When it comes to teaching kids to be independent, I am apparently an expert.
My nine-year-old is notorious for doing all sorts of things without asking my permission. He will rewire his toys with his dad’s tools, rearrange the icons on my laptop, download games to my phone (which is supposed to be a game-free phone), and walk away in stores as if he’s the adult and I am supposed to follow him.
My daughter is amazing at wasting my best bath towels to mop up the bleach she spilled while attempting to clean a stain off the blouse she borrowed without my permission. She’s particularly gifted at putting me on the spot by making plans for friends to sleep over or by informing me she will be sleeping at a friend’s. She’s sure to begin a project I wanted her to do—but without waiting for instructions from me.
And my three-year-old is a little independent fellow, as well. He’s usually the first one to disappear out the front door as he takes off on his own to get the mail. Or he may dump my recipe box on the floor because it’s in his way as he pulls a chair over to reach the knives and cut up his own apple. I can also expect to step in puddles on the bathroom floor because he is a big boy and “cleaned.” When we are cooking together, he starts mixing the powder before we add the liquids. Then we all get to breathe in the brownie cloud for hours.
When it comes to teaching my kids independence, it might seem like I’ve cornered the market.
Yet my daughter can’t figure out how to get herself ready for an appointment or notice that the garbage is full and needs to go out. She isn’t able to organize her room, pick a t-shirt color, or decide on a hairdo on her own. She follows me around the house, pestering me for opinions. Then she tells me why my choices are wrong. When emergencies crop up, she refuses to jump in. She never takes the initiative to help with a spill, a vomiting brother, or a pot boiling over unless I explicitly ask.
My nine-year-old needs constant reminders to put his socks in his own hamper and then a follow-up to be sure that they actually made it there. I have to remind him to drink his water bottle or he ends up complaining that he’s thirsty.
My three-year-old has suddenly decided I need to dress him even though he’s been doing it by himself for the last year.
And all three children call me the moment I begin to sit, nurse the baby, use the bathroom, or make dinner.
So maybe this market isn’t cornered yet! All this autonomy and lack of independence within one day are enough to exhaust me by noon. Add school work to the mix and you have got one tired Mama!
Then I hit on some creative ways to make my children more independent.
My sixteen-year-old usually failed to finish her school work and yet blamed me for lagging behind. I handed her the lesson planner and forced her to create her own schedule. Now she is responsible to make sure she finishes learning all her subjects by the end of the school year in order to avoid summer school.
My nine-year-old once needed his pants glued to a seat in order to keep him at his work site. It seemed I was constantly forcing him to finish his work. I decided to give him the chance to finish all his daily work by himself in exchange for allowing him to skip spelling and reading for the day. I told him he could only attend his weekly Trail Life meetings if he memorized his multiplication facts one family at a time.
When my daughter’s dog broke her chain and needed regular walks each day, I put the ball in her court by refusing to let her go to her friend’s houses until she had the chain situation fixed. Guess what? The chain was fixed that morning.
My oldest son is now in the habit of getting up before me and taking his work out. He completes everything he can do on his own. Instead of pushing and pulling him to get finished before dinner time, he rarely works past noon. His reading level has increased. His math skills have soared past his grade level, and he can identify prepositions, nouns, and verbs with little thought.
My middle son has had his appetite for independence satisfied by getting to do many age-appropriate projects without mom! By paying attention to his obvious need for independence, I helped him find healthy and safe alternatives to the constant mischief he was getting into. Now more of my time is spent enjoying his developmental milestones rather than feeling like I was chasing after a loose cannon.
My daughter now takes the initiative and packs lunches for all of us when we’re headed out for an appointment. She not only gets up early enough to get ready but also has time left to help the rest of us.
My oldest son has taken the lead in making sure to help the three-year-old get breakfast and buckled in when we go out.
Proper discipline is key in teaching autonomy and independence and creating helpful, well-behaved children. By establishing and pointing out natural motivators to my children and following through with negative, logical, and natural consequences, I’ve encouraged them to be independent. Fostering appropriate opportunities for them to exert their independence has also curtailed their mischievousness.
So perhaps I haven’t cornered the market, but I’m on my way!
Lisa Blauvelt (with her family and three dogs, two cats, a horse, pony, donkey, two red-eared turtles, a fluctuating number of tadpoles and baby fish, and various other creatures collected by her adventurous boys) puts her education degrees to work at her home in the Deep South. There she teaches not only her own children but others who come to her home to learn. Her decade-long experience in teaching children to read will soon be published as a 476-page guide for parents.
