Mind Your Manners

Teaching Kids Etiquette and So Much More

What does the word “etiquette” call to mind?

Perhaps you think of tea parties with doilies, complex seating charts or where to place the salad fork when setting the table, but to Taneesha, etiquette is much bigger.

Growing up as a southern belle in a military family, proper decorum was simply a part of her culture. “I was constantly reminded of southern charm, traditional social graces and how proper conduct was the way of the law,” she says, but a volunteer opportunity at an elementary school showed just how different the world is for today’s kids. The children displayed a painful lack of social awareness toward one another.

“That experience lit a fire under me,” says Taneesha, who was so inspired that she eventually opened a charm school in Brandon, Florida.

When the school took off, more doors opened for Taneesha. Over the next few years, she was able to expand into other states across the U.S., teaching children and adults alike the proper tools for social interaction.

With enough demand, she started her Train-the-Trainer program, a certification process that educates adults on how to bring children into the world of etiquette. Quality boxes of leather-bound books and carefully-planned materials set an appropriate tone for what to expect:

“I wanted our Train-the-Trainer Children’s Etiquette Certification Program to be special, affordable and worth every penny invested,” says Taneesha.

BoxUp plays a critical role in making sure her program is reaching trainees in a way that not only validates the materials within, but communicates how legitimately special her curriculum is. The quality of BoxUp’s design “gives the receiver confidence that they chose the right Program to earn their designation,” according to Taneesha, who credits the company for allowing her small company to hit the scene with a “high-end” presence.

Why put so much energy and time into etiquette? According to Taneesha, it’s about so much more than a napkin on your lap or the proper way to shake hands.

Contemporary culture no longer creates space for children to cultivate their social skills, such as cotillion. “These types of engagements, skills and learning opportunities no longer existed for children; however, children are expected to know what social graces are,” she says.

Proper manners aren’t about an arbitrary set of rules, after all. Etiquette is a way of being respectful toward others and mindful of oneself in all manner of social situations. How can we expect kids to understand civility when they haven’t had a chance to truly learn?

Thanks to Taneesha’s programs, now they do.

Interested in becoming a bit more cultured, or in teaching kids the value of etiquette? You can check out Mind Your Manners online, here.

“These are valuable lessons that most people do not teach their children these days… a lost art one could say.”CUSTOMER REVIEWMIND YOUR MANNERS