What would you like your child to learn this year? Your kidsʼ teachers have lesson plans for your children. As a parent, you can draw up a parenting agenda, too.
Here are three skills that will help your kids grow up to be successful, thriving adults: emotional intelligence, resilience and compassion. Consider how you can help your children develop each this year.
Emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is the ability to know and regulate your feelings.
High emotional intelligence is the factor that most strongly predicts success in adulthood. High emotional intelligence correlates with higher incomes, stronger friendships and more effective leadership.
As a parent, you can serve as your childʼs emotional coach. Simply ask your kids how theyʼre feeling. Keep it simple. They can be glad, mad, sad or scared. If they cannot tell you what their emotional state is, take a guess. Once you get identify their feeling, you might visibly see them relax.
A childʼs ability to regulate their feelings is guided by brain development. Expect different things from different aged kids.
Resilience. Resilience is the ability to bounce back from adversity. Like emotional intelligence, resilience is a skill thatʼs improved with practice. In order for kids to build resilience, they must be given the freedom to make their own mistakes. This can be a challenge for parents!
Your child is temperamentally drawn to a set-point on the optimism-pessimism continuum. You can create more optimistic children by the way in which you explain why bad things--and good things happen.
Everyone must face lifeʼs bumps. Better for kids to master resilience when the bumps are smaller.
