There is no genetic predisposition to becoming a leader but by teaching them while they are young you can influence them in their own environment. Leading by example and allowing children to learn by cause and effect, you are increasing their reasoning and social skills in a positive way.

They are never too young to learn leadership skills and here are a few of the best ways to instill these valuable tools for the best future possible.

Allow them to developed a sense of identify.

By giving children choices and letting them follow through, you are teaching them cause and effect. Praise their successes and help them understand if their actions went by the wayside. Compliment them often on the outcome of each scenario.

Ask for their input.

Whether it’s what to make for dinner or which jacket to wear, ask them what they think would be best idea. Be helpful with suggestions but allow them to have their voice.

Establish rules and enforce them.

Learning to understand that rules are to be followed is a necessary part of life. Rules acknowledge performance and impose discipline and there is no escape from suffering the consequences of bad choices at any age. Be sure your rules and consequences are fair, firm and followed.

Accepting Mistakes.

This can be challenging but by encouraging children to acknowledge their mistakes allows them to be responsible for correcting their problems. Teaching them mistakes are a normal part of life and how best to deal with them will help them to move past the blunder and continue to try new things with more confidence.

Keeping self esteem intact.

Mistakes will happen and frustrations will occur but admonishing your children or anyone in a public way is never the way to reprimand. Keep corrective action private and always remind the child that its the behavior that is the issue, not the child.

Support constantly and intervene sporadically.

It’s natural for parents to feel protective of their children but we must allow them to resolve conflict individually and develop their social skills. Be prepared to step in when needed but wait until you are asked or immediate attention is warranted.

Show unconditional love and respect.

Showing you love and respect your child in every area of their lives will help them develop their confidence and encourage them to show respect for others. Teaching them kindness, generosity and goals from early on can pave the way for great things for our children. In the long run, it’s worth it for all of us.

Sensible Guides.

In reality it comes down to finding out what peaks their curiosity. The trick to keeping their interest is once you find what makes them question, keep them surrounded with whatever makes their eyes light up.

Small children are sponges and the questions can often be fast, furious and yes, nonstop. But by providing the answers in an age appropriate language that they can understand, you can begin to encourage a more structured learning that they are not even aware of.

Encouraging children to find the answers themselves are often the best ways to teach and often hit home the most.

It’s Not Just Books

There are very little areas at home where learning cannot be taught. From colours in the kitchen pantry to science in the vegetable garden. Leaning can be anywhere at any time and at any age. Keeping it interesting just gets a bit more challenging as they grow older.

As they grow, math can be incorporated with trips to the grocery store, history from the local museums and the arts from what they are exposed to at home in music and books. Giving them ample explanations about everything they question keeps their interest peaked and in turns broadens their base of information.

Of course reading out loud to them from early on is by far the easiest way to incorporate words into their vocabulary. Having them read to you while you are doing work around the house challenges their language skills and pronunciations and in turn gains their confidence in public speaking.

It’s fact, the more children and young adults read, the more proficient they become in almost every aspect of their education.

Keeping It Real

When you find what interests each child surround them with all manner of it. If they love stories about history, help with planning vacations will encourage interest in the history and the geography of the area. If they are animal lovers, then farming and agriculture can be incorporated, again in age appropriate ways.

As children age, activities can become more complex. It’s a matter of taking the time to know what they are interested in and keeping them motivated. Libraries and online book clubs can encourage personal choices and independent thinking always keeping it crystal clear of your monitoring for appropriate choices and online safety. As they become more proficient you can broaden their ideas with new topics that appeal to them.

The more a child participates in their own learning, the more growth can be achieved. By upping the ante as they increase their education, you will keep that spark alive and teach them the importance of learning, and the ability to learn in every areas of their life.

Sensible Guides.

While the majority of parents are involved in their children’s education, they have little time to participate in the actual day to day structure of it. They see teachers and the school system as one part of their child’s day that they don’t need to worry about. They can simply trust the professionals to do their job. However, its actually because of the busyness of our lives that parents need to become more involved in their child’s school by volunteering on a semi regular basis.

It needn’t be every day or even every week. With email and school web pages, you can sign up and be added to volunteer lists and be available when the time works best for you. It can be as much or as little as you like. The key is being available to help when you can.

Seeing Your Child Through A Different Lens

When we take the time to visit our child’s class during a regular day, we have the opportunity to see for ourselves the many challenges and issues faced by teachers and students today. Its here in the trenches where we can see just what is needed and where we can step in and help. By observing, participating and asking where we can be most useful, our children can reap the rewards of an extra pair of hands and a little bit of extra time from another caring adult.

Having the chance to see your child interact can give you a heads up to situations you were not aware of. Children often behave very differently in school than they do at home and it can be a very illuminating experience. Teachers are professionals. Spending the time observing their teaching styles and the manner in which they engage children, can give you an understanding on how to teach your own child at home in life situations.

Being in the classroom also shows your child that you value their education and are making the time to keep it a high priority in your family’s life. The younger children may be excited at your interaction in their classes and although the older children may not be thrilled with your presence, chances are they will appreciate your commitment to them and their education.

