Read Teaching Kids to Think Online
Authors: Darlene Sweetland
Teaching Kids to Think (13 page)
One of the most fascinating and timely findings is the synaptic reorganization in the areas of executive functioning and social cognition that occurs during puberty. Blakemore and Choudhury showed clearly through the summary of research that during puberty, adolescents not only are the most ready to learn executive-functioning skills but also are the most ready to apply these skills to their social relationships. Puberty is the critical time to learn these skills, and they learn best through personal experience. Therefore, when parents fall into the trap of rescuing them from solving problems on their own, jumping in to smooth the way in social situations, or giving them things without them working for it, valuable experiential opportunities are taken away. Adolescence is when their brains are primed to integrate and learn from all they are experiencing as well as when these skills will be learned more easily than at any other time. This is why these skills need to be a top priority when parenting and educating children and teens.
What some parents don't realize is that while they are seeking academic advancement and extra tutoring to push their kids ahead in preparation for college and adulthood, they are bypassing the essential skills to be learned during adolescence. If adolescents are not given ample opportunity to independently experience and practice planning, organization, making decisions, and critical thinking during this time, they will be entering adulthood vastly unprepared.
Confidence Comes with Experience
While the brain is primed to learn executive functioning beginning in middle school, by no means should parents wait until then to help them prepare for these experiences. Even at young ages, children should learn to expect the response, “What do you think you should do?” from their parents when they approach their parents with a problem.
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A toddler shows her dad a broken toy and his answer can be, “How do you think we can fix it?”
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An eight-year-old forgot a math sheet for homework and the prompt is, “What is the best way to solve this problem?”
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A ten-year-old talks about a conflict with another child at school and the guidance is, “What are some things you can do to make that interaction better?”
The solutions are usually not going to be well developed or mature and will likely need some support from an adult, but this response helps them become comfortable with the idea that they are the ones who need to come up with solutions when there is a problem, not someone else. This enables them to build the confidence they will need to tackle the challenge of developing the more complex skills of executive functioning later on.
How Parents Can Promote Good Judgment and Decision Making
The use of good judgment when making decisions requires a person to exhibit positive executive functioning, as well as the ability to be considerate and aware of others. Just as with anything else, there are some children who are naturally gifted at this, beginning at a young age. However, most children need lots and lots of practice with decision-making skillsâit's a process that develops slowly over time.
For example, when an elementary schoolâaged child puts on a seatbelt every time she gets in the car or wears a helmet every time she rides a bike, it seems like she is making good decisions based on sound judgment. In reality, the child is following a well-established habit. Young kids fail to fully understand the importance of wearing a seatbelt or helmet in an accident, even though their parents explain that it is good for them. There is a difference between doing something out of habit and using good judgment.
Young children first learn behaviors based on habit and repetition, what authority figures have told them to do, and what they have observed. Sometime in late elementary school, they also begin to learn from personal experience and practice. When a routine or habit changes, they are required to rely on the executive-functioning skills of identifying alternative solutions, considering how the solutions will impact others, which of the solutions will have the best outcome, and then figuring out how to implement the solution. Today's Instant Gratification Generation habitually jumps at the first possible solution, rather than considering all the potential outcomes. That impulsive need for an immediate solution prevents them from using good judgment when making decisions. In turn, if a parent falls in the rescue trap, kids are prevented from problem solving on their own.
One way parents fall into the rescue trap is by telling them about mistakes they made as a kid, in hopes their own children won't make the same ones. Adults have a lot of experience making mistakes and learning from them, which helps us to avoid doing the same thing again. As psychologists, we hear all the time, “I don't want them to make the same mistakes I did.” So how do teens learn?
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Some particularly mature and conscientious teens learn by listening to their parents and feeling sympathy for what their parents went through.
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Others learn by watching someone in their peer group experience something, including the outcomes and consequences (positive and negative).
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The most salient learning comes from direct personal experience. Many teens have an “it will never happen to me” mind-set and act accordingly. Those are the ones who need to experience the consequences of a situation and learn from that (i.e., oh, it can happen to me).
Parents of kids in this generation need to be even more aware of how they can encourage their children to take advantage of this critical period of learning. This promotes brain development in the child (building stronger synaptic connections) in the area of executive functioning.
How to Preview Consequences with Your Child or Teen
Giving your teenager space to experience things can be really scary for a parent. Previewing consequences as much as possible can be an effective communication tool, because this establishes your expectations as a parent, and clarifies potential outcomes for your teen. Here are some examples of what you can say:
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“If you miss curfew, you will not be able to go out with your friends for two weeks.”
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“If there is drinking at the party, you can call us and we will pick you up. If you don't call and we find out about it, you will not be able to go out with your friends for two weeks.”
