Tips for Inspiring Good Values in Your Kids

Recently, my family watched the new Disney Junior princess, Sofia the First in her premiere special, and I found myself thinking about the lesson Sofia learned that behaving like a true princess must come from the heart. Although I believe my own little prince and princesses are good kids, how can I ensure that I am passing on the key values of a life well lived: honesty, loyalty, courage, independence, compassion and grace? It’s not easy to be a parent, but I still do my best to really make an effort to focus on my children and parent consciously. Beyond the very critical act of living my life with the very values that I hope to pass onto my kids, I also try to make learning life lessons fun and relevant. • Read with your kids: Reading takes you to other places and helps you to understand others through their experiences. Even if those experiences are fictional, that understanding teaches compassion. I recently started reading Charlotte’s Web to my kids and the discussions it has spawned have been heartwarming as I hear them really grasp that everyone is special in their own way. • Encourage older kids to read to younger siblings: If you have an older child that knows how to read, having them read to their younger sibling(s) not only increases the basic benefit of reading to everyone, but also encourages compassion, caring and bonding between siblings. (Plus, your older kids will feel so proud of their accomplishment!) • Take trips into the community to do acts of service: When my son turned five, we asked everyone to bring donations for the Food Bank instead of gifts. It was a wonderful lesson in sharing and compassion. We also ask our kids to donate part of their allowance to charity by using a separate jar in their room. If those ideas don’t appeal, there are many others: pick up trash in the park; volunteer to hand out food in a homeless shelter; or collect toys, clothes, and books and donate them to a Woman’s Shelter. • Make your kids Special Helpers: In my son’s class, a different child is the Special Helper each day. I decided to try the concept at home and it’s worked quite well. Each day, my Special Helper sets the table for dinner, feeds the cat, and assists me with general tidying. The Special Helper is also allowed to be the first one into the minivan, chooses the type of juice I offer at snack time, and picks the television show we watch after school. It’s a win-win and has encouraged both independent thought as well as compassion. What kind of ideas do you have to inspire your children to good values? Share them with the Disney Junior Canada community now.