A Conversation with Sean Covey, author of THE 7 HABITS OF HAPPY KIDS


Q: What is the overall effect that you hope The 7 Habits of Happy Kids has on children and families?
SC: It’s a difficult world today for parents and teachers to raise good kids: kids who are leaders and who have self-confidence and skills to live and survive in the twenty-first century. I hope this book is just one more important arrow in their quiver to help them raise kids with good values.

Q: Your other books were geared towards a teen audience, why did you decide to write a book for young children?
SC: I decided to write a book for young kids because over the years I have had so many parents, teachers, and others say to me “You know what, this stuff is so good for kids to know, how can I get it to my kids?” I also have a lot of teens say to me, “Oh, I wish I would have had this when I was younger.” We’ve also been surprised to find that dozens of elementary schools around the globe have already done this. They have taught the 7 Habits to kids and have had great success with it. So that’s where we got the idea of writing a book that teaches the power of the 7 Habits to young kids in a way that is engaging for them.

Q: Following each habit in the book, you provide a list of discussion questions and tips that parents and teachers can use. Why did you feel this was important to include?
SC:Sometimes parents and adults need some help getting started. As adults we’re all so busy and sometimes we’re just worn out at the end of the day. The discussion points and questions make teaching the principles just a little bit easier for a parent to connect with their child.

I think the greatest challenge between child and parent is communication. The questions and discussion points provide a way for parents and children to open up a dialogue and talk to each other.

Q: Do you have children, and do you practice the 7 Habits with them?
SC: Yes, I have kids. In fact, I have eight of them. And it’s pretty chaotic in my home sometimes. And yes, I do try to teach them the 7 Habits. I try not to overdo it, and sometimes my kids think it’s stupid, but my wife and I are subtly teaching these all the time anyway without trying to shove it down their throats.

I also ask my kids to read my books, sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t.

But, absolutely, I think that youth are more open to influence when they are younger than when they are teenagers. So I think teaching them through stories and tying in a habit and a principle after the fact is a great method. We try to live the 7 Habits in my home and I goof up a lot of the time, and sometimes my kids call me on it, and they tell me that I’m not seeking first to understand or I’m not thinking win-win.

Q: The 7 Oaks gang in the book is a fun group of characters you use to share each habit. Are any of these characters based on your own children?
SC:Yes, all of these characters came right out of my kids and their personalities. Sammy Squirrel is modeled after my son Nathan. He is a gadget man and he loves gadgets, even as a really little kid he loved taking things apart and he loves playing with screwdrivers and tools.

I have two daughters who are quite crafty and love to do arts, colors, and paints and to put things together; so Lilly Skunk is based upon my daughters Rachel and Victoria.

Jumper Rabbit is modeled after my son Weston, who is five. Weston is a great athlete and loves sports. Jumper loves athletic shoes (you’ll notice he wears a different pair in every story), and my oldest son Michael loves sports and loves to buy and trade athletic shoes.

Tagalong Allie is a cute little mouse named after my youngest daughter Allie who likes to tagalong with all the older neighborhood kids, and for a while couldn’t say words correctly like the big kids could.

All the characters and stories were inspired by my own kids.

Q: Your father, Stephen Covey, is the author of the world-famous The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Did you seek his advice while writing The 7 Habits of Happy Kids?
SC: No, I didn’t seek his advice because he would have just said to me, “You know what to do, so just do your best,” and so I didn’t think it was necessary to ask his advice. At the end of the book I did ask him to write an afterword and he did that. He is a great dad and he has taught me many things, one being that I am capable of doing my own work. When I wrote The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens, I did ask him for help a couple of times and he said, “I don’t have time, and you write so well so just do it.” So I didn’t think I would ask him for help when writing The 7 Habits for Happy Kids.

Q: What is the Leader in Me program that you are involved with?
SC: The Leader in Me integrates timeless leadership principles into elementary school culture and curriculum, providing students with practical character and life skills relevant for today’s twenty-first century challenges. The process has been proven to build children’s self-confidence and interpersonal skills, elevate student achievement, and reduce school wide discipline problems. Teachers are enthusiastically expressing delight in the approach, and parents and community leaders are synergistically joining in to make it happen. To learn more go to www.theleaderinme.org.

The Leader in Me is one of the most exciting things I have ever worked on. It is a program designed to help create great elementary schools, to increase the leadership capability of kids, to help them become more self-confident and to help them learn how to communicate well, how to use data, how to set goals and accomplish them. It’s a wonderful program that can really transform schools and increase test scores and create higher parent and teacher satisfaction. I have never seen anything quite like it. It’s a program that anyone can implement. It doesn’t replace curriculum; it’s jet fuel for curriculum that makes everything they are already doing go better through teaching leadership skills and timeless principles to kids, administrators, and faculty. It’s totally integrated with the entire school.

Q: If you were to offer one piece of advice to parents on how to raise a happy kid, what would it be?
SC: With kids of my own and from being a retired kid, I would say, “affirm, affirm, affirm.”

Stop being a critic and be a light; don’t be a judge, be a model. I think we are far too critical. I think the best way to correct behavior is to accentuate and affirm positive behavior and to ignore negative behavior. Generally speaking, there is a time to correct, of course; but my biggest advice would be, “affirm your child.” The true definition of leadership is to communicate so eloquently the worth and talent in a child (or anyone) that they come to see it themselves.