All parents want our children to be educated well and grow up with good physical and emotional development. That is why we care that they go to a good school, that after-school activities that they do are of quality and also, we want them to feel that they are capable of achieving whatever they set out to do in life. But sometimes we forget something much more important ... Parental behaviors can make education and all effort difficult.
Even if you want with all your might that your children have a good education, it is possible that without realizing it you have some behaviors in your daily life that are hindering the good education of your children. That is why today I want to talk to you about some of these behaviors that parents can have and that make education difficult.
Overprotect them
We live in a world where danger will always be around the corner and parents know that safety comes first. Many parents live in constant fear if something happens to their children and do everything possible to protect them. But without realizing we have isolated healthy risk behaviors and this has had an adverse effect on the evolution of our children.
Psychologists have found that if a child does not play outside or is never allowed to experience falling and scraping their knee, they will grow up to develop phobias as an adult. Children need to fall to learn that it is normal, adolescents are likely to be in love and will need emotional maturity in order to have longer lasting relationships. If parents completely eliminate the risk from their children's lives and overprotect them, they are likely to have low self-esteem and they do not develop correctly on an emotional level, causing you emotional problems in the future.
Don't let them solve your problems
The current generation of youth has not developed the same skills that the youth of 30 years ago did. This happens because there are many parents who take care of solving their children's problems and forbid them almost without realizing it ... the opportunity to grow up and feel the satisfaction of having managed to solve something for themselves. Parents should be the guides, not the ongoing saviors.
When children and adolescents are rescued and not allowed to learn in their problem solving, you are eliminating the need to navigate between difficulties and solve problems themselves. Even if you think it is good, it really only works in the short term because in the long term you will be doing more harm than good. Sooner or later, children will get used to others solving their problems and will think that they do not need to make an effort because others will solve it for them. They will start to have bad behaviors because 'others' will be responsible for that. When in reality, this is not how the world works and you are making your child unable to grow as a competent adult.
Overpraise
There are parents who praise their children too many times in an attempt to raise their self-esteem or not to feel bad at a certain moment. But the reality is that when children are praised too much they make children feel special but it has consequences that are not appropriate for the future development of children.
Children will see as time goes by that their parents are the only ones who think they are awesome and no other people think so too. They will begin to doubt the objectivity of their parents and although they feel good in the moment, they will not be connected to reality. They won't know if they really should try harder to improve or not… When praised too easily, indifference to bad behavior also has bad consequences. Children over time learn to cheat, exaggerate and lie to avoid the difficult reality because they have not been educated to face them.
Do not give negative to avoid the feeling of guilt
Your children will not love you during every minute of their lives. Children must learn to manage disappointment or frustration because they don't always have to get everything they want. Therefore, it is necessary to say 'no' or 'not now' in the education of children, and also, quite frequently. Children must understand and differentiate what is a whim from what is a necessity.
Many parents have a tendency to give their children everything they want or to reward them more than necessary to see them happy. When a child does something well, we believe it is fair to praise and reward them every time. This is not realistic and causes the child to miss the opportunity to understand that success depends on our own actions, which must be correct. Regardless of material rewards or praise, because it is personal satisfaction that really counts. If the education with your children is based on material rewards, the children will not experience any intrinsic motivation, they will not feel a vocation or unconditional love for anything.
We confuse intelligence with maturity or talent
Intelligence is often used as a measure of a child's maturity and as a result, parents assume that their child is intelligent and ready to enter the world… but this is not always the case. Some professional athletes and movie stars have great talent or intelligence in one area, but they are disasters in their private lives.
The fact that intelligence is present in children's lives does not mean that it permeates all areas. There is no age of majority that is magical or that shows when a child should have more or less freedoms ... but it is necessary to observe children to know if they really can have more freedom or independence, or not.
In addition, you must remember that so that your children's education is not affected too much, you must be a good example of behavior. Think about the behaviors that may not be helping him grow and improve, and improve them in yourself first.