by Sarah Welch posted in Life & Home
From DVD programs that supposedly expand your brain to speed reading programs, there are a plethora of products on the market that cater to parents looking to give their children a leg up in life. But before you rush out to buy a brain-enhancing product, consider another (free) alternative: instilling a good habit or routine.
There are many reasons why a good habit is a better bet than that fancy flash-card system.
For starters, there are neural connections to consider.
The young human brain develops literally trillions of connections, called synapses during the first ten or so years of life. Ones that aren’t used repeatedly get pared away during the later teenage years. So, the earlier you institute a good habit, the more strongly the neural connections are wired, and the more likely the habit is to stick over a lifetime.
Secondly, their pre-frontal lobes (responsible for insight, planning, and other big-picture executive functions) do not fully develop until somewhere between the ages of 18 to 25. As a parent then, part of your job is to serve as their external pre-frontal lobe. That means you must look ahead for them and identify which kind of regular behaviors will serve them best in the long run, start them on the path to adopting that behavior, and then bolster their (weak) wills when they falter.
Finally, last, but not least, chances are that your own involvement in their adoption of the new habit will strengthen your relationship with them and maybe even build your own good habit muscle a little too.
The bottom line is simply this: starting good habits, whether it’s making the bed, cleaning up toys, or organizing themselves for their bags for baseball practice, sets kids up to become more productive, and yes, organized, adults.
If you’re looking to get started but aren’t sure where to begin, consider taking on the morning routine. If you wait until they are old enough to be in school it’s often a battle, adding to the stress and chaos unnecessarily. So there is a clear benefit to making a routine that includes making the bed, putting laundry in the hamper, etc second nature to them early.
To help you, here are three great free printable tools you can use to help your kids get buttoned up in the morning:
A Morning Routine Star Chart from Buttoned Up
Adorable free printable cards (great for non-readers) from Living Locurto
Printable routine cards from Childhood101
Did your parents give you routines to follow as children? If so, did you find it helpful? Do you currently have routines for your kids? If so, how well do they follow them?
Read more from source:“babycenter”
organizing kids the power of simple routines
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