It is important to teach your children about agency. This involves allowing your children to make choices, and just as importantly allowing them to receive logical consequences for their actions. As parents it is our natural instinct to do everything we can to protect our children from the negative things in the world, but preventing them from having consequences can be a disservice to your children.
It is best to start out teaching your children about choices and consequences when they are young. It is also important to teach your children that good children have positive consequences and bad choices have negative ones. You can begin by setting up simple rules for your children to follow, and then apply logical consequences to these rules. Additionally you can allow your children to begin making choices over the things that they do, the clothes that they wear, and other smaller daily decisions. This can help to increase their confidence.
As they grow you can allow your children to make more choices and as a result more consequences. It is important to explain your expectation in a situation before your children enters it, when possible. It is also important to discuss the expected behavior and why the children may earn a positive or negative consequence. It is essential to discuss these choices so that your children will learn how to judge the situation and its possible outcomes.
The plan of salvation teaches us the importance of recognizing our agency. It also discusses the importance of teaching our children the commandments and the possible consequences we can receive by choosing to go another way. If you spend time teaching your children the gospel, as well as about choices and consequences when they are young, then they will better able to make choices as adults.
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