What do we inadvertently teach our children and what can we learn from them?

Leaving home for college or stepping up to a new year group at school brings all kinds of challenges and learning opportunities.

This leads us into our first topic of season 2 - how are we letting our kids learn?

Julia: I dropped our youngest daughter off at university and as we were doing a trolley dash around her new local supermarket she commented that she was really grateful that both of her parents cooked. All I remembered what the mind numbing daily chore of preparing dinner for 3 kids who would only eat macaroni cheese together! "Cooking" never felt like a culinary art or event but as I said - like a chore and I was not proud of the results. My husband on the other hand is a good cook. I was taken by complete surprise as to what in those situations was important and what my daughter took away from it - me preparing food for the girls, sitting with them and my husband doing the same. What counted was the act, not so much the culinary value.

What have you learned from your child?

Anke: I too dropped off my daughter at Uni 2 weeks ago - and she’s not a plane ride away like her siblings but stayed local. I am happy about that, and was ready to help her with whatever she needed now that it was logistically possible!

Well, I texted my girl the day after we helped her move to the dorm asking how the first night went - and she replied “why? do just want to know?”

Wow. I felt almost rejected and at the same time embarrassed. She clearly did not want my opinion, advice, help or even my empathy.

What she needed was my trust in her ability to figure things out herself.

And she was afraid that I would take charge when she wanted to do it herself. I am proud of her for standing up for what she felt she needed even though it must have been hard for her.

So I learned that even though she is close by, she wants to do things on her terms as she should, I learned that by me trusting her to be capable of this, I am helping her more than by physically doing things for her.

Trusting the process is hard. Trusting your kid to do the right thing can be too. We want them to have a smooth transition, no hiccups, no bumps in the road. We want to know they have friends, food and are safe and happy and do not fail this new beginning.

Well - what if FAIL stood for FIRST ATTEMPT IN LEARNING?

Confidence and resilience need to be learned. As parents we can help by letting our kids FAIL, given them the opportunity (still kind of under our watch) to learn from experience. THEIR experience. Make it clear that perfection is not the goal, but learning from actions is.

And when you have this urge to just go and fix whatever it is that you see wrong with the situation, ask yourself

“Am I preparing my child to do this independently next time or am I preventing him/her from learning how to do this alone?”

The line can seem very blurred. We might feel fearful, frustrated, anxious - but just pause and ask yourself if you want to truly prepare your kids to be independent, confident and resilient adults.

Be intentional - if you find yourself trying to do it all - ask yourself why?
Do you need the validation of being needed?
Is it because of learned habits or your own journey or culture?
Is it because you think you know best?

You have to let go of being right if you live by the First Attempt in Learning Rule. You can try using

‘I’ve got some ideas but first what do you think you should do’ instead of advice.

then think about what is your intention - a quick fix or a long term self learning for your child.

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