How to Measure Quality

Now that we know quality when we see it and will expect it from our children, and ourselves how do we maintain it.

There are two effective ways (you may find our your own best way) to gauge how well we are meeting and exceeding our expectations of quality. In fact, many of us have been measure on our quality of work regularly during our appraisal with our boss or reporting officer.

One of the ways to measure how well your child is doing what he does is by conferencing. You can do conferencing with your child during the journey back home, meal times, or simply a one-to-one bonding session. Just do some simple catch up talk, do not make this conferencing an interrogating session. I always like to talk to my children, one at a time, or all three together at the couch, or by their beds. When our children become involved in the process, they may come up with their own ways to improve. 

One caution note, when doing conferencing about quality try not to target more than two quality at a time. Else, we may in the end list down everything all at once that you want your child to improve upon, and this can be more than a little discouraging. We must realist that it took our children a long time to form those bad habits, and it will take a long time to break them. There a Chinese proverb saying: "It takes ten years to grow trees but a hundred years to rear people."

A second way to measure quality is to keep a record. Our bosses use scaling, grades or rubrics to measure us. Same for school, teachers use grades, which works in the school environment. As for home, I suggest using 'checklist' or 'rubrics' to monitor your child's quality level. Create a checklist of what things to notice when, for instance, they clean their room. Put this list on a clipboard or paste it on their bedroom door, etc any creative ways you can think of. Hand it to them when it is time to do the chore. As they check off each item, both you and your child can have confidence that they've done what was expected. You can reward them with praises, encouragement or a sticker to be pasted on a chart. Checklists may seem a bit regimented, but they are effective. Look around your public environment, many people are using checklist to monitor their stuff. 

Essentially, with both of these tactics, we are teaching our children that how well they do things can improve the quality of their life and the lives of those around them. One day, they will find what they learnt is useful to them.

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