Be your kid’s bunny slope
‘Intentionally lazy’ parents teach children executive function skills
Last year, I was working with Charlie, a typical kid. He was a bright student, taking a few honours classes and scoring around the 90th percentile on standardized tests. He played lacrosse. He had a group of buddies.
But every time we met, he shared variations of the same problem: A test he bombed because he forgot to study; a missing piece of equipment for lacrosse that caused him to miss practice; a paper he procrastinated writing so he had to pull an all-nighter; or a homework assignment he forgot to turn in.
As bright as he was, Charlie was underperforming academically.
Like many kids, Charlie was struggling with executive functioning, a neurological skill set critical for success. The skills are mainly controlled by the frontal lobe of our brains — the part that allows us to work toward goals, regulate emotions, solve problems and make decisions.
Parents and teachers are trying to help kids build their executive function skills. Teachers are being taught strategies to incorporate the skills in classrooms: Posting schedules, making to-do lists and providing outlines detailing assignment requirements. Parents need a framework to reinforce these skills at home.
That framework is what I call intentional laziness parenting. Essentially, it means to deliberately be disengaged. It gives children the independence to try, do — maybe fail — on their own. And intentional laziness parenting is not lazy at all. It’s difficult and requires mental and physical determination from the parent.
Executive function skills include organization, time management, thinking flexibly, paying attention and emotional regulation. The average fifth-grade student isn’t directly taught how to keep track of assignments, plan a night’s work, then complete the task. They’re expected to know how to do this, or to figure it out. Students are rarely taught how to plan a project over a six-week period, or even how to plan a busy day of school and sports practice.
Unfortunately, executive function skills aren’t generally practised. With other activities, there’s a focus on skills. Tennis players have a swing coach. Singers have a voice coach. Most people don’t think organization and time management are skills that can be practised and improved, but they are.
Intentional laziness parenting allows children to develop those skills. Instead of doing things for children, parents need to structure activities to push the child to take ownership. Rather than jumping in and rescuing a child, parents should plan a structured starting point and then step back.
An analogy is learning to ski. The first time out, a skier will head to the bunny slope for a lesson. They’re provided with the basics and given a few practice runs, then it’s off to the real ski lift. The newbie skier has been given just enough help to go out and learn on their own. A few bumps, bruises and falls may happen, but that’s how life goes.
Parents can do this for children, acting as a bunny slope for many life tasks. They can analyze an event, determine how much the child can do on their own, plan some frontend structure and then let the child tackle the task independently.
For example, a seventh-grader should be able to buy school supplies. Intentional laziness would have a parent outline the tasks for the child: Go to the school website and print off the supply list; drive the child to the school-supply store; meet them at the register after 20 minutes and pay for the supplies.
In this scenario, the child does almost everything. Is there a chance they mess up? Sure. Would that be annoying? Absolutely. But focus on the positives. The child has printed out a list, navigated the store, chosen supplies, been given freedom, probably had to interact with a store employee and carried out a multistep task.
Intentional laziness parenting requires planning and self-control. It’s a way for parents to promote executive function skills, foster independence and create patterns that will lead children to success.