12 Ways To Set Your Kids Up For Success

A look at the childhood and family background of some of the most successful people found anywhere today shows the vital role their parents played in cultivating habits that would see them succeed as business executives and captains of industries later in life. As a parent, there are habits you need to inculcate in your kid to set him/her up for success in life. Here are the 12 ways you can set up your child for success in today’s Nigerian society.

1. Make them do home chores

It is important to teach your kids to always partake in doing home chores. It is wrong for you to raise your child in a way that he/she never gets to do anything at home after school or over the weekends.

Most Nigerian parents, especially the elites believe home chores are the sole responsibilities of housemaids and servants. According to Julie Lythcott-Haims, former Dean of Freshman at Stanford University, and the author or “How to Raise an Adult”, kids who grew up doing home chores end up becoming successful employees who can get things done without assistance and collaborate well with other workers when the need to work as a team arises.

Engaging in home chores will help you kids learn how to be good team players in any organization they find themselves later in life. Doing home chores such as washing clothes, doing the dishes, cooking, cleaning the house, etc teaches your kids the importance of contributing their quota to making the home they live in a more conducive place.

Teaching your kids the importance of doing home chores and ensuring they help with the home chores help them understand how to come up with solutions to problems in the workplace.

Helping with the chores will also help your kids realize that they do not need to wait for others to get things done. Doing home chores make your kids more self-disciplined and responsible.

2. Teach your kids good social skills

According to results from a 20 year study carried out by researchers from Pennsylvania State University and Duke University, children with good social skills are more likely to be college graduates and be gainfully employed before they turn 25.

There are things no one will teach your kids in Nigerian schools, and these social skills are some of them. You need to teach your child good communication skills, how to respect others and relate effectively in every setting.

A child’s ability to communicate with others, help others solve their problems, come up with solutions to issues troubling everyone in a group he/she belongs to make the whole difference in determining the type of future the child will eventually have. A child with good social skills in Nigeria has much higher chances of taking his/her academics all the way to the university level and become gainfully employed, while a child with inadequate social skills have higher chances of becoming an “agbero” in a place like Lagos and likely end up in prison for killing someone during a fight.

Teaching your kids good social skills early in life helps them learn good morals and values that direct them on the right part.

3. Have great expectations for their future

Results from studies carried out by Professor Neal Halfon and his colleagues from The University of California, Los Angeles have shown that parents who saw their kid earning a college degree train up their child toward that goal despite their economic status.

Having a great expectation for your child’s future helps you train up the child in line with the great expectation you have for him/her. For instance, if you want your child to become a medical doctor, lawyer, engineer, scientist, etc, from any of the reputable Nigerian universities, the academic expectation you have for the child will enable you train the child to love education and fall in love with the particular professional path you expect the child to toe.

Some ways you could get the child to love such academic paths you have in mind for him or her is to tell the child success stories of people you know such as friends or relatives who became successful by becoming lawyers, doctors, engineers, accountants, scientists, etc.

You can also get some toys, cartoons and video games that help the child develop interest in that particular field.

4. Maintain good morals as a parent

According to a study review by The University of Illinois, children from parents who get along fare better than children from parents who are always having conflicts.

Children from parents who are morally bankrupt do not really amount to anything great in life. As an immoral parent, you are more likely to have more conflicts with your spouse and this goes a long way to determine dominant behaviors in your kids.

It is a common thing in Nigerian families to see that a man beats up his wife regularly over minor issues. This type of behavior will rub off on the child in no time because kids pay more attention to what you do more than they do to what you say.

Kids from a conflict-ridden home grow up becoming violent as well, which explains why a number of them grow into chain smokers, binge drinkers, rapists, kidnappers, armed robbers, etc.

Most children who join cults in Nigerian universities had rough childhood as a result of divorce and other conflicts between their parents.

5. Take education serious.

A 2014 study carried out by The University of Michigan Psychologist Sandra Tang and her colleagues showed that mothers who attended college are more likely to raise kids who would do the same. As a parent, you are expected to live by example.

If you want to raise kids who will grow up to love education, you must do your best to pursue your own academics to a certain level to enable your kids know you value education. In spite of the harsh economic conditions in Nigeria today, most parents who were unable to go further in their academics have found ways to acquire more academic qualifications such as part-time degree programs diploma programs, etc.

Apart from helping your kids know you value education and they are expected to do so, it increases your chances of getting a good job with a good pay to enable you train your kids up to the university level.

