How to Set Your Child Up for Future Success

It goes without saying that every child wants their child to be successful, and most parents feel that the responsibility for this success lies in their hands. Despite this, there is no handbook on “how to be a good parent”, even though parenting is widely considered to be the hardest job in the world. While everyone has their own methods and ideas about parenting, it’s proven that parents can do their bit to stimulate their babies’ brains. In fact, just day-to-day living can provide ample learning opportunities, so long as they’re used properly. To that end, detailed below are just some of the steps you can take to set your child up for future success.

Read to Your Baby

Firstly, you should make a conscious effort to read to your baby. While it might be the case that they can’t talk yet, babies are ready to learn as soon as they’re born. At just three months old, babies are capable of distinguishing each sound that’s spoken to them. Therefore, reading aloud to your baby enables them to build their language skills. As they get a little older and are able to understand and say a few words, you should start to point to pictures in the book and ask them questions about them. For instance, “What animal is this?”, “What color is their T-shirt?”, and so on. This way, their language skills will be engaged, and they’ll find the experience of reading more enjoyable.

Treat Baby Talk as a Real Conversation

As an adult, the sounds and gestures made by babies may seem like gobbledygook; however, this is their form of communication. As your baby babbles away, you should treat this as a real conversation. This means responding to a baby’s actions, cues, and sounds, as the number of words that a baby is exposed to will determine their vocabulary when they reach the age of two. They will also determine your child’s reading age in later life. As a result, baby babble should be encouraged and taken seriously.

Start Lessons Young

Whether it’s swimming lessons for kids or dance lessons, any kind of lesson is great for setting your child up for success. This doesn’t mean pressurizing your child into something they don’t want to do, but it means giving them a foundation to learn new skills and discover more about themselves. Lessons provide children with feelings of confidence and enhance their ability to make friends. Therefore, starting lessons young is one of the most effective ways of setting your child up for success in the future.

Take Play Seriously

Young children are like sponges; they’re constantly absorbing new information that’s being fed to them. This involves when they’re playing and are seemingly not learning about anything in particular. For instance, the fact that children must share during playtime is a valuable life skill, while role-play games teach them to empathize. At such a young age, games are all about problem-solving and creating new possibilities, which are invaluable to a child’s development. It’s for this reason that screen time should be limited, as children aren’t forced to be creative or perceptive when they’re using electronic devices.

Use Everyday Experiences as Learning Opportunities

As an adult, certain activities can seem incredibly insignificant; however, the most mundane of activities can be learning opportunities for little ones. These include running errands, cooking, sorting laundry, and so much more. You can stimulate language by narrating what you’re doing, introduce math by counting things, and so much more. There’s a lot for kids to learn from everyday experiences.