In moral intelligence: the seven essential virtues that teach kids to do the right things, Dr Michele Borba, an educational consultant says, “the best way to help kids overcome negative pressures and act right in this immoral times is to boost their moral IQ. Parents can teach traits of moral intelligence such as empathy, love, conscience, self-control, respect, kindness to their children.”

Parents today can no longer sit back and assume that their kids will become decent human beings. They will have to take the reins in their own hand to raise moral children. Raising a moral child is more than correcting misbehavior and encouraging positive action.

Children learn behavior and values from their environmenst, but mainly from their parents, siblings, relatives, peers, teachers and increasingly, the media.

They learn from watching how other people behave, from observing minutely how their parents deal with difficult and trying situations and from their own experience. Research say that parents who have clear moral convictions are more likely to raise good children because they live their moral beliefs and priorities them in their daily living.

Sadly, today many parents are wrapped up in their careers and the world and fail to nurture their children’s moral intelligence. They feel that providing their children with food, clothing and shelter is all that they are duty-bound to do. “Parents are their children’s first and most powerful moral teachers, so make sure that the moral behaviors your kids are picking up from you are the ones that you want them to copy. Don’t let them be influenced by role models they watch around them who are empty-headed and immoral. Try to make your life a living example of good moral behavior for your child to see. Your gentleness will teach them kindness. Your positive attitude about life will rub off on your children and they will be upbeat,” says Richard Eyre in teaching your children values.

Keep in mind that “If we do not educate our children, society will, and they, and we, will live with the results,” so for most of the parents, the greatest opportunity they have is to deepen their own character and make sure that their children really can become the best they can be.