It Amazes Me How Smart and Capable Jada Is

Today Jada had re-positioned her bowl so it wasn't very stable and when she tried to eat out of it it fell to the floor spilling the food everywhere. I told her "oops, that was an accident!" and I showed her where to put her bowl on the table so if wouldn't fall off. Then I told her we needed to clean up the mess and I told her to get a cloth from the sink. Then I put my hands over her hands and guided her through the motion of gathering the food up into a pile, and picking it up with the cloth and then taking it to the garbage and shaking out the cloth until all the food was off it then going to the sink and washing out the cloth and repeating until all the mess was cleaned up. It was so incredibly successful. After two times of going through the motions with her I let her try it by herself. Although it wasn't perfect she mimicked what I had just taught her and did a good job at cleaning the rest of it up and remembered to shake the cloth out in the garbage and then wash it out in the sink. This taught me to never under-estimate what even a kid at her age (2 1/2) is capable of learning if we are in the attitude of and diligent at fulfilling our role as a teacher. I got the idea for this from a e-book I have been reading that I bought from www.raiseyourkidsright.com I have been looking at this book for almost a year and just recently bought it. The whole book is lessons on life skills (ie: hard work, cooperation, patience, self-control, ect.) that she suggests teaching your children in a family class scheduled once a week (aka. Family Home Evening). She also gives examples of how to teach them throughout the week and in everyday life. I don't know if she is LDS or not but I thought the connection was neat. Also I have been studying a lot on parenting from prophets and apostles as well as examples in the scriptures and the way these lessons are set up are right in line with what I have learned from that study. She stresses that all teaching must be done in love with a calm tone or else no real learning will take place. George Albert Smith and Gordon B. Hinkely talk a lot about this. She stresses the importance of the parents having the mindset of being teachers and verbally expressing to the children that they are their teachers. Ex. Telling your child "I am your teacher, your teacher at school teaches you things like math and science and I teach you at home things that will help you be happy and successful in life such as kindness, responsibility, hard work,etc." The lesson plans a full of discussion and questions that help the children come to conclusions themselves and internalize the lessons. There are also suggestions for preparing the children ahead of time and getting them thinking about it. Example: on the Work lesson she suggests showing them examples of things that take work and things that don't throughout the week such as a beautiful park and a overgrown lawn and asking them which one they like better and just leaving it at that and then bringing up their answers in the lesson and discussing it together. Another idea of her I really like for follow- up is having a list of these skills and qualities on the fridge and recognizing when the kids do something that falls under one of the things listed and asking them which quality on the list their sister or themselves just exhibited. She has another lesson that helps them recognize the thoughts and feelings that come from their brain and their heart and how to use them together in harmony (helps them learn self-control and appropriate reaction). When the kids are in the middle of an arguement or have done something noble you can ask them did this feeling or thought come from the brain or the heart and help them recognize it or compliment them on using the appropriate reaction. I think this book is a great teaching tool. I love to share whatever I find that I think is really valueable.