The question of how to raise a child in the “New Era” of abundant information and exponential technological progress is a powerful one — and one that strongly resonates with me as a father of two young daughters.

Peter Diamantis’ piece captures the essential of what a useful education for the New Era should be about : raising curious, creative individuals with the capacity to parse and analyze the flow of information that will irrigate them, passion to orient them, and resilience to reach their goals. These individuals will be the leaders of the New Era and we all want the best for our children.

However, I think modern science gives us the opportunity to dig further. After all, parents have not waited for deep-learning AI or synthetic biology to play games of Why or What If. What neuroscience tells us is that early childhood, about between 3 and 5, is a critical period to develop executive functions, and the best way to develop them.

Here is the gist of what I think parenting with a focus on executive functions could look like:

1. Encourage autonomy: for 2- to 4-years-old, we tend to do a LOT for them, brush their teeth, tie their shoes, spoonfeed at times… the more we give them to do, the more they learn, even if it’s messy at first.
2. Curb down parental impatience: Impatience is the great devil that make us interrupt our kids’ activities (ie learning processes). It is really difficult to get rid of impatience in everyday life I admit.
3. Prepare the environment: the environment is the first teacher, before the adults. We should spare no effort to encourage autonomy through preparation of the environment. Kid-height bookshelves, toy shelves, coat-hangers, and dishes, enable our children to decide and act by themselves rather than be submitted to the adults.