What to Teach Your Kid This Year: An Age-by-Age Guide

Every parent has the same thought at some point: what should I actually be teaching my kid right now?

Not in general. Not “be kind” or “try hard.” Specifically. What should a 7-year-old know how to do? What should you be handing off to a 10-year-old? What are you supposed to teach a 13-year-old that nobody taught you?

The answer depends on where your kid is. Not just their age — their capability. But age gives you a starting map, and a map beats wandering.

This is that map.

The principle: skills are sequential

You can’t teach a kid to manage money if they can’t manage their belongings. You can’t teach them to cook a full meal if they’ve never been trusted with a butter knife. You can’t expect a teenager to manage their own schedule if they’ve never managed their own morning.

Skills stack. Each one is the foundation for the next. Skip a layer and you’ll feel it later — usually around middle school, when the gaps between capable kids and managed kids become impossible to ignore.

The good news: you don’t need to teach everything at once. You need to teach the right things at the right time. One skill per month, matched to the age, builds more than you’d think.

Here’s what to focus on, year by year.

Ages 3-4: The beginning of “I can”

This is where capability starts. Not with big skills — with the identity that they’re someone who does things.

• Get dressed with minimal help — they pick the shirt, they pull it on. It takes four times longer than doing it for them. That’s the investment.
• Put shoes on the right feet — or the wrong feet. The point is their hands did it.
• Follow simple instructions — “Put your cup on the counter.” One step at a time. This is the seed of every future responsibility.
• Clean up their own toys — with a clear container and a clear expectation. Not perfect. Participatory.
• Use words instead of meltdowns — this takes hundreds of reps. Start now because you’ll need every one of them.

You’re not teaching skills here. You’re teaching a belief: I am capable. That belief is the foundation for everything else on this list.

Ages 5-6: Responsibility takes root

Five is when things shift. They’re not toddlers anymore. They can handle real tasks — small ones, but real.

Life skills to teach your 5-year-old covers this stage in detail, but the short version:

• Make their bed — it won’t look good. It’s practice, not a hotel inspection.
• Set and clear the table — contribution to the household, every day.
• Pack their own bag for school — with a checklist at first. The checklist goes away once the habit doesn’t.
• Get themselves ready in the morning — with a routine they know, not one you direct in real time.
• Help in the kitchen — washing vegetables, stirring, pouring measured ingredients. They’re part of the process now.

At this age, the goal is shifting from “I can do small things” to “I have jobs in this house.” That shift changes how they see themselves.

Ages 7-8: Real contribution

Seven and eight is where you stop treating them like a helper and start treating them like a contributor. The difference matters. Helpers assist you. Contributors own something.

• Do simple cooking tasks independently — scrambled eggs, toast, a sandwich. Supervised, but their hands, their decisions.
• Sort and start laundry — they can learn which dial to turn and what goes together.
• Manage their own homework — you can check it. They do it without you sitting next to them.
• Handle small amounts of money — a few dollars at a store. Making choices about what to buy and what to skip. This is the beginning of financial literacy.
• Resolve small conflicts with peers — before you step in, ask: “What did you try?” They need practice handling friction while the stakes are low.

This is the age where doing everything for them starts to cost you both. Every task you keep doing is a task they don’t learn.

Ages 9-10: Self-management

By 10, a kid should be managing several pieces of their own life. Not perfectly. But without you driving every step.

What every 10-year-old should know goes deep on this stage. The essentials:

• Own their morning and bedtime routine — alarm, hygiene, getting out the door. Your job shifts from directing to verifying.
• Track their own schedule — activities, homework due dates, commitments. A calendar they maintain, not one you maintain for them.
• Cook a simple meal start to finish — not a snack. A meal. For the family if possible.
• Handle basic money management — saving, spending decisions, understanding that money is finite. Every lesson here pays forward.
• Make decisions and live with them — what to wear, how to spend free time, which activity to commit to. Decision-making is a muscle. It needs reps.

A 10-year-old who manages themselves at this level walks into middle school ready. One who doesn’t walks in overwhelmed.

