Teaching and training
Parenting is complicated. We need to pick up technical skills like learning what to feed our child, how to get him to sleep through the night and how to teach him the three ‘R’s (Reading, Writing and Arithmetic). Then there are the relationship building tools like communication and love languages.
But much of our parenting requires a mixture of skills and relationship and constant re-balancing on the part of the parent.
For example even in teaching the child to read, while I found many of the resources and tools (like what I found at Tamarind and Myplayschool) extremely useful, what really makes the difference in seeing progress in my child is knowing how much to push him before he develops a distaste for learning or an aversion to spending time with me. I am sure many parents have heard this : That you can’t teach your own child. However, it is possible to successfully teach our children without jeopardizing our relationship (especially in the long run) with them, or causing them to lose their love for learning.
This column is dedicated to that mission.
