Raising Sucessful Children

Let me just say up front that I think both my grandchildren are being raised very well in warm loving environments. Since they are still babies articles on parenting catch my eye. This article was linked to by a Christian blogger that I respect greatly, she thought it was thought provoking and so do I. Give it a read.
If my adult children want to say anything about how they were raised good or bad, have at it. I admit parenting is kind of experimental and we tried to back ours up with hefty doses of prayer. I know we missed the mark many times and I particularly lament now my frequent lack of patience and displays of anger along the way.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/05/opinion/sunday/raising-successful-children.html?src=me&ref=general
From the article (but read it all as it explains some of the testing in the research.)

Parental involvement has a long and rich history of being studied. Decades of studies, many of them by Diana Baumrind, a clinical and developmental psychologist at the University of California, Berkeley, have found that the optimal parent is one who is involved and responsive, who sets high expectations but respects her child’s autonomy. These “authoritative parents” appear to hit the sweet spot of parental involvement and generally raise children who do better academically, psychologically and socially than children whose parents are either permissive and less involved, or controlling and more involved.

I still do not think formulas work in raising children because each child is unique but it does help to read up on what the research is saying. It is mostly talking about parenting styles.