Parenting has changed and often overdoes care at the expense of independence and resilience. Parenting approaches of the current era have led to young people being dependent on praise. They have over-emphasised 'self-esteem' and under-emphasised growing competence. Some effects include anxiety, depression, low self-efficacy and low self-control.

By making things too easy for children they will fail to learn. The best model of parenting is 'authoritarian': responsive and demanding.

The five essential skills that all young people need to develop:

1. Resilience - ability to cope with difficulty

2. Self-regulation - forgoing current pleasure for future gain

3. Resourcefulness - taking initiative to improve the situation

4. Respect - for authority figures and rights of others

5. Responsibility - wanting to contribute to the community, not to just be self-focused

Judith says that these five skills are more important than school results, because without them young people will really struggle when they get into tertiary education and the workplace. She cites high levels of dropping out of university as an example.

Allow the school to give them occasional bad days; help your child face and learn to overcome the impact of these.

By age 18 our children should be contributing a full adult level of chores around the home. Work towards this, with 50% by age 13.

Ensure they remain compliant and give effective consequences - she recommends a 'chore set' that has to be completed before privileges are restored (rather than a multi-day device ban, for example).

Allow them to individuate from you.

On the other hand don't go home and try and make all these changes at once and immediately!

You can read more in Judith's books: https://www.bonsaichild.com and https://www.bonsaichild.com/#about-student-book.