How to Help Your Child Reach Their Full Potential
What does the video above have to do with your query about how to help your child reach their full potential? It requires a little reading between the lines of the quote from Grace VanderWaal. In her interview with Rolling Stone, VanderWaal stated:
“It’s about how I’ve gone through so many different phases and styles and friendships, and it’s about how now, I think that this is who I want to be and this is what I want my life path to be.”
Grace VanderWaal | Rolling Stone
The key words are “who I want to be” which are ultimately steeped in a young person’s desire and ability to chase after and attain their dreams. While most kids, who are un-jaded by the passage of time and experience, have the desire to be whomever and whatever they want to be, few ever grow-up to realize their full potential. Did you? Unfortunately the answer is the same for most of us. It’s for this reason that you want to help your children/students shoot for the moon and lasso it too. Below are powerful steps to making that happen. Read ahead and get ready to foster the next generation of superstars!
5 Powerful Ways to Help Your Kids / Students Reach Their Full Potential
Unlearn Limitations
If a young Elon Musk told his parents that he would one day fly people to the moon for leisure excursions, they would probably have smiled, patted him on the head, and said “Sure, Honey” before eventually handing him pamphlets to Queen’s University in Ontario to get his degree for a more “sensible” career. It’s the response most of us received in youth. We’re told that we can become anything, but as we pass through adolescence most teachers and parents begin to talk about aptitudes, pensions, RRSPs, and other things that plant seeds of fear that perhaps maybe our dreams are too whimsical to chase.
Don’t let that happen.
Instead, hold steadfast in your resolve to let your kids know that they can and will achieve their biggest dreams even if they (and YOU) can’t yet see how it will unfold. Teach them, and yourself, to unlearn everything they’ve heard about limitations. Meanwhile. you can start buying tickets to the moon in time for next spring break.
Empower Them with Resources to Soar!
Unlearning limitations is only effective if children are empowered to go after their dreams. However, the resources we’re referencing aren’t financial in nature. Instead, information is all of the currency that your young child needs to get a head-start. The Plant a Seed & See What Grows Foundation’s Seeds of Inspiration and Plant a Seed – Read! programs seek to empower Canadian kids to that end. Visit the respective links to learn more, while gathering other reference materials (hardcopy and online) based upon your child’s early ambitions.
Teach Them About the Benefits of Hard Work (while having fun)
No dreams are achieved, and no potential is fully realized, without hard work. It’s important for your child to understand this early in life. That being said, lessons about hard work must be delivered in a manner that does not scare them away. Follow our 3-Step Guide for How to Teach Kids to Work Hard (while having fun).
Help Them Battle the Beast of Procrastination
Never mind the monster in the closet and creature under the bed. The biggest beast to face in your child’s chase to reach their full potential is procrastination. It’s the number-one party pooper of dreams. Follow this 5 Step Guide to Breaking the Cycle of Childhood Procrastination which can be employed at home and at school.
Stand Back and Let Them Take Charge
This one if for you (especially Moms and Dads) and it won’t be easy. Your paternal instincts may be to hold your child’s hand through nearly every challenging undertaking, but you do them a disservice if you do. As long as you have initiated everything above, and continue to provide them with emotional and motivational support, they will have all they need to make magic happen. For classroom settings, have kids decide upon leadership roles and responsibilities for given projects, and watch them take charge (although they may stick you with the grunt work).
The Plant a Seed & See What Grows Foundation works tirelessly to inspire and promote healthy living for kids across Canada. Help us help the next generation by pledging your support too! View more on how you can get involved.
