السلام عليكم ورحمةالله وبركاته

Firstly, you must build a bridge of trust between yourself and your children, an open dialogue with the foundation of it being love, honesty and respect. Any problem they have, they should be able to come to you first! Without this trust between yourself and your children you will never be able to raise them the right way, it is a priority. By doing so and following through, you must follow it with preserving their honour and dignity, uplift their self esteem.

Allah created every single human being with honour. Allah said in the Qur'an (Interpretation of the meaning): Indeed we have honoured all of the creation of human being. Allah created us with honour and dignity, and the child has that honour and dignity, it is your duty as a parent to preserve it and teach them to preserve it!

The baby is born upon true innate nature, Muslim, he/she is perfect. It is the parents who cause him to be a Jew, Christian or fire-worshipper (Zoroastrian مجوس)

Furthermore, you need to show love, appreciation of their presence and good-doing, show admiration and be a positive bubble surrounding them. You are an expression of approval for them, so offer them laudation.

This is a rule, whatever you want from anyone (including your children), you praise them first. This rule is even with Allah Almighty God - when you want something from Him, to invoke Him, the Prophet (peace be upon him) informed us prior to asking Him, start with praising Him. Start your invocation with praise of Allah. We follow this rule even with each and every unit of our prayer when we recite Soorat-Al-Faatiha. That applies to all human beings.

Even prior to the advent of Islam, if someone was in need of assistance from the ruler, he would go before him with praise and compliments first often in the form of poetry. One time a bedouin went before a ruler and told him: "You are like a dog in your companionship, you are like a strong goat in fighting your enemy." He praised him. Then the ruler granted him his request.

This is the tradition and methodology of our beloved Prophet (peace be upon him) too, when he sought something good for anyone, he used to praise them. One time the Prophet noticed Ibn Umar not offering prayer at the last third part of the night, the Prophet wanted him to do it, so he started off with praise, he said, "How excellent Ibn Umar is if he just offers prayer at the last third part of the night". After that, Ibn Umar's slave Naafi' (may Allah be pleased with them all) informed us that during the night all you would see is Ibn Umar making wudoo' and offeirng prayer - a constant cycle of wudoo' and offeirng prayer - and he would only sleep during the night a little.

Peace, blessings and mercy of Allah be upon Prophet Muhammad, and may Allah be pleased with all his companions.

- Shaykh Musa Jibril حفظه الله