Ages 11-12: Pre-teen readiness

Middle school is a cliff. The kids who were managed by their parents suddenly have to manage themselves — multiple teachers, multiple classes, social complexity, emotional turbulence, and a schedule that doesn’t wait for them.

The skills kids should learn before middle school aren’t academic. They’re operational:

• Manage a multi-day project — break it down, set deadlines, execute without someone checking every step.
• Do their own laundry completely — sort, wash, dry, fold, put away. The full cycle, unsupervised.
• Navigate social situations independently — friendships, conflicts, peer pressure. You can coach afterward. You can’t be there in the moment.
• Use a phone or device responsibly — if they have one, they need to demonstrate they can handle it. Freedom is earned, not handed out on a birthday.
• Take care of their own space — room, belongings, school materials. Without weekly reminders.

This is also when you start talking about failure on purpose. They’ll face more of it in the next few years than they have in all the previous ones combined. Knowing how to sit with it, learn from it, and keep going is the difference between a kid who adapts and one who shuts down.

Ages 13-14: Increasing autonomy

Teenagers want freedom. Good. Freedom is the reward for demonstrated capability. At 13-14, the handoffs get bigger and the training wheels come off.

• Plan and cook meals for the family — not just for themselves. Planning, shopping, cooking, cleaning up. The full loop.
• Manage their own time across a full week — school, activities, social life, rest. Without you building the schedule. Time management can’t be taught in a lecture. It’s learned by doing.
• Handle conflict without adult intervention — with friends, with teachers, with siblings. They should be able to work through disagreement without you mediating every time.
• Make meaningful decisions with real consequences — what to spend money on, which commitments to keep, how to prioritize. Let them decide, and let the results teach.
• Do basic household maintenance — change a lightbulb, unclog a drain, clean a bathroom properly. Not because they’re free labor. Because they’ll need to do this in four years and nobody else is going to teach them.

The instinct here is to tighten control as the stakes go up. Resist it. The stakes going up is exactly why they need practice now.

Ages 15-16: Near-adult skills

What your 15-year-old should be able to do on their own is a long list. By this age, you should be handing off nearly everything. Not all at once — but deliberately, skill by skill.

• Manage their own money — a bank account, a budget, saving for something real. Money skills at this age aren’t hypothetical anymore.
• Cook consistently and independently — a weekly rotation of meals they can make. Teaching them to cook by 15 means they won’t live on ramen at 18.
• Handle appointments and logistics — doctor’s visits, rides, paperwork. They call, they schedule, they show up.
• Work or volunteer — real responsibility to someone outside the family. Showing up when they don’t feel like it. Being accountable to someone who isn’t their parent.
• Have hard conversations — about relationships, about expectations, about things that went wrong. Without shutting down or blowing up.

If you’re looking at this list and your 15-year-old can’t do most of it, you’re not too late. But you’re running low on easy time. The summer skills list is a good way to close gaps fast.

Ages 17-18: Launch readiness

This is the final stretch. Everything that’s still yours needs to become theirs. The 50 things to teach your kids before they leave home is the comprehensive list, but the core of launch readiness is this:

• Feed themselves — meal plan, grocery shop, cook, clean up. The full cycle, consistently, without help.
• Manage money for real — budget, bank account, understanding of debt, basic taxes.
• Take care of a home — cleaning, laundry, minor repairs, organizing. The full domestic load.
• Navigate bureaucracy — fill out forms, write professional emails, understand a lease, keep documents organized.
• Handle their own problems — emotional, logistical, relational. Without calling home for every decision.

An 18-year-old who can do these things isn’t just ready for college or a job. They’re ready for life. And that readiness didn’t happen in the last year. It was built, one handoff at a time, across every age before this one.

The right time to start is now

If your kid is 4, start with shoes and toy cleanup. If they’re 9, start with their morning routine and money basics. If they’re 15, start with cooking and scheduling.

The worst thing you can do is look at this list, feel overwhelmed, and do nothing. The second worst thing is trying to do all of it at once.

Pick one skill. The one that would make the biggest difference this month. Teach it. Practice it. Hand it off. Then pick the next one.

Your kid doesn’t need you to be perfect. They need you to be intentional. One skill at a time, matched to where they are, building toward where they need to be.

That’s not winging it. That’s a plan.

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