The Self-Driven Child: Parent Book Club

This past Tuesday, a group of Primary and Middle School parents met to discuss a book, The Self-Driven Child. The book, by William Stixrud and Ned Johnson, dives into brain science research, case studies and the importance of giving our kids freedom to make decisions...fail... and learn from them. Starting with a discussion around the false assumptions:

• **There is one narrow path to success
• **Success in school = Success in life

**Parental pushing helps
**There is increasing danger in the world

We talked through several chapters about understanding the brain and decision making, stress, the struggle over homework and allowing our kids to make decisions. The parent group, ranging from nursery parents through grade 7, talked about their own struggles with giving kids freedom, but setting limits. 

These ideas stood out: 

• Don’t decide things that kids can decide themselves
• Set boundaries and them let kids manoeuver
• Help your kids make informed decisions
• Use collaborative problem solving
• Allow children to go with their choice if it isn’t crazy (what aunt, uncle teacher or coach might say is a terrible one)
• Children have to listen and think through options
• Be careful if child is depressed, addicted

The book explain the reasons as to why we should let kids make decisions:

• The brain develops according to how it’s used
• Suffering develops resilience
• Kids need practice making decisions before they can do so legally
• Kids need to understand and feel the consequences of decisions
• Parents/adults don’t always know best
• Kids are capable
• Kids need to pay attention to their emotions

A fascinating read and worth looking into as a parent of growing children. For the slideshow and other parent workshops that have occurred throughout the year, please see the side page with links to all. We appreciate parents who have joined us on a learning journey this year throughout all of our parent workshops.

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