The normal life of many parents today is that their time is often very full, but there is no dedicated time left for their children. Companionship is the best education. Excellent family education is the influence that parents have on their children intentionally or unintentionally during joint activities with their children.

Many parents are usually busy with work and sometimes cannot help but start the discipline mode when they are with their children. This is actually the most annoying thing for their children.

In fact, only in the purposeless company of parents can children develop a sense of belonging, security, and reveal their true selves. At this time, education will not only happen naturally, but the effect will be extremely obvious.

For example, you can have breakfast and dinner with your children every day, play some family games with your children, or read together for 15 minutes before going to bed. If you really don’t have time, you can regularly go hiking, going to parks, or visiting museums with your children on weekends and holidays.

It is love that connects parents and children, and companionship itself can bring a deep sense of satisfaction to each other. The establishment of a trusting relationship between parents and children is more important than all scientific parenting methods.

Principal Li Xigui has a famous saying, "Education is actually the study of relationships." In schools, if the relationship between teachers and students is good, education cannot be bad. This rule is the same at home. If the quality of companionship is high, the child cannot be bad.

The most basic premise for educating children is to have a bottom line. What is the bottom line? It is a discipline that must be followed. For example, "You must go home on time after school."

Of course, children need to set different bottom lines for each age group. Parents can discuss with their children every year on their children’s birthdays to determine the bottom line requirements for the next stage, and fully explain the reasons to their children. You may not necessarily listen to your child, but you must explain the reasons clearly to your child. And, the bottom line is no bargain.

However, as long as the child does not break the bottom line, try not to impose too many discipline requirements on him.

If, in addition to the bottom line, you keep saying "no" to your children, and this won't work and that won't work, then the children won't know what they can do, and they will be timid and afraid of taking responsibility, let alone their sense of innovation.

While determining the bottom line, you must also clarify what disciplinary measures you will take if your child fails to reach the bottom line. The "punishment measures" here refer to some small daily rules and small prices. For example, "You can't eat meat if you can't finish your vegetables", "You can't play with toys if you can't finish your homework", etc.

Once you have determined this bottom line, you can write the content down or even print it out, making two copies, one posted in the child's room and one posted somewhere where all family members can see it.

For children, parents are undoubtedly the authority and have great power.

However, if you always use power to suppress your children, you may indeed "win" your children more often than not. But the child became a loser time and time again. If children fail frequently, they will either become rebellious or become blindly obedient.

In fact, what we parents really need is not to "win" our children, but to "win" our children so that they understand and trust us.

Therefore, we should use less power and more rules.

The rules are different from the bottom line mentioned in Article 2. The bottom line is mandatory and there is little room for bargaining. But we cannot make rules unilaterally, they must be negotiated with our children. Similar to the bottom line, in addition to established rules, parents can no longer make arbitrary and endless demands on their children.

Parents need to be kind but firm if their children don't follow the rules. We need to let our children understand the rules, rather than forcing them to follow them. For children who have not yet formed a good sense of rules, do not determine too many rules at once. You can start with easier ones and then more difficult ones, and gradually improve them.

All good habits are not innate but need to be cultivated over time. But cultivating good habits is not that easy. Often when a child cries or acts coquettishly, the parents relent and give up.

What we have to do is to design strategies and give children a scaffolding so that they can climb up the ladder of good habits more easily.

For example, almost all parents want to cultivate the habit of reading in their children. Then whenever we go out in the future, we must bring a small schoolbag with the child's favorite book in it. After you go out, it doesn't matter whether you watch it or not. Let the children know at all times that even if they go out, there is still a favorite book in the small schoolbag behind me. Just such a hint is actually a scaffolding. According to such self-awareness and psychological hints, it is easier for children to develop the habit of reading. Instead of parents forcing their children to read at home every day, "If you want to read, you must read."

For another example, if you want to cultivate the habit of eating vegetables in your child, don’t put all the meals on the dining table together. Put the vegetables that your child must eat but usually doesn’t like to eat on the dining table first, so that he can eat them first when his appetite is better. Finished vegetables.

For another example, if you want to cultivate the habit of sleeping on time in your children, you must set a good family schedule. You can use 15 minutes before bed as parent-child reading time, and start reading together as soon as the time is up. After reading together, children usually go to bed on time.

This is "designing strategies and cultivating habits". Habits cannot be achieved overnight, they are gradually developed following the strategy.

Developing habits is important, but a child’s growth is a gradual process and cannot be rushed. For example, if a one or two-year-old child just starts learning to eat, grasping with hands may be the most effective way, but it will definitely make a mess on the table and clothes. But at a certain age, children will easily learn how to use chopsticks and spoons. Don't worry, it will come naturally as you age.

Understand this and don't blame your child when he first messes up. Parents themselves should not get angry, nor should they take the place of their children. Gradually, they will do better on their own. Children will feel confident in their abilities just from something as simple as eating, which is the most precious thing. What parents have to do is to help their children build ladders and turn difficulties into easy ones.

For another example, if you want your child to tidy up his room, we'd better give him a list of items that need to be tidied up and teach him how to do it. With such a grip, the child will know what to do. This is the scaffolding and the ladder.

