Week 5: When Choices are bad for kids All content from Tim Elmore’s Habitudes Experience

When Choices are bad for Students/Kids Tim Elmore wrote “I am part of a generation of adults who have evolved over the last three decades. We have changed the way we discipline students. We’ve changed the way we reward our kids. We’ve even changed the way we talk to our children. I see it in classrooms, as faculty members are forced to handle their students differently, for fear of parental backlash. I see it in coaches, who guide young athletes. I definitely see it in parents.” One shift in today’s culture has transformed kids’ attitudes and actions for the worse. It has harmed students emotionally, fostering both depression and entitlement. It’s giving them too many choices at the wrong times of development and task. It’s all about the choices we give them at an early age. For some reason, we’ve lost sight of the fact that children mature at different paces— cognitively and emotionally.  This means they may be smart enough to comprehend the options in front of them, but are not emotionally prepared to make a good choice because their frontal lobe is still immature. We somehow believe that if they’re smart, they are mature. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Too Many Choices Too Early Parenting went awry when we decided to offer kids choices on almost everything. For example, at meal-time, millions of moms ask their children if they want this entrée or that one. While this seems like an innocent decision, two realities occur: Children expect to experience only what they want. Children become overwhelmed at the options they face. For example, when I was growing up, my mom cooked most of our meals—and they were good meals—but there was no choice. We ate what she prepared. If we didn’t eat it, she’d wrap it up and put it in the refrigerator, knowing we’d be hungry eventually. If we went hungry, it was our own doing. Can you guess what happened? I learned to eat lots of different kinds of foods. My wife and I did the same thing in our home. Certainly, we learned the preferences of our kids’ taste buds along the way, but we tried to feed them well-rounded menus. They were too young to make a wise decision on their own.

Insights on Offering Appropriate Choices Remember, becoming an adult is not only about making good decisions, but it’s about learning how to live with scenarios where there are no choices. Choices should start small and few. Adults should watch how well a kid manages these opportunities and options before they give more responsibilities. Adults must model wise decisions if we have any hope of equipping our emerging generation do the same. We can’t expect what we don’t exemplify. Each year, look for opportunities to extend the options for your students, moving from simple, transactional decisions (like food, clothes, sports to play) to choices where the stakes are higher (programs to watch, friends, how late to stay out, etc.) Adults must always allow students to see that every choice carries benefits and consequences. If we remove either one, we fail to teach them how life works. Task: Talk in a small group about how these items directly impact your life and give examples of how you can use the same approach to help other students make appropriate choices