Your Job as a Role Model

Your Job as a Role Modelare taught.
What is the take home message? The main thing
A certain educator was once asked at what pointfor you to realize is that you have far more
should a parent begin to prepare for child raising.influence on your child than you probably realize.
"How old are you?" the educator inquired.Your child is going to pattern himself after you.
"Twenty-three."That is how nature set it up. Your job as a parent
"You should begin twenty-three years ago."is to be the best role model that you can be.
What is the message? The single most importantTrue, it is hard, but that is the way it is.
thing a parent can do to educate a child is toThe following is a story I heard recently that
provide the child with a good role model. A parentbrings out the extent to which your child learns
has to work a whole lifetime becoming the typefrom your actions.
of person that he wants his child to become.A certain kindergarten teacher once warned a
The most important people in the world in thegroup of parents to be careful how they behave
child's eyes are his parents. They are his first andin front of their children.
most important teachers. The behavior of a child's"By the way your children play in school," she said.
parents leaves a permanent impression in the"I know which of you treat each other
child's subconscious mind. Why is this so? Therespectfully. I know which of you use foul
reason is that the most reliable source of prioritieslanguage at home. I know everything about how
and values in a child's eyes is his parents. Childrenyou behave in your home by the way your child
have an innate trust in their parents. They feelplays, talks, and behaves."
that everything their parents say and do is theRemember, you might think that everything that
true and proper way to behave.goes on in your home behind closed doors is
We all wish our children would do what we sayhidden from the world, but it is not. Your child
and not what we do. However, this is not howsees everything. Your child is going to take your
the mind of a child works. The intellect of a child isbehavior and broadcast it to the world. Make sure
undeveloped. As a result, children function anthat what he is transmitting is something that you
emotional level, absorbing more from what theywant the world to see.
see and hear around them than from what they