©             Love children, let them play games happily together

 ©©         Develop children naturally by playing management games

 ©©©        Children learn management concepts through games and apply at school and daily life

Present to All Parents:

Do you want your children’s future to be as bright as possible? Management and interpersonal skills essential to success does not start at high school or university. It starts as early as kindergarten stage. Through focussed and defined playing and interaction techniques, these essential skills can be stimulated and developed at an early stage.
Behavioural learning potential and ability is at an optimum level when a child is very young. Learn early, practise early and then achieve early. Just like learning swimming, music and cycling. Learnt at a young age, the skills become natural basic instincts.

Let’s use a common management technique “5W1H” to analyse “management development from childhood”.

What
What is Management? Without describing the numerous theories and hypothesis of “Management” as a subject, it is clear that the basic critical concepts and skills relate to “managing oneself, other people and matters”. Examples of Management elements in terms of “managing oneself” include EQ (emotional quotient), Time Management and Brainstorming. While the elements relating to “managing other people and matters” include motivation, communication, public speaking, financial management and marketing management. New Management Concepts will develop when Managers find new ways of meeting the ever-changing needs in this tuberlent and dynamic world.
What is management development from childhood? We select and simplify fundamental management concepts and apply them at a tune that children can comprehend. At different ages it is possible to focus upon a child in different areas of management concepts, depending on the mental disposition of the child. A suitable analogy for the term “Management concepts” would be several large cakes of differing flavours. We can select a flavour that a child naturally likes but then we need to cut the large cake into the right size in order that the child is able to digest properly. 

When
When should children start to learn concepts of Management? Equipping children with management concepts should start as early as they are able to communicate and understand basic ideas. Simple creativity thinking skills such as Brainstorming and Mind-mapping can start from kindergarten. Have you ever attended a Management Training Course? If so, you would see that many of the ideas could have been developed at a much earlier stage. In other words, many management skills are basic human relation and thinking skills that could have been introduced to us at a much younger age. Management skills evolve and mature with age. If children are able to adopt these skills early, they can apply them effectively to other relevant aspects of lives, such as their schoolwork and daily actions. These skills will become natural thinking instincts as the child grows older and the applications will facilitate higher achievements and better performance in many areas of their lives. 

Why
Why develop children with management concepts from childhood? Generally speaking, managers have to learn and apply management skills and techniques. Many may think that only adults at work need to learn while young children at school merely play and be content. Being parents, we have to prepare our children for the future. Some parents may not necessarily have aspirations for their children to become Managers; however, they should expect their children to be successful in whatever the children eventually choose to do. The point is, Management Skills are not just for managers. Management skills are life- achieving skills. At the very least, children can learn how to “manage themselves” well in order to achieve whatever they wish. Effective Management Skills include planning, organising, directing and controlling. For example, children who learn basic management skills early will be able to plan, organise, make informed decisions and control their schoolwork at the right pace and to a standard required. 
In today’s world, parents, especially working parents are often just too busy. Even after work, parents may never have the energy or time to focus and manage the children in order to deal with examinations, home work, projects and so on. When our children are developed with management techniques, they can manage their own work independently with minimum supervision. Children will certainly benefit by possessing these skills in order to effectively and successfully meet their future challenges. On the other hand, a child without these skills may see a future where simple everyday achievements are just too much of a challenge.

How
How can children benefit from management development? Children are stimulated by playing games with each other. The games will have a focus upon certain management concepts and themes. By interacting with each other and playing together, children can easily be introduced to simple concepts. For example, role-playing is an effective means of developing certain skills. They are able to practise concepts with guided examples. Then we demonstrate and encourage them to share these concepts with their parents and motivate them to apply the ideas to their schoolwork and daily lives.
Furthermore, management development can develop children’s mental awareness and agility. The programme will emphasise the term “balanced intelligence” (BI). BI involves socio-emotional, cognitive skills, language and adaptive ability. Children possess different innate talents in different areas, he/ she may be gifted in language and creativity while others may have a predisposition to cognitive thinking abilities. Through management games, we can identify and monitor the development of children’s mental disposition, in a balanced manner. Children naturally display their strengths while playing games. They also display weaknesses in certain areas. The programme will provide children chances to enhance their strengths but to also develop the weak elements. 
In fact, one management game can cover several management concepts. For example, in the game called, “Time, People and Place”, children learn “cognitive-thinking” techniques by learning how to make up stories while incorporating the “brainstorming” techniques, children have to exercise creativity in finding alternatives. 
This game is also the foundation game for learning the analysis technique of 5W1H at an upper level. Teamwork and Team-building games are essential for all children, not least for their interpersonal awareness. Instead of introducing team-building workshops to adults in the work environment, it would be more beneficial to introduce and adopt the concepts of teamwork to children at an earlier stage of their lives.

Who
Who can develop children with management concepts? All of us who love and care for children. These include Parents, teachers, Boy Scout leaders, team leaders and whoever is in a position where they are in some way or another influencing children in the path of learning. However, Management Concepts must be understood by these agents in the first place in order to fully apply the knowledge behind the specific games and techniques.
The procedure to transfer the knowledge and concepts is through “Train-the-trainers”. We should train those who train our children. We should equip ourselves with the knowledge of playing management games with children and guide them whenever we have chances to play with them. Gradually, children learn how to play games together, whenever they meet together, any of them who know how to play games will lead the team to play on their own. They will be creative enough to modify the games according to their needs, just like they will adjust themselves to meet their future challenges in their lives. Different children will join in the games, just like they have to work with different working partners in the future. Children enjoy playing games and parents enjoy seeing them learn. 

Where
Where can children learn management games? Children spend most of their time at school and at home. Many kindergartens, schools and other learning establishments follow traditional prescriptive methods of teaching that has no specific learning objectives. A good example is a typical kindergarten school, where you will typically find a group of children playing together or alone in a random fashion. Ideally, school teachers should learn management concept development games and apply the ideas in their teaching programmes and to guide students to demonstrate the concepts in their own times, such as break times. For example, teachers can lead students to practise brainstorming techniques in history lessons by listing out as many emperor names as possible. Also, playing “Time, People and Place”, teachers can demonstrate how historical incidents occurred through variables of time, people, place, steps and consequences. Interestingly enough, the class can be divided into groups representing each variable to go for rounds describing different historical incidents. 
At home, parents who understand the management concept development techniques can also share and play games with children at home and at family gatherings. Without waiting for birthday parties, we have to arrange more chances for children to play management games together. Some reputable training institutes also organise training programmes where children can play management games together regularly. Other than knowing more friends and building up team work concepts through playing together, children can also achieve sharing experience and networking among themselves.

CONCLUSION
In conclusion, it is essential to introduce management concepts to children at an early stage. Management concept development games specifically focussed on developing particular areas of Management Concepts can be introduced to very young children. The programme will ensure that specific skills are taught in specifically developed games. Once the skills have been adopted by children, the concepts can be applied in many aspects of their lives and increase their ability to be successful in whatever they choose to do.
Especially families with small size and working parents should build up more chances for their children to play together. Incorporating management concepts into the games can further develop children’s balanced intelligence at the same time. Instead of attending prescriptive style lessons, children can easily learn management concepts and skills through games naturally. Children can then apply at their schoolwork and daily lives and gain higher achievements. Management skills are life-achieving skills. Certainly, children enjoy a happier childhood when they can manage themselves more effectively and efficiently.
“OUR GAMES REVEAL TALENTS”

Sylvia Liu
October 2003