Years ago I used to conduct a training program for children between the ages of 8 to 13. It was my dream project which gave me more satisfaction than any other training I have ever conducted. Unfortunately, like most dreams this too was shattered. Somehow parents who thought nothing of spending Rs.5000 on the latest toys and gadgets for their kids, suddenly became money conscious about investing a fraction of that amount for something which would stay with the children for the rest of their lives. The program wasn’t meant to generate profits, just break-even, but instead it broke my spirit. After hearing umpteen parents tell me that ‘it was too expensive’ (at that time is was only Rs.1600 for 2 days including meals), I lost my cool and told one father who was bargaining with me to tell his wife to shop for one dress less this season and they will have the money for their kid’s future! Needless to say the shopping spree won and I vowed never to conduct this program again.
Parents think that if their children are getting good marks at school then all is well. If teachers and neighbours are not complaining about their behaviour then the child is well adjusted and doing just fine. But the sometimes the real story is very different. In one of the sessions I conducted, a little girl whose father was the country manager for a large multinational bank, nearly broke down in tears during a desensitizing exercise in which she was asked what hurts her the most and who is responsible for this hurt? He reply was ‘my parents don’t think I’m as good as my older sister’. Upon probing further I learnt that the parents had a habit of always holding up the other sister as an example to “motivate” her to excel. But the kid was not excelling at anything, instead she was withdrawing further and further into her shell, and the parents had sent her to the program because they wanted to enhance her self-confidence. These parents were not evil, nor were they partial towards one child, they were merely following what they had learnt from their own parents.
My objective during these sessions was to create a safe, fun ‘adult free’ environment where the kids could learn to fly without being judged on the number of attempts it took. NLP techniques were used in the session to boost their self-confidence, raising their self-esteem and removing the effects of past negative conditioning and criticisms. My facilitators and I spent time with the kids individually to understand their communication strategies, we assessed which of the 7 intelligences were predominant in them. We taught them techniques of memory enhancement so that learning could become fun for them. All this information was passed on to their parents with suggestions on how to deal with them. I’m not sure how many parents actually took that advice on board, not many I’m sure, perhaps because it required too much effort to change their own behaviours.
There can be no satisfaction greater than to see the child whose mother claimed cannot be left alone because he would start crying amongst strangers, tell his parents to please leave and come back at 5 to pick him up. To see a petite 8 year old girl break a ½ inch wooden board with her fist, through sheer focus and mind power constitutes one of my personal proudest moments. When the shy introverted kid is cheered by his team to complete a task we renew our own faith in humanity. When 30 kids are told they are free to do what they like and they still behave with responsibility, then you know our future is secured.
Why did I focus so much on such small children when this program would have been easier to sell for the teens? Simply because I feel that most damage is done at this stage. If we can teach life skills early on, the chances are we will have confident, focused and strong teenagers. My disgruntlement over the parents’ attitude made me lose sight of the basic objective – the kids. Perhaps now I am ready once again to get up, shake-off the dust and make my dream a reality once again.
Parents think that if their children are getting good marks at school then all is well. If teachers and neighbours are not complaining about their behaviour then the child is well adjusted and doing just fine. But the sometimes the real story is very different. In one of the sessions I conducted, a little girl whose father was the country manager for a large multinational bank, nearly broke down in tears during a desensitizing exercise in which she was asked what hurts her the most and who is responsible for this hurt? He reply was ‘my parents don’t think I’m as good as my older sister’. Upon probing further I learnt that the parents had a habit of always holding up the other sister as an example to “motivate” her to excel. But the kid was not excelling at anything, instead she was withdrawing further and further into her shell, and the parents had sent her to the program because they wanted to enhance her self-confidence. These parents were not evil, nor were they partial towards one child, they were merely following what they had learnt from their own parents.
My objective during these sessions was to create a safe, fun ‘adult free’ environment where the kids could learn to fly without being judged on the number of attempts it took. NLP techniques were used in the session to boost their self-confidence, raising their self-esteem and removing the effects of past negative conditioning and criticisms. My facilitators and I spent time with the kids individually to understand their communication strategies, we assessed which of the 7 intelligences were predominant in them. We taught them techniques of memory enhancement so that learning could become fun for them. All this information was passed on to their parents with suggestions on how to deal with them. I’m not sure how many parents actually took that advice on board, not many I’m sure, perhaps because it required too much effort to change their own behaviours.
There can be no satisfaction greater than to see the child whose mother claimed cannot be left alone because he would start crying amongst strangers, tell his parents to please leave and come back at 5 to pick him up. To see a petite 8 year old girl break a ½ inch wooden board with her fist, through sheer focus and mind power constitutes one of my personal proudest moments. When the shy introverted kid is cheered by his team to complete a task we renew our own faith in humanity. When 30 kids are told they are free to do what they like and they still behave with responsibility, then you know our future is secured.
Why did I focus so much on such small children when this program would have been easier to sell for the teens? Simply because I feel that most damage is done at this stage. If we can teach life skills early on, the chances are we will have confident, focused and strong teenagers. My disgruntlement over the parents’ attitude made me lose sight of the basic objective – the kids. Perhaps now I am ready once again to get up, shake-off the dust and make my dream a reality once again.
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