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I met a special girl the other day. Her name is Violet and she is 6.

Violet’s age and diminutive size wouldn’t mark her a leader, but her future undoubtedly includes some leadership—and she will excel at it.

She wasn’t telling people where to go or how to do things. She wasn’t pushy or loud, either.

Violet simply sat there with her mom and pointed out all the things she liked about the people around her. “I like your bag!” she told the older lady next to her. To me—“I love your blue hair!”

Everyone Violet spoke to – which was anyone near her – went away smiling. Her “soft” leadership skill of finding and calling out the best in others will take this little one far if her mother continues to encourage it.

I have read at least 50 books in the past three years on the subject of leadership. It comes with the territory of pursuing a doctorate on the subject. Yet the most important aspect of what I’m studying might not be addressed at all—how do we train tomorrow’s leaders—our kids?

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“Mommy! Why can I not open my eyes when I look at the sun?

Why do I always have to sleep early, when you can stay up late?

Momma, why does the water not flow up the mountain ever?

Doesn’t the moon hate the sun for hiding it in the daytime?

Why is my hair straight and Dad’s curly?

Why can I not fly like the birds?”

Have you also had your share of the endless questions with limited unsatisfactory answers for your little ones? Did you ever think of hiding behind the couch like me seeing your little one in a questioning mode?

It’s payback time! But don’t worry! I’ll make sure it is fun for everyone!

It’s your turn to put some interesting questions to your kids. Because when you put a thoughtful question to your child, it zaps on her thinking mode automatically. And when young minds think, analyze or introspect, they learn best and grow up to be resourceful adults who can think out of the box and survive in any situation.

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At a recent youth retreat my 12-year-old nephew, Joey, was called up on stage along with four other preteens. Each participant had a box of tissues set in front of them. They were told, “at the word GO your challenge is to be the first person to remove all the tissues from the box. The winner will receive a large box of candy.”

At Go, four of the middle schoolers began to frantically remove the tissues from the box, one at a time. Joey, looking puzzled, watched his frenzied competitors for a moment, picked up his box, ripped off the top and pulled all the tissues out at once. Done!

When I asked him later how he came up with that idea he said, “It was the fastest way to get them out of the box.”

Critical thinking – being able to look at a problem, analyze it, and come up with a creative and effective solution – is one of the most important skills our children can learn. Critical and creative thinking skills help us make good decisions and solve problems. Those children with good critical thinking skills will be more successful as adults.

Joey saw the problem, thought outside the box, and emptied his box to receive his reward.  So how do we raise kids who think like this? How do we raise kids who can look at a situation and come up with creative and alternative ways to address it?

Here are 3 easy ways you can encourage critical and creative problem solving in your own kids.

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When my youngest was two he suddenly became obsessed with Halloween.

I’m sure a lot of my own enthusiasm for the holiday had something to do with it. As an American living in the U.K., I wanted my children to experience my favorite holiday. So, I threw a big party.

This became an annual tradition and it grew. Soon, I was renting the local village hall and inviting all thirty of my eldest son’s classmates. My youngest loved the scary characters, crafts, songs, and costumes, but his Halloween fixation continued long after Halloween.

As December approached I couldn’t interest him in Santa or snowmen or anything else having to do with Christmas. He wanted me to read him Halloween stories and he demanded Halloween songs at bedtime. I only knew two Halloween songs and I was getting fed up with them.

I soon started adapting classic songs to give them a Halloween twist. “How Much is that Doggy in the Window?” became “How Much is that Vampire in the Window?” My father-in-law came up with “99 Scary Monsters on the Wall” in lieu of “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall”. That quickly became a favorite.

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