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“If we find that you had friends in the car (before legally able, a huge problem in California), you will lose car privileges for a month.”
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“If you make a decision that puts you or someone else in an unsafe situation, you will face very serious consequences.”
The Most Important Lessons
In the Instant Gratification Generation, children and teens are missing the essential opportunity to practice the skills that parents, teachers, researchers, and employers deem the most important. Practice takes work and time, is not convenient, and can cause a lot of frustration. Yet it is essential to provide opportunities to teach children and teens that most things take practice to do well. This idea is the subject of the article by Rachel Keen, “The Development of Problem Solving in Young Children: A Critical Cognitive Skill.” This important review of development concludes that parents and society as a whole need to design opportunities and environments that encourage and enhance problem solving for children as early as the first year of life.
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That there is evidence that children as young as one and two are capable of early problem-solving strategies surprises many people.
If parents understand the importance of taking advantage of the critical period of adolescence to build a foundation and solidify problem-solving skills, their children will be much better prepared for college and the adult world. It is so important when raising and educating children and teens of this generation to realize the ways that overscheduling, dependence on technology, and rewarding the end product rather than hard work undermines the natural developmental process that teens in past generations had the chance to experience naturally. The best gift you can give your children is ample practice to learn how to think.
Putting It All Together
The Issue
This generation of children and teens is so technologically advanced that they have the ability to use electronics to solve many of their problems for them. In addition, parents tend to emphasize the academic résumé and providing their children advantages at the expense of taking advantage of the “critical period” for developing executive functioning, which are the skills that are so essential to becoming a confident, independent, and thoughtful adult.
The Trap
In this generation, it is so easy to get caught up in the traps that limit the development of executive functioning: rescuing children, solving their problems for them, giving them things without them working for it, and becoming reliant on the ease and convenience of technology.
The Alternative
Be supportive of your child's efforts to solve problems and think critically, even if his solutions are not well developed. Remember that children do not always comprehend the complexities of their social and emotional environments. By providing them with opportunities to practice these skills, you are equipping them with tools that will last a lifetime.
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Emphasize mistakes as part of the process of learning to solve problems.
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Praise your children when they try to do things for themselves.
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Focus on the “process” and effort your child puts toward a task, rather than the outcome, even if the outcome wasn't what she expected. That means talking about how she tried to achieve a goal and whether or not it worked. If not, what could she have done differently?
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Avoid focusing on things such as “honors class” or “competitive athletic team” as accomplishments. Instead, focus on the work a child needs to put toward getting there.
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Don't put your child's academic résumé ahead of learning to solve problems, don't manage his or her schedule, and encourage your child to take chances to try new things.
When working with teens, especially those who feel they know better than their parents, very often the best way to help them develop their skills is to let them learn from natural consequences.
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Don't do the work for your teen; let her experience the disappointment, guilt, and consequences of failing to study for an exam or complete an assignment.
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If you know your teen is going to need a particular outfit or item for school (or anything else), feel free to ask if he needs help getting it. If you get ignored, leave him to find a way to deal with his lack of planning or laziness. He will have to figure out something. If this results in embarrassment or stress, your teen probably won't let it happen again. Don't take the bait and do it for him without being asked.
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Preview the consequences of choices they will be required to make, such as missing curfew, getting a poor grade, cutting class, drinking alcohol, being unkind, not being at the place they told you, and so on.
C
HAPTER
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Ivy League or Bust
Are We Providing Children What They Really Need to Succeed?
Parent:
Dr. Stolberg, I am calling to see if you can help our son. He went to college this year and is having a hard time. He wants to come home. He always got good grades and took lots of AP classes in high school, but now he is failing his classes. He said he wants to take a year off and transfer to another school next year.
Most parents will agree that having their children earn an advanced degree after high school is high on their list of child-rearing goals. In fact, nationally, the emphasis on promoting higher education has become a top priority. The United States spends more on higher education than any other nation in the world, and that financial commitment increases each year. Yet 30 percent of students beginning a four-year college do not return after the first year and only 60 percent of students attending a four-year college complete their degree in four years.
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We receive many calls every year from parents whose college-aged children are struggling with their adult responsibilities. Parents list the student's accomplishments and express surprise and frustration that their child is not following the path that was expected. Most parents are confused as to what they could have done better to prepare their child for the shift to adulthood.
Today's parents understand that it's harder than ever to get into college, compared to ten to twenty years ago. The headlines of news stories each fall boast the tremendous challenge of being accepted into college for students today. For example, one
New York Times
article began, “Applications to select colleges and universities are reaching new heights this year, promising another season of high rejection rates and dashed hopes for many more students.”
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