day at school.

Her mind probably needed a break from all the ‘serious’ stuff that had been bombarding it from as early as 7.45am till 2.35pm, with only short breaks for recess and lunch.

She is, after all, still a child, only turning eight later this year. As a result, it should be all right that she does not work that hard as yet. As the old saying goes, all work and no play makes Jill a dull girl.

Watching cartoons do actually provide some benefits. And they are not limited to children alone. Some cartoons cater to adults as well.

When adults watch children’s cartoons with them, they can have some fun time together. If the cartoons happen to be the classic evergreen Disney genre that the adults had watched when they were young, they would already know the lessons behind them and can point them out to their children.

We all enjoy cartoons as they make us laugh and laughter is good for the mind and body. As they say, laughter is the best medicine. When you laugh, you produce endorphins that have pain-relieving properties and help strengthen your immunity.

Cartoons can take your mind off work, worries and stress, which has been shown to be a contributing factor to physical illness.

Watching cartoons is not only fun but it is an educational activity for children as well. Cartoons can be used as accompanying tools for teaching valuable lessons, while making learning more fun.

There are role models and heroes to emulate, songs and music to sing and dance along with, and they help children remember educational information more easily. Children can also learn a new language by watching cartoons in different languages.

So what’s not good about watching cartoons?

It’s when we leave our children unsupervised and use cartoons or the television in general as a convenient babysitter or child minder.

For your child to benefit from watching cartoons and other animated movies, you need to help them make the right choices. Watch together with them, if possible, and tell them what’s right or wrong, what’s real or not.

While it is all right for my daughter to re-live her pre-school days by watching Dora or Little Einsteins, it would not be appropriate for her to watch cartoons that contain violence or sexual elements, or those that use swear words freely. These do not teach proper behaviour and values.

Viewing time should also be controlled, lest they go overboard and neglect their studies, homework, exercise, and social interaction times.

Like in most things concerning our children, we need to supervise, monitor, and play a guiding role to develop and nurture their character, morals and values.