Hol up. A little off topic, but a better goal is to be a supportive and loving parent. Don't have kids with a goal to have them do X by Y. Children are there own person. Guide them, direct them, support them, teach them, but their goals should be their own.
A better mission might be to help your kids explore their own interests, find what they're passionate about, and then do whatever you can to foster and encourage that interest.
I have a kid who I taught to read by 2 years old. That was a mission. She hated it and hated me for it at the time.
But I just came off a 2 hour session with her teaching her SEO. She was jumping to do it, because that early reading taught her how to be self-sufficient in learning things herself from the very beginning.
Another mission was to teach her how to find and learn anything she wants in a short period of time. I did that and now she complains to me that her friends want her to do everything for them.
I told her that's how she makes money. By doing the things that other people are too lazy to do.
The point is that your mission with your kids is to actually force generic life skills down your children's throats. It's not an option!!!
Teach them to read! Teach them basic life values! Teach them global techniques that they can apply to learn anything they want later. These things are not something you leave up to kids -- unless they are learning disabled somehow.
Now she is interested in art, music, computers -- none of which I taught her, because she was able to quickly learn it herself.
A lot of parents just hands-off the kids, particularly in the early stages, and then you end up with a kid that is socially stilted, or unable to do anything for themselves later.
> The point is that your mission with your kids is to actually force generic life skills down your children's throats. It's not an option!!!
You're presenting a false dichotomy, where the only options are either forcing skills down your children's throats, or being completely hands off. There's a way to teach them good skills that doesn't include forcing them to hit arbitrary deadlines for reading and calculus, and making a 2 year old hate you in the process.
I'm glad this parenting style has worked for you, but it's not a generically applicable way to raise kids.
Put her in an environment that she can only navigate by reading signs?
Flashcards and the conditional withholding of food?
Then i had her put simple words together - syllable by syllable. It was shocking how quickly she learned.
But the key to it was DISCIPLINE.
It was not something she could avoid or say that she did not feel like doing it today. I was cold and unemotional about it. Because its as basic a skill as breathing in the modern world.
As she got older, we spent the summers reading 2 novels each week (Jack Vance). Then as she finished a chapter, i had her bring it to me and summarize what she read.
This is how she learned complex vocabulary. Through practical use. She got A's in anything related to language from the beginning of school.
Coincidentally -- its the same way how i learn new computer languages, by diving into real projects immediately.
Children are definitely their own person and I generally agree with what you're saying, but sometimes kids don't develop their own goals. Then they graduate from high school and their childhood is basically over and they have no inner voice driving them in a certain direction.
This is happening with someone I know right now and the anxiety that it's creating is making the problem much worse.