What’s developmentally appropriate? When is a kid ready to focus away from shiny stuff onto what matters for a good life?
#1: Questions: "What made you feel good today? ... Tell me about it.." (By them telling the story, they relive the experience, and the brain releases the same feel-good endorphins)
#2: Receptors: Even if kids don't understand language yet, they're still hypersensitive to your emotions. By you yourself practicing gratitude in their presence, they'll tune into it and receive the signal.
Piaget agrees, but puts it at 7-11 years old.
Both say the beginning and ending ages are an approximation and development occurs throughout, but that's the developmental stage when the brain is particularly sensitive to it.
At the same time try to avoid values dichotomization so the kid won't grow up with a destructive idea of financial wealth being a bad thing to pursue.
If their intelligence seems not sufficient try to make it fun for them to play n-back games like BrainWorkshop, their intelligence will develop stronger and my experience suggests it helps to grok all kinds of stuff (including even transcendental matters!) a lot, in whatever an age (it in fact has enhanced my own mind capacity enough to instantly realize that life in a society is not a zero-sum game and it is usually more beneficial for myself to help others to develop, succeed and strive than to care about maintaining competitive advantage over them and that in whatever an argument the primary objectives are to understand the opponent (whatever bizarre they may sound and regardless to whether or not they're wrong) and enrich your vision while winning the argument is a secondary objective and even happens to be irrelevant in many cases).
By observing everything that is not them but theirs (memories and feelings included) and recognizing what remains.
> what exactly is it?
That's you.
> Also, the influence of n-back training on general intelligence is anything but uncontroversial.
How is it controversial? There are at least 2 credible papers proving it works and the empirical experience of mine and of other people I know demonstrates its efficiency.
Your post has good aim but I don't believe this is the case. Financial wealth is relatively trivial to safeguard after a point - particularly more stable forms (if you own a home outright, in a jurisdiction without property tax, it's essentially yours).
By contrast, one could wake up tomorrow suffering amnesia, could be hit by a car, or suffer any number of health ailments that would drastically curtail those "inner" attributes.
How do you figure?
It wasn’t until the middle school groups (age 12-14) that you really saw kids with what looked like genuine concern for others, and we ran staffing levels more like 6:1.
I grew up in the 80s and 90s and remember spending a lot of time unsupervised going about wherever and doing all sorts of wild things well before I was 7 years old. Looking back now as a parent it is absolutely terrifying to me what I was "allowed" to do. Then again when I think about the Norma in countries like Japan (where it is not uncommon to see kindergarten kids walking home by themselves and crossing streets and intersections), I am reminded that kids can develop independently to a great tune than we give them credit for. I don't know about Japanese kids materials levels but I've noticed that they are typically given more freedoms to act independently and spend a lot more time on outdoor and social activities. If I had to guess I'd say they are a lot less materialistic than their Western counterparts.
As for my own child, I try to let him be independent even at 1 year. For example, we have a TV stand that any parent would be terrified if their kid climbed on it. I was terrified at first but then with some observation and secret supervision I let him climb it. To my surprise he quickly learned how to turn around and get down safely. There was only a single time when he fell from it sideways unhurt, but now he goes up and down like a pro without any supervision. I can leave the room knowing he will always get down fine. To what effect independence will have an impact on materialism remains to be seen but I suspect one of the commenters is right on the money with mirroring behavior and values.
My experience with Japanese children is limited, but when I worked in informal education we had a number of groups of high school students from Japan, and when I was in college there was a large group of exchange students from Japan. Some of my American friends went on to become full-time teachers in Japan… and some of the Japanese people I knew went on to become full-time teachers in America. My impression is that if you think that Japanese children are “given more freedoms to act independently” then this is probably a result of your cultural bias around what it means to be independent. The phrase that usually gets thrown around is “出る釘は打たれる”, which means “the nail that sticks out is hammered down.” There is generally a lot of structure in the lives of Japanese children. As for materialism—your mileage may vary. The Japanese people I’ve known haven’t been exceptionally different from Americans when it comes to broad aspects like materialism. Japan definitely has its share of brand-conscious consumers.
And this is a song and dance we’ve heard before. “If I only raise my child using principle X, then they’ll grow up to be great people.” There is no secret technique to raising better children, there’s just a million little things and a lifetime of effort.
It's mentioned by Piaget that kids are inherently ego-centric at that level, and likely won't share. It think it's a generally relative thing for them to be very self-centered at that age.