As promised, here’s my follow-up to the last post entitled, Identifying Talents at a Young Age. You’ll want to initially visit this prior post in order to lay down some ground work and then proceed to the building process by reading today’s info. I’ve decided to give you a little behind-the-scenes look at how “Begin with the end in mind” has played out in the lives of my personal, real-life child stars: Toodlez, Junior, and Little Man. Let’s start with a recap of the two fundamental steps that should be applied when participating in the ongoing child talent development process:
- identify your child’s strengths, natural talents, skills, and interests (at as early an age as possible) and then,
- provide them with opportunities to develop in those areas.
For starters, I’m going to take you through both steps for each of my three children, starting with Toodlez. I can’t possibly spell out all of the wondrous complexities of my children in this one blog piece and I definitely don’t want to belabor the discussion, so I’ll just give you a little insight into how Husband and I have tackled the child talent development steps. Here we go.
Step #1 for Toodlez: strong in STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) areas with a high acuity in math, highly artistic in the visual arts, strong in hands-on techniques, cooking guru, hair care experimenter, gardening cultivator, analytical thinker, strong critical thinking skills, creative, artistic designer, instructor, strong interpersonal skills, content creator…
Step #2 for Toodlez: has always had free rein to personally express her creative flair through music, cooking, hair care, gardening, and visual arts such as drawing and painting; attended challenging magnet elementary and middle schools that provided a strong scholastic foundation; took honors courses in middle school and AP/IB/Honors courses in high school in subjects such as Calculus and Physics; participated in rigorous art program in high school; tutors children in STEM subjects and projects; works as an engineering intern/co-op; is a Senior Mechanical Engineering student with plans to graduate May 2019.
Step #1 for Junior: strong in STEM areas with a high acuity in math, highly competitive, athlete, entrepreneurial, enjoys working behind-the-scenes and discovering the inner workings of things, researcher, multi-faceted, analytical thinker, strong critical thinking skills, strong interpersonal skills, technical and computer guru, content creator…
Step #2 for Junior: has always had free rein to explore entrepreneurial efforts and has done app and website design and development as well as graphic design; attended challenging magnet school programs from elementary through high school which all provided a strong scholastic foundation; took honors courses in middle school and AP/Honors courses in high school in subjects such as Calculus and Calculus II; participated in a science magnet in high school and in Project Lead the Way (PLTW) with a focus on STEM studies; played basketball for middle school, high school, and other competitive leagues; participated in math competitions; is a Freshman Electrical Engineering student starting out his college career.
Step #1 for Little Man: highly creative, innovative, and imaginative; artistic in the visual arts; strong in hands-on techniques; has a dedicated interest in constructing things of all magnitudes; favorite toys to play with are Legos; very determined and persistent; artistic designer…
Step #2 for Little Man: has free rein to construct and build at will; is constantly creating things with Legos; makes all kinds of visual artistic work like drawings, paintings, and 3-D sculptures of robots; performs DIY projects using recycled, repurposed, and everyday household items; is a worker bee that enjoys activities where he can get his hands involved; will look into future participation in his school’s robotics program.
Now that I’ve taken you on my “begin with the end” journey, using my children as examples, it’s time to get going on steps 1 and 2 with your own kiddos (if you haven’t done so already). There’s no time like the present. Obviously, since none of us parents are all-knowing, we won’t realistically be able to see the end from the beginning when it comes to our children’s outcomes in life. However, an increasing clarity amongst the unknown will become apparent when we, as parents, do our best to assist our children along their child talent development pathway. We accomplish this by sharing with them those valuable life lessons we’ve learned and allowing what they’re good at and passionate about to be cultivated (with the caveat that we won’t encourage destructive interests that could negatively affect our children’s success in life).
Husband and I made a conscientious effort to be involved in our children’s talent development from the beginning of their existence; and at this point in time, we are reaping the following benefits: one child with an engineering position waiting for her once she graduates in May, one engineer/entrepreneur in the making, and one future architect perhaps (has yet to be determined). Furthermore, I’m a big proponent of children utilizing their talents for the family business. So, you’re going to see contributions from my artistic design team (Toodlez and Little Man) and technical subject matter expert (Junior) being displayed throughout Degrees of Maternity. Keeping it all in the family. Anyway, let’s just say that investing in your children now is sure to pay off big dividends for them (and you too) in the future.
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