Self-Esteem

Self-esteem is when a person feels satisfied and positive about themselves and their abilities. When your child has positive self-esteem, they feel loved, accepted, and understood. They feel capable and able to deal with all that comes to them in life.Unlike some traits, children are not born with self-esteem. Children need to learn about:

• Having confidence

• Trying new things

• Taking risks

• Taking in both praise and criticism in healthy ways

• Dealing with challenges and both successes and disappointments

• Understanding their personal strengths and challenges

What’s Healthy Self-Esteem?

As your child’s first and most important teacher, you can help them develop healthy self-esteem.When children have healthy self-esteem they are:

• Self-assured they can meet expectations.

• Believe in their value and worth.

• Able to try new challenges and don’t feel overwhelmed by them.

• Proud when they do a task well or meet their responsibilities effectively.

• Think positively about themselves.

• Can handle mistakes.

• Able to make friends and treat people with kindness.

When children have low self-esteem they may:

• Feel they are not as “good” as other kids.

• Fail to participate often out of fear of failure or start to participate and then quit when they feel they are not doing well or perfectly, or even cheat to win games.

• Be hard on themselves – “I can’t do anything right.”

• Avoid challenges or new tasks. Feel overwhelmed even with daily challenges like getting ready for school.

• Act in not age-appropriate ways, such as an older child going back to sucking their thumb.

• Have a hard time coping with mistakes or failure. Make excuses for mistakes and blame others
  • If the coach wasn’t so stupid, I could have made the basket.

• Spend more time thinking about when they did NOT succeed, rather than when they did.

• Not be able to take criticism or praise.

• Let others treat them badly or act bossy and lash out at others.

Encouraging Healthy Self-Esteem

Promoting self-esteem in children involves promoting your attachment to them and how you value them, as well as promoting and praising how they handle life’s challenges.

• Tell your child often that you love them unconditionally so they know your love is not dependent on how well or not they do any particular task. Praise effort, not outcomes.

• Pay attention to what they are feeling and thinking, so they know who they are as individuals is important to you.

• Praise your child - appropriately so that it has meaning:
  • Give specifics about what they did well.

• Don’t praise everything they do or “over praise” – every drawing is not the best one you’ve ever seen in your life. Over praising can make children feel they need to be perfect.

• Show your child you have confidence in their skills by letting them to do or try things by themselves.
  • Even very young children have things to do on their own – drink out of a cup, put away a toy.

• First, show your child how to do something. Then let them try to do it themselves. Be patient. Let them work problems out on their own.

• If at first they don’t succeed, encourage them to try again.

• But don’t have them keep trying so they get completely frustrated. They can work on it another day. Tell your child when you feel frustrated with something, and let them see you handle it in a positive way.

• It might take less time for you to fold the clothes, but let your child take the time to figure it out and finish the task. It shows them you believe they are capable. It helps them learn about the effort needed to learn a new skill.

• Let your child take reasonable risks.
  • Talk to a new friend.

• Read a book with challenging vocabulary or concepts.

• Use the zip line at the playground.

• Give your child reasonable age appropriate choices to help them feel empowered and able to make decisions. Start small.
  • Crackers with cheese, peanut butter or plain?

• The red shirt or the blue shirt?

• Give your child age appropriate chores. Let them know they are an important part of contributing to family needs.

• Encourage your child to take care of their minds and their bodies.
  • Choose healthy foods.

• Develop good grooming habits.

• Engage in various activities to grown their mind – reading, puzzles…

• Help your child deal with disappointment.
  • Make sure they know no one is perfect! Everyone has disappointments. Share a story where you had difficulty, but kept trying until you got it right..

• Let them have their sad or angry feelings, but also let them know you have confidence in their ability to try again or try a different tact.

• Don’t overly sympathize if your child turns disappointment into negative self-talk – “I’m so stupid” or “Nobody likes me.” Encourage them to try again. Let them know you can enjoy activities even if you aren’t the “best” at it.

• You didn’t hit every ball at t-ball, but you hit one. If you want to practice, I bet you can improve.

• I see you are sad you didn’t get the role you wanted in the dance performance, but you also look like you are still having fun and feel happy dancing with your friends.

• Don’t compare your child with what others do.

• Don’t be overly critical. Humor is often helpful, but avoid sarcasm, particularly with young children.

Up, Down and All Around

Just like adults, there will be times when your child’s self-esteem “takes a hit.” Perhaps he didn’t make the softball team or missed some words on a spelling test. Other times, he might be flying high with confidence, when he masters a skill he’s been working on or has a great time with a new friend. Be attentive and give your child unconditional love during all the ups and downs and try out some of the tips above. You’ll be sure to be building your child’s self-esteem over the long term and helping them become able, confident and caring children. This article is brought to you by Parenting Now! Parenting Educators and authors, Tova Stabin, Claire Davis and Lynne Swartz and consultant Jay Thompson (andupdatemywebsite.com).  Parenting Now! is passionate about happy, healthy families. For more information about Parenting Now! please visit their website (https://parentingnow.org/) or contact us at info@parentingnow.org

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