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There is a big difference between children who help at home and children who feel responsible at home. Helping usually happens when someone tells them to do something. Responsibility is when they perform something as they know it is their duty. Such difference might appear insignificant, yet it alters the manner in which children are raised.


Many parents today do almost everything for their children. It is not because children are incapable of doing things, but it is quicker and easier to have adults simply complete the work themselves. Bag-packing, bottle filling, organizing books, cleaning rooms, shoe keeping, remembering homework, reminding everything. On a gradual basis, the life of the child proceeds easily, yet the child is not driving their own life. Someone else is.


Ownership does not come from being told “be responsible”. Ownership comes when a child knows that something depends on them. It could be something very small. Watering plants every evening. Feeding the dog. Packing their own school bag. Keeping their shoes in place. Folding their own clothes. These are very ordinary things but they silently impart something very significant to the children. They make them understand that it is their duty to do something, and in case, they do not do it, it is not going to get done.


When a child waters a plant every day, they slowly understand consistency. When they pack their own bag, they understand responsibility. When they forget something and face the consequence, they understand accountability. These are big words, but they are learned through very small actions.


Many children grow up being told what to do all the time, but they are not given something that is actually their responsibility. So they grow up waiting for instructions. They don’t automatically see work and do it. They wait for someone to tell them.


Children who grow up with small responsibilities start seeing things differently. They see work and they do it. They do not feel that it is the work of other people. They realize that a house runs because everyone does little things not because one person does everything.


Educating responsible children is not a matter of lectures or admonition. It happens through small daily responsibilities that slowly become habits. Watering plants, packing bags, keeping things back, helping at home, remembering their own work, all these small things slowly build a sense of ownership.


And once a child learns ownership, you don’t have to keep reminding them about everything. They start reminding themselves.