In raising my three kids I think a lot about how to cultivate independence. I want them to grow into people who can handle unfamiliar situations, including interacting with strangers as needed, and I think this has been going well: people often comment on how competent and self-sufficient they are for their age (though I think they're still not that far along the spectrum compared to what's possible or historically normal).

In supporting this growth, sometimes they're strongly motivated to do something by themselves, and all I need to do is figure out the minimum they need from me. Which might be nothing! Other times, however, I'll give a small push.

This weekend I brought them along to Mentone AL where Kingfisher was playing for contras. Dinner was in the dining hall, and for dessert they served peach cobbler with ice cream; Nora (5y) asked if I would get her some. I don't like to set artificial hurdles for them, but I'm also not going to pass up a good natural one and she was clearly going to be highly motivated by the goal. With an older child I would have considered saying if they wanted dessert they'd need to get it themself, but that seemed a little too strong. Instead, I told Nora that I was still eating, but if she wanted dessert now she could go get some. She did.

She waited in line, talked to the server, got some peach cobbler with ice cream, and then promptly dropped it. This was not what I was planning to teach! It also posed a challenge beyond what I thought she was ready for, and risked other people needing to do extra work to make up for my lazy-appearing parenting. I came over, helped clean it up, and sat back down. She got a new bowl, brought it back to the table, took a big bite, and then looked like she was going to cry:

Me: What's wrong?
Nora: I don't want my dessert.
Me: Why?
Nora: I don't like the brown stuff, I just want the ice cream, but the brown stuff is all over the ice cream.
Me: What should we do?
Nora: Can you go get me a new one that is just ice cream?
Me: I'm still eating, but if you tell them that your papa is going to eat the other one and you want a new one with just ice cream I think they'd give you that.
Nora: [cheers up essentially instantly] ok!

She waited in line, explained what she wanted, and got a bowl just the way she liked it:

I asked her about it in writing this post, a few days later. She said she felt bad when she dropped her ice cream, would have preferred I had just gotten her ice cream, and really enjoyed eating the ice cream. I think this is a pretty good illustration of how this approach to parenting works in practice: not perfect or necessarily appreciated at the time, but good enough and building skills they'll need.