How to raise a driven child? You can use this golden formula as soon as you take it

I mentioned before that a child’s drive is naturally present in the body. The desire for knowledge, exploration, and the pursuit of self-worth are engraved in human DNA. The first thing we need to do is to protect it and not replace the child\’s inner spark with strong stimuli such as rewards and punishments. So, what should children do if their favorite things are also popular for three minutes? There are some things they don’t like, but they have to do them. Is there any way to stimulate their internal drive? In fact, psychology and neuroscience have conducted in-depth research on internal drive, and have also given out a scientific formula. I summarized it, and this formula is: sense of autonomy: I can choose what I want to do dopamine : This thing is fun and exciting. Sense of competence: I can do this well. Sense of connection: I can do this in an environment full of love and support. Have you noticed that when these 4 elements are present? At this time, we enter a virtuous internal drive cycle, and our brain can continuously generate and maintain power. How do you know your talents? 15 training methods for discovering god-level talents pdf. So when you feel that your child is not motivated enough for one thing, don’t worry, don’t be blind. What really helps is to conduct self-examination against these 4 elements: I Have you arranged your child\’s life too fullly and taken care of it too much, causing the child to lose his or her sense of autonomy? Is this thing too boring and boring to arouse your child\’s interest and excitement? Is the difficulty of the tasks I assign to my children appropriate, or do they need some help from me on something to feel competent? Have I ever made my child feel rejected instead of loved because of his poor grades and inability to do his homework? If we can investigate one by one in this way and solve the discovered problems in a targeted manner, then for most things, we can think of ways to maintain children\’s motivation. Take my daughter\’s English learning as an example. Old readers who often read our articles may know that my daughter particularly likes mathematics, but doesn’t like English very much. I have always been in a state of laissez-faire with her English. But recently, the English drama class my daughter is taking is about to have its final performance. The children have to memorize the lines and not make trouble for the teacher. In other words, during this time, I have to let my daughter work harder on English that she doesn’t like. Taking this opportunity, I also compared these 4 factors to find out the reasons why my daughter does not like English: 1) English learning focuses on memorization, which is relatively boring and lacks fun. 2) I don’t pay attention to her English and rarely practice it. She is not as good as other children in the class. She often cannot understand the words and sentences the teacher says, and she has no sense of competence. 3) When I took some online English classes with her in the past, she was often in a daze, and I was going to have a heart attack every minute, so I couldn\’t help scolding her with a straight face. As soon as I learned English, my mother turned into a fierce monster, and I became an unpleasant child with no sense of connection. Now that I have sorted out the problems, I plan to solve them one by one this time. ▎Dopamine The reward mechanism in the brain is triggered by dopamine. When we feel bored, dopamine levels in the prefrontal cortexIt will become very low, making it difficult for us to work intensively. This is why children can take a few hours to do simple homework, but once they say they can go buy ice cream after finishing it, they may finish it in fifteen minutes – the anticipation of ice cream makes the children\’s brains produce enough dopamine to stimulate them. They get to work. When I\’m working, I often need to buy some snacks to keep beside me to maintain my dopamine levels. Relying on food to stimulate dopamine is certainly not healthy enough. In fact, the easiest way to maintain dopamine is to let children do what they like, choose their favorite major, and work in the field they like. Image source: TV series \”Charlie\’s Diary\” But sometimes, children may have to do something they are not so interested in. What should they do at this time? The solution is to make boring things interesting. For example, my daughter likes to dance. When I was reciting English lines, I asked her to make up a dance move for each line. I used the bed at home as a stage and performed while reciting the lines. She was very excited. Another example is that when my daughter learns ballet, she needs to practice bending and reaching. This exercise is very boring, so I add some game elements – put a doll in front of her toes, and she will get one point if she can reach the doll. Therefore, my daughter often takes the initiative to ask for more exercises. , so as to beat his score from the previous day. I thought the message from a reader last time was particularly good. For practicing the piano day after day, she inspired her children to have fun by telling them the stories behind the music and watching videos of others immersed in happy performances. Another example is