Helping Our Communities

Volunteering also provides support to the community. School funding is often a struggle and administrators are constantly fighting for more value with limited resources. Volunteers can help provide the support that schools could not possibly afford.

A parent volunteer willing to spend a few hours a week helping out is a welcome support to an increasingly overwhelming school system. Most classrooms are overcrowded and a volunteer can give some individualized attention to students that may be struggling. It can be anything from help with reading and homework assignments to field trips and administration duties.

Parent volunteers have become a necessary staple in our educational systems. With a few hours a month, you can support your community and show your commitment to your children’s education. You are supporting the teachers by allowing them to focus on teaching and providing the best learning experience for your children.

Most importantly though, you are leading by example and pitching in where your are needed. You are being present in their lives not only at home but away from home as well. Your time is all the investment you need to make a difference.

Sensible Guides.

What Is Your Child Really Saying?

But the fact is, “I’m bored” can mean different things to different children. It could also be a catch-all phrase used to describe a general feeling of angst or restlessness without knowing why. Yet when it comes from kids in that whinny, helpless voice, it’s particularly irritating.

But what children are really saying can cover so many things like:

• I’m overwhelmed
• I want to do something more creative or exciting
• I don’t like this
• I want your attention
• I’m scared
• I don’t know what to do next
• I need a break
• I’m fed up and don’t know what to do about it
• I feel I need to do something else and don’t know what that is
• What I’m doing right now doesn’t challenge me
• This challenges me too much
• And so on….

It can be anything at all. No wonder a parent can miss the mark in a big way. There may also be a cultural thing at play here. Kids are so overstimulated and over-scheduled these days with school and extracurricular activities like sports, dance, art, drama, music, etc….that when they have a moment or space between activities, they don’t know what to make of it. So they feel the pauses in activity as discomforting.

What A Parent Can Do

Some suggestions to help your child:

• Probe your child in an open, non-judgmental way to uncover what’s really going on. Listen, reflect, restate and validate to uncover the underlying theme of how they feel.
• Let them try to solve their boredom problem on their own.
• When you get an “I don’t know” response, try to break the issue up into its parts and ask what part bothers them the most.
• Let them know you have periods of boredom too and you make it a quiet time to dream or read or garden, and so on.
• Brainstorm some ideas with your child for the next time they get bored.
• Help them change their perception of the situation with, “what if you …”
• Make sure your child gets enough unscheduled time to generate their own ideas and activities.

Teaching a child that it’s ok not to know what comes next is really an opportunity for them to use their imagination to uncover their own resourcefulness. Boredom should not be something to dread. It is a natural part of the ebb and flow of life. It’s not a signal for the parent to immediately fill the void.

Once the parent understands the why behind the words ‘I am bored,’ it will become much easier to coach them in dealing more effectively with their boredom. Maybe that means helping them find a process to work through the situation in using their imagination to find other things to do, or to just dream up new ideas.

Sensible Guides.

The only organizing you have to do is to choose the package that best suites your family. Once you arrive at your cruise launch location, you let the cruise ship staff do all the rest. This way everybody gets to relax at the same time, parents included. A family cruise can give you an exciting and thrilling adventurous change from your standard, sometimes labor intensive, vacations of the past.

Cruisin’ Along With The Kids

Kids will find many choices of on board activities, facilities and other special events like water slides, games, shows, movies, arts and crafts and so much more.

Family activities and contests are common, which allow for some friendly competition and the forging of new friendships. Some cruises will combine on-shore attractions at different ports of call to fit nicely into their family theme.

If you’re traveling with very small children, almost all cruise ships have on board childcare. This will allow you to take some private time by yourself or with your spouse. You can enjoy, for example, a few minutes to pamper yourself at the spa, or enjoy a candlelit dinner with your spouse without worrying about the little one.

Choosing the Perfect Family Cruise

Your travel agent will help you find the cruise lines that specialize in family vacations. You can also do your own research and book your vacation cruise package using the Internet.

Most of the major cruise lines offer fun family package options such as Camp Carnival, Disney Cruise Lines, Celebrity Cruise Lines and Royal Caribbean Cruise Line, to name a few. Some of them even offer private destination adventure packages.

Create Fantastic Memories

Your adventure will never be forgotten when you bring your digital or video camera with you. Cruise ships also have staff photographers to capture your favorite moments, especially useful when you are in the action itself. Photos and video clips usually get posted a few hours later and you can pick and choose your favorite memories to bring home with you.

And The Awesome Food…..

The cruise ship’s menu does not take a back seat to any of these fun-filled activities. On the contrary, not only do they cater especially to the tastes of children, gourmet choices abound. It’s first class all the way. And, you can choose healthy gourmet, vegetarian as well as indulge in rich dessert decadence any time. Because there is so much choice for all kinds of taste pallets, you may well want to avail yourself of the fitness activities like walkabouts, aerobics or yoga.

Family vacation cruises will give you such fun-filled experiences, and relationship memories to reminisce about for years to come.

