Children Education : Wealth Creation & Emotional Intelligence Development
A reader, and also a good friend of mine, has provided the following critiques to my articles on “Investment Knowledge”, with respect to bringing another dimension on the subject of children education. (You are welcome to email me for password to some of the articles.)
His perspectives and critiques are valuable and useful, as they falls into the objectives of this “QuaSyLaTic Knowledgebase” : acquiring human wisdom as a WHOLE, increasing human capability and capacity in order to live a full and happy life.
Your articles suggested that parents tend to bring up their children to be good in their studies without a grounding on creating wealth in later life. I suppose life is not just about creating wealth but is about being able to fend for oneself in this competitive world. One has to be able to interact well with others , have leadership qualities , resilient and be able to persevere on even under trying conditions in order to succeed in life. It has been recognised that children who do well in studies do not necessarily do well in their career life later. During a seminar break recently I remember a remark from a Singapore U Professor who suggested that they also noticed that people who do well tends to be those that involve themselves in a lot of extra curricula activities. These people through their involvement in these extra curricula activities develop a grounding in leadership qualities which equip them well for their career life. I do agree with this observation and have personally come across many such cases. The contention here therefore is to encourage our children to be active in school activities and to have the right balance with studies.
Another issue you may want to ponder is this. There is current understanding that there are 7 types of geniuses in humans. These include the normal IQ (generally on proficiency in Maths), Sports IO, Linquistic IQ, Music IQ etc.
I believe that each child is endowed with certain qualities which fall into one of the categories. It is therefore important for the parent to spot the child's potential early in life and then to cultivate those talents. Once the child is given the right direction I would think he would have more than half the battle won. In effect he would enjoy his work to the extent that ' he would then not need to work a single day in his life'. I suppose people like Michael Chang, Boris Becker, Martina Hingis, Mozart and many others have their parents to thank for . They are not necessarily good in studies or even high in their normal IQ but yet they do very well indeed in life.
More importantly they enjoy their work and at the same time create great wealth from it.
I hope my observation is of some interest.
Challenges for Parents:
1.0 Human being is both a materialistic and spiritual entity
Parents’ challenge is “How to strike a delicate balance and blending between intellectual and emotional intelligence?”.
Within Intellectual Intelligence, my articles suggested investment knowledge as a missing piece in both home and school education, enabling children to protect and take care of their financial well being, under the concept of wealth creation. My articles also suggested that, general Intellectual Intelligence emphases on specialist knowledge, designed by the society, without due consideration of knowledge for secured livelihood, especially in time of collective or societal economic upheavals like economic crisis or organizational downsizing.
Indeed, as my good friend has well articulated, high scores in Intellectual Intelligence without any maturity in Emotional Intelligence make children stepping into society, incapacitated. Worse still, if they have no investment knowledge to protect their livelihood.
Emotional Intelligence involves social skills, from the interaction with other people, with students involved in extra-curriculum activities, taking up various roles play.
Likewise, high Emotional Intelligence, without reasonable Intellectual Intelligence, may only be able to contribute to society using their muscles as manual workers, although they may be matured human being.
On the other extreme, children with high Intellectual Intelligence, inclusive of investment knowledge like a financial wizard, but low in Emotional Intelligence, lead an unbalanced life in society.
2.0 Geniuses and Average Children
Being genius is a gift from God. The gift has to be carefully nurtured and developed. Generally genius has a mind of his or her own, the home or school education is not the prime driver, but facilitate the evolution of the genius mind.
Parents of the gifted child or children need special sensitivity and skills to ensure full blossom of the genius minds. One of the skills parents need maybe financial adequacy as possible developmental investment. This can involve sound investment skills, although the gifted child or children need not acquire such investment knowledge skills, if the gifted minds are not inclined towards financial specialization.
Parents with average children, not the geniuses or gifted minds, will be in the category as discussed above. They need to balance well the development of intellectual intelligence, inclusive of exposure to investment knowledge, emotional intelligence, inclusive of paying due attention to children interest or inclination to particular subject, be it music, science, finance, whatever and help them to develop fully in that direction. The emphasis on investment knowledge is made, as advocated in my previous articles, is due to absence of such education at home and school. And, the articles also postulate the increasing difficulties for future generation to cope with personal / family financial matter for the greater population of the employee group.
3.0 Parents’ Creativity and Innovation on Balancing Game
If we define Creativity and Innovation as making un-usual connection of variables or components to produce positive results, then a framework is created to help parents to play a good balancing game among various factors that could help children to increase their capacity to face the future bravely and surely.
Note: It is said that Albert Einstein is not noted for the originality of his ideas, but ability to make un-usual connection of many other researchers or scientists’ work to produce a brilliant result.
From the above discussion, and for simplicity sake, we derive 3 components or variables to help a child to grow to a matured person with ability to ensure good livelihood without adversely being affected by the collective force of the economy or society.
- 1) Intellectual intelligence, as mostly developed by the educational systems
- 2) Investment knowledge, as advocated by this writer / investment consultant
- 3) Emotional intelligence, as per various types of social interaction, guided by teachers, parents, family members etc.
Over emphasis on one domain, neglecting the other two, is not making any connection at all. The negative consequences are discussed previously.
The un-usual connection can take many combination and permutation. Whatever may be the configuration, it is the positive end result that matters.
A discussion on a possible connection :-
Taking investment knowledge as the starting point for making connection, and we take investment knowledge using Unit Trust Fund as the instrument, as children are familiar with saving account / fixed deposit, not so with Unit Trust Fund.
The investment knowledge advocated by this author / consultant is the Theory of Patterns and Trends with respect to market forces. This investment knowledge on Unit Trust Fund needs not be very specialized, as specialized knowledge on market research and portfolio investment decision is left to the professional fund manager. Our knowledge domain is a) monitoring the fund manager’s performance with respect to the unit price variation, b) understanding the market forces from the Patterns and Trends of the price movement.
Theory of Patterns and Trends is a scientific study. When parents become knowledgeable in it, they could help children to relate to their school work on arithmetic and mathematics. For example, mean / average, statistical study, etc. Price movement involves data collection, compilation, graphing etc. and these involve computer works.
Interestingly, parents and children have common stakes, i.e. both invested in the same Unit Trust Fund. Common stakes can lead to Shared Vision, binding parents and children together in positive communication and dialogue mode.
Investment knowledge is connected to children Intellectual Intelligence development and connected to parents / children communication and collaboration.
What about Emotional Intelligence? What connection could be made?
Patterns and Trends of market forces is basically a study of human behavior. The market is greatly influenced by the collective extreme behavior of human being, either over greedy on perceived profit / gain or over pessimistic sentiment of market bear. It is this extremes and periodical swings of the market that contribute to the kaleidoscopic phenomena of the market.
As Patterns and Trends are on human behavior, parents could engage in interesting and meaningful conversation with children on many related subjects. For example, self interest of the rich nations affecting poorly nations as reflected in economy performance, international trade policies, national budget and economy, collective behavioral patterns of teachers or students, own habits that form patterns, etc. etc.
A good conversation on human behavior helps children to reflect on their Emotional Intelligence evolution and development.
Wealth Creation
Wealth creation in the context of Investment knowledge, linking with full development of children potentials and capacity, needs not then confined to making money. It is a richness that help to self actualize a person holistically.
End.
Refer:
QuaSyLaTic Investment Consulting Service
QuaSyLaTic Knowledgebase
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By Andrew Wong, 26th August, 2000
COPYRIGHT @ 2000
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