Below are some tips from the Austin Oaks Hospital on how to help build self esteem in children as well how to be encouraging.
Encourage your child. Focus on your child's resources, giving positive recognition to improve the child's self-concept and feelings of self-worth. Keep it simple, and be consistent. These four methods of encouragement can build a foundation of mutual respect for a positive parent/child relationship.
- Show faith and have confidence in your child. Allow him or her the opportunity to be responsible.
- Build self-respect by enthusiastically supporting your child's interests. Avoid comparisons with siblings or peers.
- Help children develop realistic goals, then recognize and acknowledge improvements and progress toward those goals.
- Focus on a child's strengths. Society tends to emphasize mistakes and faults. By emphasizing your child's strengths and assets, you offset those negative influences and help your children develop independence and self-determination.
10 Ways to Encourage Children
- Give responsibility.
- Show appreciation for contributions at home.
- Ask your child for opinions and suggestions.
- Encourage participation in decision making.
- Accept mistakes.
- Emphasize the process, not the product
- Turn liabilities into assets. Look for positive potential.
- Show confidence in your child's judgment.
- Demonstrate positive expectations.
- Develop alternate ways of viewing situations.
