My sister and I had this conversation one time comparing kids who are naturally smart but lazy and the average kids but diligent. We had a number of examples of kids who are naturally smart but are very lazy to study, so at the end they didn’t excel in school and didn’t reach their maximum potential as a student. Meanwhile, there are also other kids who are not so smart. They need to read and study diligently and only then they will be able to grasp their lesson. But because of their discipline and diligence, they excelled in their academics and reached their maximum potential, academically that is.

So, after that conversation, we concluded that we’d rather choose our children to be diligent rather than smart but lazy. But as a parent whether our child is naturally smart or not, we have to create an atmosphere for them to learn and teach them the discipline of establishing a study habit. I for one, belong to the second category, I’m not naturally smart but since my Mom has ingrained in me the importance of diligently studying my lessons, I somehow excelled in my academics. I remember that my parents invested a lot of money to buy books and encyclopedias for us to read. And I could still remember the time when I was small and she would review my lessons with me every night until such time that she saw that I can do the revisions myself. By that time, I have already learned the steps in studying and reviewing my lessons. And thus, developed that discipline to study every night. I thank God for my Mom for training me that way too. Because from my primary to university years, studying and doing my school work hasn’t been a struggle for me.

With this in mind and my Li’l girl going to Kindergarten, I’ll have to start developing in her the love to learn by exposing her to the different mediums of learning and by training her and letting her have good study habits. And I’m sure, in the future, studying and doing school work won’t be much of a struggle for her anymore.