I'm Nicholeen Peck and I am a parenting relationship expert. I also love the topic of education
and how people learn certain things. I know that there's 2 different types of intelligence.
Well, actually there's probably more. There's emotional intelligence. There's academic intelligence
and there's also practical intelligence. Practical intelligence is really powerful. In fact,
the people that usually end up jumping out into leadership to the world are the people
who know how to communicate with other people, they have leadership skills, they know how
to take risks and step out of their comfort zones. They're innovators, they start new
things. You know what? These people have practical intelligence. So, one thing that is a big
part of practically intelligence is social development. Many people have asked me, "How
to teach my child social skills?" Well, that's what this video is all about. There are 3
different ways that we can learn social. So, we can learn social from same age peers which
I think a lot of people think is a good way to learn social. Or we can learn social from
the media which I would think many people would not trust necessarily learning their
social skills from the media. Or we can learn our social skills in a very historical way
which is from our family. Now, what do you think about that idea? What I've recognized
is the majority of people would like to help their children learn social skills, how to
teach them how to succeed with other people. If you're that type of person, this is the
video for you. Every great teacher knows that the most important teaching principle is teaching
by example. If the teacher is not doing it, the students are not going to do it either.
Well, the same goes for our social skills. If we're going to teach our children how to
have great social skills, we have to have great social skills too. So, I want you to
write down on a piece of paper what you're great social skills are. Do you reach out
to other people? Do you step outside of your comfort zone? Do you compliment people? Are
you optimistic? What are some of your social strengths? There are many social strengths
to have. Write those things down. Then also, on another sheet of paper, write down what
you're social struggles are. You need to know that because what your social struggles are
will probably be the same social struggles that your children have. I homeschool 4 of
my children. I didn't get to homeschool any of my foster children. But all of my biological
children, I homeschool. And let me tell you what everybody asks you when you choose to
homeschool your children. They always say, "What about the social?" And everyone is really
worried about that. And I thought about that question a lot as I embarked upon this journey
of teaching my children at home. And I thought to myself, "Is there going to be enough social
development?" Because social is important. That practical intelligence factor actually
is oftentimes what it takes a person to that next level of success in relationships as
well as in business and many other things. And I wanted my children to have that edge
just like everybody else does. I also knew that my social skills were some of my greatest
strengths.But then I started looking around me, family to family. And remembering friends
from when I was young and thinking of their parents. And I recognize something. I recognize
that a person is only as social as their parents are. It is very rare for person to adopt better
social skills than their parents had. Unless they had more association with people who
were outside of the family. Some parents might ask, "Yes, well, I have a child who has social
skills that are worse than me. They're definitely not better than me. In fact, I feel like they're
had better ones and then they've gotten worse." Well, I might be asking you, "Well, what other
factor has been coming in as a big presence in that child's life?" Are they spending a
lot of time on TV, video games, the media? Are the spending a lot of times with friends
and not as much as time with family? Well then, that could start the dominant influence
in the life of the child. But hopefully for doing things correctly, we maintain that dominant
social influence in the lives of our children. And they will become just a social as we are.
Which means, if we're constantly improving our social skills, they are going to directly
benefit from that great example. One thing we can do to help our children have good social
education is to be deliberate about the process. It shouldn't be any secret that a person grows
and develops social skills. In fact, you should talk openly about the fact that you're going
to be helping your child develop social skills. You should make list with your child of what
skills they are good at. And what social skills they need help with. This isn't something
that's shameful. Everyone works on skills they don't have. Just like if I was good at
playing the piano, looking at the music but I wasn't good at site reading then I would
say, "I need to work on site reading." And that wouldn't be any personal slam to me.
But some people take their social skills very personally. And they feel like there might
be something wrong with them as a person if they have to work on social skills. Make sure
that any conversations that you have with your children are very open and casual and
don't carry that feeling just because there's something we're working on socially that there's
anything wrong with he person. Because there's certainly is not. So, make goals with your
child. In fact, have check up times with them on a regular basis so that they can see that
they are actually progressing socially. You may even want to factor in a few things like
positive consequences with some of the social training that you're doing. If you set a goal
for instance that you're child will choose not to complain. Did you know that complaining
is a bad social skill? It's called negative attention seeking. And it makes people not
want to be around you. So maybe you say, "You know, I've noticed that you have a problem
with complaining. This is a negative social skill. We're going to work on this." Everytime
that you complain, this is how we'll handle it. And this will be the native consequence.
But everytime you choose to be optimistic, we're going to recognize that and we're actually
going to show you a positive consequence. And this will be the positive. Maybe there'll
be some sort of little point system for a short-period of time. Don't ever do things
like that for too long because they don't last. Or maybe there will be something like
a tree or.... If they choose to conquer that deliberately on purpose. Social training is
vital for the success and the happiness of your child. Make sure you deliberately make
plans for how you can improve your social development and theirs. If you enjoy this
video, you're going to love the next video which is How To Parent A Strong-Willed Child?
Go ahead and click over here. You'll love it.