Kids who know they’re cared for and cared about have fewer behavioral problems and stronger relationships.

A lot is said about children having stronger psychic ability because they’re so unjaded and innocent. This excruciating view of children is generally expounded by people who think like children and perhaps can be forgiven.

Here’s a fact that may not surprise you: the children of the rich perform better in school, on average, than children from middle-class or poor families. Students growing up in richer families have better grades and higher scores, on average, than poorer students; they also have higher rates of participation in extracurricular activities and school leadership positions, higher graduation rates and higher rates of college enrollment and completion. Whether you think it deeply unjust, lamentable but inevitable, or obvious and unproblematic, this is hardly news. It is true in most societies and has been true in the United States for at least as long as we have thought to ask the question and had sufficient data to verify the answer.

This is where the children of honest poverty have the most precious of all advantages over those of wealth. The mother, nurse, cook, governess, teacher, saint, all in one; the father, exemplar, guide, counselor, and friend! Thus were my brother and I brought up. What has the child of millionaire or nobleman that counts compared to such a heritage?

The children who are appreciated for what they are, even if they are homely, or clumsy, or slow, will grow up with confidences in themselves - happy. They will have a spirit that will make the best of all the capacities that they have, and of all the opportunities that come their way. They will make light of any handicaps.

Rich kids are more confident that they can influence government, and they are largely right about that.14 Not surprisingly, poor kids are less likely to try.

Russell commented that the development of such gifted individuals (referring to polymaths) required a childhood period in which there was little or no pressure for conformity, a time in which the child could develop and pursue his or her own interests no matter how unusual or bizarre.

The children you don’t especially need, you have always with you, like the poor. But the bright ones get away from you. They have their own way to make in the world. Seems like the brighter they are, the farther they go.

The children said together, “And the better they feel, the safer we are.” “February, translate that.” “Da mo’ betta dey feels, da mo’ safer we be.” “Nice.

By contrast, almost all our richer kids said that (with some qualifications) they do trust other people. That comparison reflects not paranoia on the part of poor kids, but the malevolent social realities within which they live and the fact that people and institutions have so often failed them.

Allow children to be happy in their own way, for what better way will they find?

Gifted children and child prodigies seem most likely to emerge in highly supportive family conditions.In contrast, geniuses have a perverse tendency of growing up in more adverse conditions.

Children have as much mind to shew that they are free, that their own good actions come from themselves, that they are absolute and independent, as any of the proudest of you grown men, think of them as you please.

How many children, discontented with the exercise of needful authority, might learn submission and thankfulness from the lot of others ; such a temper as that we have been describing is very uncommon ; the treatment of children oftener errs on the side of over-indulgence than aught else. How many might be taught better to appreciate the blessings which surround them by considering what some, less fortunate than themselves, are called upon to endure !