Sensible Guides.

Having kids is the easy part, but once you take that step, you are taking on the most important role you will ever hold in your lifetime. The bliss and the curse of parenting is that you take who you think you are plus the opportunities and challenges that life gives you and multiply these by the factor of children. It can be scary and exhilarating at the same time.

Who Are You?

Here’s a short list of questions to ask yourself. Honest answers to these questions will reveal how you are showing up as a parent:

• How conscious am I of my own strengths and weaknesses?
• How do I respond to the ups and downs of life?
• How calm and patient am I in a crisis?
• How good of a listener am I?
• What is my normal leadership style? Am I a boss or an inspiration to others?
• How flexible am I to changing and adjusting my style or approach as the situation warrants?

Your Parenting Roles

Whether you like it or not, your children will discover all these things about you. They will learn how you navigate through life and will eventually pick up on, choose what resonates with them, and reject what doesn’t. They are your instant mirrors. And they’re very good at it.

And as a parent you are their protector, role model, guidance counselor, entertainer, teacher, and the list goes on indefinitely. The point is, when you have kids, you become their universe when they are little, and hopefully their friend when they grow up.

Being a parent means you are taking on a responsibility, both moral and financial. It means you are officially an adult. Pretty frightening stuff, but also very rewarding.

How does this all happen? We all heard this a million times – “Kids do not come with instruction manuals.” This is true, but in essence, the instruction manual is inside us all. So what can we do to guide our kids into adulthood?

Be A Good Role Model

When kids are little, they often mimic what their parents do and say. We, as parents, need to be very careful of how we act or what we say around kids. If we display signs of aggression or give in to the urge to lose our temper, kids often pick up on that and will act out those emotions in school, the playground or even back at us.

We, as human beings, are not always perfect, but if you keep in mind that you are a role model for your kids and then ask yourself, “Is this how I want them to act?” The next time you want to scream or fight in front of them, or raise your voice at them, you will think twice.

To Rule Or Not To Rule?

How strict are you with your child? Your own upbringing, religion and culture will influence your parenting style. But no matter what you decide, never make empty threats that you do not intend to follow through on. It’s also critical for both spouses to be supportive of one another so that their child does not get mixed messages.

Be clear about what you expect from your children. If you have a problem with their behaviour, describe it to them in a way they can understand. Let them know how it makes you feel and the natural consequences resulting from their behaviour. If a difficult adjustment needs to be made, offer help by working with them on a solution.

Keep The Communication Open

Talk to your kids. A great place to do that is at the kitchen table. Try to have at least one meal together as a family. Once the communication is open, your kids will tell you about what is going on in their lives. And at the very least, you will be able to pick up on their feelings and views on different topics.

Make this a habit. If you can’t have your meals together, find some quiet time to be with your kids and show them that they can talk to you about anything. They’ll be more likely to come to you when they are having a problem.

In the process of being a parent, there are many walls we will hit and mistakes we will make. The bottom line is we need to create an environment for our children to lean into, and take with them the strengths and lessons of life they have learned in their formative years. Let us remember that our children did not come from us but through us. And, we’ve been blessed by their presence.

Sensible Guides.

Your grandchildren think the world has always been the way they see it now. You, as their grandparent, might be their only connection to a lifestyle that moved slower and had strong values.

The only thing that hasn’t changed in this fast-paced world is a child’s fascination with good stories and this works in your favor. They were born into a world full of computers, video games, the Internet, microwaves, flights to other planets, and television. They’ve probably had a cell phone for several years and spend hours “texting” friends a day. They are totally connected to the entire world around them and the world is far different from when you were a child 50+ years ago.

You could start as soon as they reach the age of wanting to hear stories by telling them about when you were their age and repeating stories you were told by your grandparents. You might have been a child before television and played games and had adventures outside instead of camping on the sofa with the remote. Don’t be surprised to get questions about how you possibly managed to live without TV.

If your grandparents were involved in the western migration, you probably have stories about wagon trains and cowboys. Or it could be your family moved from Europe during World War II. If you don’t have your own family stories to pass down, visit the library and find books that tell about the days and times involving your grandparents or parents. A good video can probably be found as well.

You can talk about the different chores you had to do when you were their age, or going farther back, tell how it was to cook on a wood stove, make butter, and milk the cows. These stories should be shared in a manner that is not reproachful, even if you think they don’t have it near as rough as you had it.

There was a time when families lived together, several generations under one roof or at least close by. Children always knew their heritage and often knew their grandparents and even their great-grandparents. That is not so true today. Many children grow up without a sense of belonging to an extended family or culture.

Old picture albums are very helpful when connecting the dots of ancestral history. For example, if you have a picture of an ancestor in a vintage baseball uniform and one of the grandkids plays baseball, there’s a connection.

Perhaps your granddaughter loves to cook and you can show her a picture of her great-aunt winning a blue ribbon at the state fair for her pie. Another dot just got connected.

Think about starting a family genealogy project with them. Together you can research the details online and start a project that will last for years and forge a strong bond between you and them.

Sensible Guides.