My husband and I often talk about how important it is to teach Jack to be a good citizen of the world. To be conscious of himself and his actions; to be conscientious of others; to be kind; to have good manners. Having good manners is a fairly concrete concepts - it's the lessons on which other lessons will be built.
Our first foray into teaching good manners aren't so much about sitting properly at the dinner table or using your forks from the outside in - we're many years away from that. Instead, we decided to start with something simple - please and thank you. We thought we were doing pretty well, Jack was really catching on to saying "please" when he wanted something - sometimes in lieu of actually asking for the actual item he wanted - but it was working, he was being polite. When we'd give him or do what he had requested he'd look at us full of earnest and say, ever so clearly, "diego!" It has taken weeks, but we finally understand that "diego" means "there you go" which is what Jack thought we were saying when we'd say "Thank you". So, for now, we now that he's trying his darnedest to be polite, and that he doesn't think that both my husband and I are named Diego.
