This article originally appeared on businessinsider.com.
We asked Pachter and Daniel Post Senning, the author of “Manners in a Digital World” and the great-great-grandson of Emily Post, to tell us about the seemingly old-fashioned manners that today’s parents might be forgetting about.
Don’t feel ashamed if you haven’t made these a priority for your kids — by adopting them yourself, you can still act as a role model.
Saying ‘you’re welcome’
Most parents teach their kids to say “please” and “thank you.” But learning to say “you’re welcome” is just as important.
Here’s Senning: “It’s not always about minimizing the thanks — ‘it was no problem,’ ‘it’s nothing,’ ‘it was no trouble.’ And it’s not about trumping the thanks — ‘oh, no, no, thank you.’ It’s really important to receive thanks well also and it’s okay to say, ‘you’re welcome; it was my pleasure.'”
Senning said: “When you receive someone’s gratitude well, you participate in their happiness.”
Making eye contact
“If you’re talking to somebody, you need to look at them,” Pachter said. “Regardless of whether you have your phone or not. And if you have your phone, then you definitely need to put the phone down and look at people.”
Saying ‘excuse me’
“We will make mistakes; accidents will happen,” Senning said. “How we handle them says as much or maybe more about us than how we handle our successes.”
Parents should teach their kids to use these words whenever they’re guilty of a breach of etiquette — like leaving the table in the middle of dinner.
“You can really transform what would otherwise be a rude or impolite act into a chance to show some courtesy,” Senning added.
Writing thank-you notes
You might not have your kids send their aunt a handwritten card thanking her for the ugly (er — lovely) holiday sweaters she gifted them.
“Just because you can do it now in an email, you can still do it,” Pachter said. “It’s really quick and easy — it doesn’t have to be a lot.”
And once your kids enter the business world, this skill will come in really handy.
Standing when you’re introduced to someone
Pachter sees a lot of parents forgetting to teach their kids this rule of etiquette.
“Women especially were taught that they didn’t necessarily need to stand, but you do need to stand.”
Observing table manners
Andrew Toth/Getty Images
“Parents should be teaching their kids [table manners] so that when [the kids] go out to dinner at work, they aren’t paralyzed because they don’t know what fork to use,” Pachter said.
Those manners include chewing with your mouth closed and not using your shirt as a napkin (the horror!).
Responding ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to an invitation
These days, most casual invitations come via email or social media — making it easy for your kid to respond with a “maybe” or to not respond at all.
This is pretty rude to their host.
“The most difficult thing for a host to manage on a guest list is a question mark,” Senning said. “It’s okay to say yes; it’s okay to say no, but it’s better to say something than to just ignore it or not respond.”
