The Power of Independent Thinking and Education

How do you raise successful children? T.R.I.C.K. them! No, it's not what you think. Esther Wojcicki, Woj to her friends, wrote about the T.R.I.C.K. technique in her book How To Raise Successful People: Simple Lessons For Radical Results. If you want to know what it stands for, you'll have to listen to the full episode.

Don't miss the parenting tips the journalist and educator shares from her own experience raising three daughters and grandchildren. One of which is Youtube's C.E.O., Susan Wojcicki. Pick up lessons from Esther and Greg's discussion on trusting kids, collaborating with them to create rules, instilling responsibility and accountability, and building independence.

Listen to the interesting discussions about how raising children affects how they perform at work. The two have compelling discussions about how schools can improve systems to encourage creativity and measure progress differently. They also discussed how odd jobs and chores are crucial to teaching kids the importance of education and money.

Episode Quotes:

If parenting is so important and we all have to do it, why do you think that this is something that doesn't need any kind of formal training? 

"We have billions of people on the planet, so clearly, we're doing something right. Although I think you have to ask the question, are those billions of people happy? And are they productive? And are they leading lives that they want to lead? So that's where the new role of parenting comes in. Because what we're trying to do now, which we weren't trying to do, I thought a hundred years ago, is to really see how productive our children can be when they enter the adult world and how happy they can also be. So happiness has become something that people are pursuing."

What's the number one thing that we seem to get wrong about the role of the teachers and the role of parents?

"I think the requirements in the 21st century are different than the requirements for the 20th century. The role of the teacher in the 20th century was to teach people to obey, to follow the rules, and to read... As a matter of fact, the majority of the population couldn't read. So the goal was to have everybody be literate and have some math skills. And I think we succeeded in the 20th century... And now, in the 21st century, we want people to think. We want people to be creative and entrepreneurial. And so what the established rules for the 20th century, the established way of teaching for the 20th century does not work for the 21st century. And you don't get creative when you're teaching people to obey. We have 12 years of doing that. And the students that are the most recognized and most successful are the ones that obey the most. They historically are also the least creative; they're less willing to take a risk and do something different."

On how the childcare situation has changed and affected parenting over the last 30 years or so:

"The parents are losing their free time, and the kids are losing their independence, and it's over the top today because now we have electronic devices where we can monitor our kids. We can monitor their every move. I think we need to remember that when you want to have happy self-reliant kids, you have to give them independence. And instead of coming up with rules that you personally come up with, why don't you collaborate with them and come up with the rules? You'd be surprised at how good they are at coming up with rules that work for both of you."

Thoughts on how education and child-rearing being too competitive:

"This is not a pet show. Your child is not out there competing with other pets. This is a human being. You have to stop competing, and it starts with toilet training. I'm not kidding. So how old is your kid? Oh, you mean he's already toilet trained? And you go home, and you start beating yourself up. No, we're all different. I've said this in some of my talks too. No one ever asks you how old you were when you were toilet trained. Ever! No one cares, or how old were you when you learned to sleep through the night. And all this competition starts early, and then it intensifies."

Is kindness a characteristic that you can teach? And is it really the role and responsibility of the teacher to teach this? Or is this really exclusively the domain of the parent?

"I personally think you can teach kindness. And not only that, I think it's really important in our world to teach people to be kind, to have compassion and empathy. I think it starts at home, and all parents hopefully are teaching this, but some parents are not. You teach it by modeling it. You teach it by treating your children with kindness, by understanding their frustrations, by being compassionate and empathetic. And one thing. That I think is again, really important is to carry this through to the school. So the school, the teacher, and parents are also working together."

Show Links

Guest Profile

• Esther Wojcicki on LinkedIn
• Esther Wojcicki on Twitter
• Watch Esther’s Videos on Youtube

Her Work

• Raising Successful People Official Website
• Buy the Book at Amazon: How To Raise Successful People
• I Raised Two CEOs and a Doctor an Article on Time written by Esther Wojcicki