6. Help them master their Mathematics and English early

According to a Greg Duncan, a Northwestern University researcher, mastering math skills early predicts both future math achievement and future reading skills. Most subjects taught in the Nigerian educational system requires the use of English and mathematical knowledge.

It is important you pay attention to your kids’ school assignments right from their kindergarten years and help them catch up on time.

Developing good mathematics skills early in life helps your child to understand the use of numbers, which is important for future business and financial success.

7. Have a good relationship with your child

According to a study conducted in 2014 by Lee Raby a Minnesota University psychologist on 243 people born into poverty, children who receive adequate parental care from age 1 to 3 fare better in academics success and enjoy healthier relationships than children who did not.

Most Nigerian parents are so busy with either work or business that they neglect the importance of building a strong bond with their kids. Studies have shown that giving your child good parental care during the early years helps the child’s intellectual development.

Children who get all the attention they need during their first 3 years of life grow up catching up in school faster than children who were left at the mercy of the nonchalant housemaids or nanny.

8. Keep your stress levels under control

Issues of stress, depression, anxiety, etc can affect a child’s mood and behaviors as the child grow up. According to a recent research reported by the Washington post, a mother who is constantly stressed or depressed might end up infecting her child with such negative feelings because kids easily pick up their parents’ behaviors like they would pick up a common cold,

Kei Numaguchi from Bowling Green State University said. Living in a busy place like Lagos can add to your stress and depression as a parent, especially when you have to endure the heavy traffic to get home from work every day.

It is advisable you get a job closer to your home or better still have a business of your own in the neighborhood to help you ease stress while nursing your babies.

9. Teach them to value efforts over avoiding failures
 

Over the years, Carol Dweck, Stanford University psychologist has found both kids and adults think about success in certain ways. Maria Popova from the Always Fantastic Brain Pickings sums it up this way:

A Fixed Mindset assumes that our intelligence, character, and creative ability are static gifts we cannot change in any way, and success is just a result of these inherent gifts. This mindset makes one strive for success while avoiding failure as a way of maintaining a sense of skillfulness and smartness.

A growth mindset on the other hand is all about facing challenges and see every failure as an opportunity to put in more efforts in order to become better rather than see failures as proof of unintelligence.

If your kids do well in a test and you tell them their success was because they are naturally intelligent, it creates a fixed mindset in the kids. But where you make them believe it was because they put in good effort, it helps create a growth mindset in the kids.

10. Be a working parent

According to reports by researchers from Harvard Business School professor Kathleen L. McGinn to Business Insider and working knowledge, being a working mum is quite beneficial to your child’s development.

It is great to be a full-time housewife to enable you have all the time to give your kids the parental attention they need, but that may not be the best option when it comes to the child’s development.

Most parents in Nigerian cities such as Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, etc make sure their kids stay back in school for extra moral classes after school until they close from work and pick them up. These extra moral classes help the child spend more time in school and learn more.

Another benefit of having a job outside home is that your kids will learn to do home chores more as you won’t be home all day to fix things before they come back from school.

11. You earn a decent wage

According to Sean Reardon from The Stanford University, the achievement gap between high income families and low income families is quite huge.

Children who are born into poor families grow up disadvantaged because their parents could not send them to the best schools. Quality education is quite expensive in Nigeria, but in the end, it is well worth it.

When you see children who have attended some of the best schools in Lekki, Ikeja, Abuja, etc, you need not be told they have been equipped to scale great heights in life. Your economic status most times determine the quality of education your child gets.

According to Dan Pink the author of “Drive”, your level of income determines your kids SAT scores. So find ways to raise your game such as starting a new business, getting a better job, or whatever you can do to raise more money to be able to afford quality education for your kids.

12. Teach them to use the powers of their creative imagination

According to a 2013 research by Angela Duckworth a Pennsylvania University Psychologist, there is powerful success-driven trait called “grit” which helps kids imagine a great future, stay committed to that future until they achieve it.

Kids who learn to dream and imagine early in life end up more successful in their chosen professions. Let them understand they can dream to become the president of Nigeria or the governor of Lagos state.

Imagination is free they don’t have to pay for it. Teach them to imagine flying an airplane is they want to be pilots. Using the power of their imaginations will help them become more creative and ambitious, which all contribute to their success in life.

The 12 tips will help you set up your kids for success in life and make them compete with the best anywhere they find themselves tomorrow.