Help your child develop a positive habit

From DVD programs that supposedly expand your brainpower to speed-reading programs, many products cater to parents looking to give their children a leg up in life. But before you rush out to buy a brain-enhancing product, consider a free alternative: instilling a good habit or routine.

Here are three ways to help your child develop a positive habit.

Plan the week. Sure, spontaneity is the spice of life, but, overall, it is better to have a sense of the week ahead.

Sit down with your children Sunday night and help them plan the week ahead. Discuss the micro and the macro -- say, how to plan for the science project that's due in three weeks as well as how to take into account extracurricular activities and coordinate schedules with everyone else in the family.

Resist the urge to give the answer. Instead, engage your children in the planning -- ask questions that engage and strengthen their planning muscle. It will help develop critical skills that can be used throughout their lives.

Make a morning routine. Mornings can be so hard, especially for teenagers. Start the kids on a path to productivity by enforcing a morning routine as soon as possible. The critical components are: getting dressed, making the bed, brushing teeth and organizing what they need for the day.

If mornings are really a problem, institute an evening routine when everyone (including Mom and Dad) can get backpacks, keys, wallets, purses and whatever else organized and ready by the door before hitting the hay.

Good things do happen to those who wait. Nothing prepares kids better than teaching the lesson of delayed gratification. A study showed that a child's ability to hold off on eating a cookie at 4 correlated with overall success later in life. Impulse purchases are part of our culture. A little treat for a kid now and then isn't a bad thing -- as long as you also reinforce delayed gratification.

Waiting for something a person thinks he really wants helps to separate the nice-to-haves from the musts -- and almost always makes whatever it is he's waiting for that much sweeter in the end.

Starting good habits, whether it's making the bed, picking up toys or organizing their bags for