Recently, my daughter turned 10, putting her into the double digits and moving her into the second decade of life. The next ten years will bring changes like puberty, physical growth, romantic relationships, complex schoolwork, high school, a driver’s license, and college. But, reflecting, I have learned a few things in raising a kid to 10 that can help others.
1. Teach your toddler to blow their nose. Yes, my 10-year-old has mastered nose-blowing. However, early in toddlerhood, my wife and I struggled to help our daughter through colds. We had that rubber suction ball thing that she resisted and just made our attempts to help her worse. Once she recovered, we found videos on how to teach your child to blow their nose out (it involved blowing a feather with air through their nose). Once we practiced and she learned, it saved us during the countless streams of colds that young children get and helped avoid many ear infections. As a 10-year-old, she now knows to carry tissues when recovering from a cold and how to care for her health.
2. Expose kids to a wide range of food flavors. When our daughter was in preschool, they provided food. Some of the food was novel for the kids, and the teachers were good about saying that the children had to take “one polite bite.” We carried that notion home. At new cuisine restaurants, we have offered her no penalty to order something that sounds interesting (with a little parental coaching). As a result, our daughter has developed a broad palate and a willingness to try all kinds of foods. I think too many parents think that children won’t like strongly flavored foods, but, in reality, kids across the globe are eating the food and flavors of their parents. As a side benefit, we can find places to eat anywhere we go and do not only require the availability of hot dogs, grilled cheese, and chicken nuggets.
3. Kids should be able to engage in transactions with adults in service roles. This means that kids can order food in a restaurant, purchase it in a store, and check a book out of the library. In a restaurant, children can speak to adults who will listen to their requests, a relatively rare opportunity in a kid’s world, and gain independence and autonomy by ordering food to their liking. But these are skills that need to be practiced. My appreciation goes to the patient sales associates who allow a child to count out coins to purchase items with their own money. Librarians are inherently patient with kids and will do anything to support their love of books. Kids can feel a sense of accomplishment at navigating the outside world by interacting with adults in service roles. Yes, kids may still need support from parents, but children need the chance to demonstrate these independence skills.
4. Kids should have chores and basic cleaning. One of our daughter’s chores is emptying the dishwasher. Her protests and whining convey her distaste for this chore, and she reminds us of her dislike nearly every time, especially when it interrupts her screen time. Nonetheless, it is part of her contribution to household management. At times, she will try to assert compensation for emptying the dishwasher (e.g., an allowance); however, we decline, reminding her that her chore is part of her contribution to the maintenance of the household. By giving her this regular chore, she is learning that she has a role in maintaining our living space, and, at the same time, she is learning that we have faith in her capabilities and in her working independently to get the task done. By at least age ten, kids can clean the bathroom, wash dishes, load and unload the dishwasher, wash a car, make their bed, fold laundry and put it away, change a younger sibling’s diaper, and more. Kids need opportunities to practice these basic life management skills.
5. Teach persistence. My daughter often thinks every drawing she makes is a masterpiece, each cartwheel a perfect 10, and her guitar practice song is in tune. But they are not. Many children want to be instantly good at whatever endeavor and lack the understanding that mastery comes from hard work and practice. I have continued to provide healthy feedback to my daughter about progress when she does work hard to improve. At the same time, we battle against her burgeoning sense that some kids are just good at some things (and she is not). So, our current refrain continues to be about working hard at a task to improve and giving her opportunities to demonstrate when she thinks she has made progress. In gymnastics, we have noted that she worked hard to master skills and was allowed to move up a level. In her guitar lessons with her practice, we pointed out that she could now learn those Taylor Swift songs with mastery of the chords. By investing in her budding persistence, I am hoping this will carry her through the next decade of challenges.
Robert (Rob) S. Weisskirch, MSW, Ph.D., CFLE, is a Professor of Human Development at California State University, Monterey Bay, and a Certified Family Life Educator. He and his wife are parents to a chatty, elementary school-aged daughter and reside in Marina.