For another example, cultivating children's reading habits will not allow them to leap from picture books to text reading in one step. You can buy some "bridge books" for your children, which are illustrated text books, to help your children improve their reading level.

For children, parents always criticize too much and praise too little. When we see any shortcomings in our children, we can’t help but criticize them and hope that they will become better.

Take a step back and think about it. In fact, good behavior usually accounts for more than 85% of children's behavior, and bad behavior only accounts for about 15%. When we think that a child has no merits that can be praised, it is not the child's problem, but the problem with the way we view the child. Why do we often fail to see 85% of good behaviors?

Therefore, parents must develop the habit of encouraging their children at any time. When your child continues to realize his own strengths through your encouragement, these good behaviors will solidify into his habits and make him shine.

What about the 15% of bad behaviors? We must have an idea in mind. Simply criticizing is useless. What we should do is reflect with our children regularly. Note that these two words are important: reflective and regular.

Reflection is to help children summarize and attribute problems that occurred within a certain period of time and find ways to improve them. For example, if you are late for school because you stayed in bed because you delayed going to bed the night before, then the problem of sleeping on time is solved. Find the reasons together and find ways to improve. This is called reflection, not criticism.

Regularity is also very important, not just saying it every day or saying it when you see it, but once a week or two weeks and reflecting on it regularly.

Of course, Principal Li Xigui repeatedly reminded that reflection is on the behavior itself, not on the child himself. Every time you encourage or reflect, remember to address the situation and not the person.

We have to believe that every child has some important abilities that can affect the world, but each person's potential may be manifested in different aspects, that's all.

If it is discovered that a child has obvious shortcomings in a certain aspect, parents should immediately shift their attention to discover the child's talents in other areas; shifting their attention does not mean giving up, but helping the child find a broader path. Children who are not good at mathematics may have advantages in humanities or art; children who do not like to play the piano may just have no advantage in keyboard skills and can try dance, painting, chorus and other arts.

If you are unwilling to accept the shortcomings in your child's talent and insist on focusing on it, it will inevitably make the child feel frustrated and lead to confrontation. Not only will the parent-child relationship become tense, but it will also affect the child's possible development in other aspects.

What parents have to do is to help their children motivate themselves and let them discover their potential.

The reason why a child makes mistakes is often because he does not have the resources to do more meaningful things. What parents have to do is to provide their children with resources beyond their expectations in the right direction, so that their development in this area will have a clear advantage compared with their peers. With resources, children will gradually develop their own awareness and ability, value their own time, love life, and then cherish life.

If you want your children to love sports, parents can buy some simple sports equipment for their children, or even go a step further and turn the living room into a table tennis court, which can allow children to exercise and attract them to play with their peers.

If you want your children to love reading, parents can take their children to bookstores more often, or they can regularly browse book websites with their children to discuss book purchase plans. Parents buy, and children buy too, and we choose together.

If you want your children not to watch unhealthy cartoons, parents can help their children find some healthy documentaries and elegant feature films, and provide them with better viewing conditions.

This is so subtle that most parents may not be aware of it.

Children often like a certain subject because they like the teacher, and the teacher in turn likes the child more because the child likes him, making it easier to discover the child's strengths.

When the relationship is good, school education will enter a virtuous cycle, and parents should promote such a virtuous cycle. The more children do not approve of a teacher, parents have to repeatedly find ways to find some characteristics in the teacher that are recognized by their children. The recognition you convey to the teacher will also slowly affect the child's view of the teacher.

In turn, parents should also find ways to obtain recognition of their children from teachers, even a little bit, and then pass it on to their children in a timely manner.

As a parent, you have to deliver good news from both ends, so that children like teachers more and teachers like children more.

The teacher may introduce your child's situation to you in two parts, not only talking about the advantages but also the disadvantages. I tell you some of your children's problems, not to complain to you, but to make it easier for you to educate your children.

At this time, parents must be careful not to directly pass on the problems pointed out by the teacher to their children. This may easily cause the children to have negative emotions towards the teacher.

In the process of educating children, conflicts between parents and children are inevitable. Once a conflict occurs, the parents will be in a bad mood, and the children will also be in a bad mood. When a child is in a bad mood, he actually blocks out the entire world, including of course his parents’ education.

Principal Li Xigui’s last principle is to deal with conflicts: deal with your mood first, and then deal with things.

When a conflict occurs, the more anxious and angrily the parents face their children, the stronger the children's resistance will be. Therefore, parents must first deal with their own emotions.

You calm down first and then deal with your child's emotions. Depending on the situation, you can let the child talk or cry, or let him meditate, hiding in a room alone, listening to music, taking deep breaths, etc. to relieve the pain. Talk to your child again after his or her emotions have calmed down.

Parents can listen to their children's stories with full attention without interrupting them; they can respond to their children by repeating their words without judging them. Each retelling actually means, "I heard it and I agree with it"; parents also need to think about it. The underlying reasons for children's emotions are not just superficial.

Give the child time and believe that the child will calm down and think about it later. Then parents can move strategically to the next activity (an activity within the family's daily plan), such as going to grandparents' or grandparents' house together, shopping together, organizing bookcases together, etc.