the great skills we need in our lives

[pillowcase]

I think this fits best in the HE section, even though I'm not one...

My children love learning and I love helping them, but believe that I will leave the reading/writing/maths to the school (a good one I believe).

Rather than deciding to 'teach' them about geography, I do wait for their questions and then try to develop as much as I can.

However I would love to create a list of ideal learning

e.g.

• Ability to reason
• Ability to express themselves well
• Empathy
• Ability to carry out their own research
• A love of learning
• Understanding of personal finance
• Understanding of food/diet/health

I think this is really a list of the great skills we need in our lives (many of which I only learned as an adult) but would love to explore with my kids.

Anyone care to add to the list?

I think that a personal need as an adult, is to understand how to change a tyre, understand how to check oil, water and tyre pressure, my parents promised to pay for driving lessons when I had mastered the above.
How to gut and fillet a fish (and also skin and gut and fillet a rabbit, if you are that way inclined). I have had to learn this, as dp is a fanatical fisherman.
Last week my kids learnt how to build a hide and build a fire, and learn to spark a fire.
This may not be what you ment, but these imo are as much life skills as any educational and empathic skills.

thestands,
yes I do mean all of that, I will add them to my list (poor dc's!)

My dream when I was small was to find myself on a desert island and to be the one who managed to start the fire and build a boat/way out. I was never the silly pathetic girl who cried at the insects!

• How to look after & maintain a home do basic household tasks like laundry, cleaning, basic electrical & plumbing knowledge etc

• How to look after a garden and grow crops/decorative plants

• Principles & practicalities of a sustainable/organic lifestyle recycling, reusing & reducing waste and living.

• How to write a CV or make a portfolio of their work

How to get stains out of clothes, it took me a long time to be good at laundry.

Emotional mastery and developing wisdom...that should keep them busy!

Knitting, sewing and other creative skills...?

Cooking

First aid

How to stay safe when out at night/on their own

Oh, and after today (dd made a banoffee pie) how to use a tin opener.

Agree about safety and, in addition, good interpersonal skills, a sense of justice and literacy and numeracy.

Apart from that it seems to me that one of the most important things is learning how to learn. It's not a disaster if they don't know things as long as they know how to find out (and interpret their findings reasonably intelligently... )

Thanks for all that. Now,when I can't 'teach' dd to get out of bed in the mornings, how am I going to tackle this list