homework, which is the most troublesome thing for everyone. There are many ways to stimulate dopamine: you can exercise for a period of time every day to let dopamine rise to a high level, and then devote yourself to homework. You can also allow the child to play after finishing it, so that the anticipation of playing will produce dopamine. You can also let your children act as teachers to tell you homework, tell them the stories behind poems, and the origins of mathematical formulas… The motivation method suitable for each child is different, but as long as you focus on the right direction, you can always find a way. Let me talk about it again, why we are so opposed to repeated test questions, because work without fun will only kill children\’s drive, and in the long run, the losses will be too great. ▎The lines for my daughter’s English drama performance with a sense of competence were printed out on several A4 sheets of paper, including a very long English poem. If she recites it from beginning to end every day, it will easily make her feel frustrated – I can\’t do it well, so I might as well avoid it and stop doing it. Image source: Movie \”Amélie\” So, how can we make children feel competent? 1 keyword here – ideal challenge. What does that mean? That is, the task will neither be too simple, boring, or without a sense of accomplishment; nor will it be too difficult, causing too much frustration. Rather, it is within a reasonable range that \”can be reached by tiptoeing.\” This is the most ideal challenge and the challenge that children need most. So what do you do when something is just too difficult? Break down the task and break Mount Everest into small hillsides. For example, if an English poem is too long, I break it into several short paragraphs and practice one paragraph a week. English last weekendIn Chinese language class, my daughter was praised because she was particularly proficient in a short section of poetry, but she was so frustrated. For another example, when practicing horizontal splits in ballet, we also break down the difficulty – first lift one leg to a horizontal position, then practice the other leg, and wait until both legs are fully stretched and no longer hurt, then move both legs together. There is also piano practice. You can practice a piece of music every day for half an hour… In addition, every time I complete a small task, I will definitely say something to my daughter: You see, as long as you practice hard, you can do everything. Can do it well. Everyone should remember that the most important thing about a sense of competence is not how well a child can actually do (for example, it does not really need to be the best in English in the class), but what they believe they can do well. An inner feeling. So give up comparing, parents, in our case, the child is the best (and only in our case, he will always be the best, right?). There is a word called \”learned helplessness\”, and this, I call it \”learned competence\”. Of course, there are actually many methods here, such as how adults build scaffolding and how to cultivate children\’s growth mindset. We will expand on this next time. Picture source: TV series \”Mother\” ▎Sense of connection The sense of connection is an aspect that I reflect on myself. Although overall I have a very strong relationship with my daughter, there are times when I can’t help but turn into a fire-breathing monster. Once, when I was trying out an online math class with my daughter, she kept squirming around and not paying attention, and even ran away from her seat several times. At that time, I scolded her very angrily. Later I calmed down and felt that I had wrongly blamed her. In the online class that day, the teacher was really boring. Isn’t it natural for children to lose focus when they are bored? When we encounter this situation, the voice that immediately sounds in our hearts is: Why is this child so unfocused and unserious? But the fault actually lies not with the child, but with the task itself. Picture source: TV series \”Mom Isn\’t Here Tomorrow\” So now before I practice English with my daughter, I will do enough psychological construction first. Download the full set of the children\’s educational cartoon \”Master Chef Xiao Fugui\” [132 episodes in 720P high definition] First of all, if the child feels bored or too difficult, it is not the child\’s fault. What I have to do is not to be angry, but to think about how to adjust the task. Secondly, if you get stuck on a task, instead of confronting your child, take a step back and try again next time. The third point is an important realization, that is – getting angry at children will not make them fall in love with learning. On the contrary, as soon as the mother learns, she becomes a monster, and she becomes an annoying child. The disappearance of this sense of connection will only kill the child\’s motivation to learn. Therefore, for the sake of long-term internal drive, no matter how difficult it is, you have to take a deep breath and hold back your temper. I can choose what I do – it\’s fun – I can do it well – I can do it in an environment full of love and support. This is a virtuous circle of internal drive. It is like a snowball. We need to help push it at first. When the snowball is big enough, it will roll down by itself.