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An excerpt from: Hidden Messages: What Our Words and Actions Are Really Telling Our Children
By Elizabeth Pantley
Plus, taking the time and expending the patience to help a willing and enthusiastic 3- or 4-year-old learn to unload the dishwasher is a lot easier than trying to teach a busy, uninterested teenager, and then deal with the frustration when he doesn't keep up with it.
If your child is over 6, every missed opportunity to teach a useful household task prolongs your child's dependence. Every single time you pick up a dirty sock, a used tissue, a crusty cereal bowl or a misplaced toy -- every time you do this -- you teach your child to believe in the "cleanup fairy." This is not only frustrating for you, but also difficult for your children when they move out of the house and discover that the "cleanup fairy" neglected to pack up and move with them.
This is one of those parenting tasks that are difficult for most of us. But the benefits are great. Perhaps the most wonderful payoff in allowing your child to master life through age-appropriate tasks and skills comes from the boost to his self-esteem. The more capable a child is, the more confident the child will become. With confidence, and a full repertoire of important life skills, comes a stronger, more positive self-image that will enable your child to take on whatever life imposes.
(Excerpted with permission by NTC/Contemporary Publishing Group Inc. from Hidden Messages: What Our Words and Actions are Really Telling Our Children by Elizabeth Pantley, copyright 2001)
