Self esteem in an important quality for all children to have. As parents, you can help to boost your child’s self esteem by following the steps below:
Model good self-esteem: Express through your actions and words that you respect yourself. Children are wonderful at imitating what they see and hear. Remember, you are your child’s best role model.
Create positive routines: Young children need routines to help them to feel secure and competent. Try to set a good schedule for bedtime, rest/naps, meals, etc. Try to keep exceptions to the routine to a minimum and explain any necessary changes if/when they occur.
Allow many opportunities for children to contribute to the family: Give your child a job/chore that only he/she does for the family. Even a small job can have a positive lasting impact on your child’s self esteem.
Talk about the world in positive terms: Even though there is negativity in the world, don’t dwell on it with your child. When with your child, be sure to point out the many positive things in the world.
Spend time with your child: Remember quality is more important than quantity. Even if you spend just 30 minutes with your child one on one — playing
games, taking walks, having long bedtime chats, or just snuggling in front of the TV, spending time with your child shows them that you value their company.
Give your child choices: Giving your child choices between a reasonable set of options that are already predetermined by you will make them feel empowered.
Aurelia Williams
Aurelia Williams is the mom of four busy children, a Personal Life Coach and the owner of Real Life Solutions, which is an informational site that also offers products, articles and a great newsletter. You can also hear Aurelia daily on the WAHM Talk Radio show, she is the Resident Life Coach.
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September 26th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
[…] Aurelia Williams has an interesting post entitled Strategies to Help Boost Your Childs Self Esteem with several points to help parents. One of them I find a challenge: […]
September 27th, 2007 at 4:31 pm
These are some great, easy to follow techniques that we all can easily incorporate.
I agree with most of the important techniques above, with the exception of one. While I believe spending quality time with your children is important, I do believe quantity is equally as important. Children need the quantity of time to feel comfortable enough to open up to their parents. As parents, we just can’t expect our children to confide in us in “the quality of time we’ve allotted them.” How can we improve their self-esteem if we don’t spend a good amount of time with them, quality or not? It is in the quantity that the genuine quality time evolves. A half hour here or there just doesn’t cut it. A good example? What if your partner says, “Well honey, I spent a quality 30 minutes with you yesterday. Isn’t that enough?”. I doubt most of us would be happy with that.
Besides that point, I think you’re spot on in your other ideas of giving children specific chores and choices that give them some sense of responsibility and pride in their accomplishments. I would add that children shouldn’t just focus on chores that care for their own support circle, but should also give to others. By helping those in need, children learn the joy in giving and as a result, feel good about themselves that they made a difference in someone’s life, therefore building their self-esteem.
October 6th, 2007 at 7:39 pm
[…] Helen wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptSelf esteem in an important quality for all children to have. As parents, you can help to boost your child’s self esteem by following the steps below: Model good self-esteem: Express through your actions and words that you respect … […]
October 11th, 2007 at 8:11 am
What a great articile! Just praising your kids for things that they do. Even little things. My 11 year old son has 2 football coaches and this is his first year. One coach praises these boys throughout the whole practice while in return teaching them how to play. The other coach screams at them and says “you are wasting my time”. When Jeremy comes home and has been practicing with the good coach his attitude and self-esteem is through the roof. If he has practiced with the screaming coach he is down in the dumps and a grump. Praising is the key to boosting selfesteem in your children.
October 20th, 2007 at 3:57 am
[…] to Help Boost Your Childs Self Esteem Admin added an interesting post on Strategies to Help Boost Your Childs Self EsteemHere’s a small excerptSelf esteem in an important quality for all children to have. Asparents, you can help to boost your child’s self esteem by following the steps below: Model good self-esteem: Express through your actions and words that you respect … […]
October 21st, 2007 at 6:06 am
[…] If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!I ran across an interesting blogpost the other day regarding self-esteem. In the post, the author did a pretty good job providing some very do-able techniques that we parents can utilize to improve our child’s self-esteem. While most of the points I agree with, there was one that I did not quite see eye to eye with the author. To read the post and see my response, Click here. […]