Social challenges at school are a normal part of growing up. When your child navigates these situations well, they grow in both intellectual and social maturity. Encouraging your child to stay optimistic and believe in their ability to overcome social issues is crucial. Here are some tips to help them understand that there are many ways to work through social challenges.
Read MoreWith the challenges children face today, from academic pressures to social media’s influence, fostering their mental and emotional health has never been more important. Read on for some strategies and insights to help you in this enriching yet challenging endeavour.
Read MoreAre we prone to making quick judgements of people? I would add, are we very vocal about our observations of others? The delicate question that I raise here is how much do we influence our children on the judgements we make of others?
It is natural to have opinions and often this comes from a life lived with increasing knowledge around and about people. If we find ourselves quite opinionated about people are we in full possession of the facts? This blog is just to remind us that young eyes and ears are around and it is not difficult for your judgements to become their judgements. After all, at an early age, they trust your opinions.
What in fact is life-giving for our children is to be open to all kinds of people and to look for the best and not the worst of people. Having such a disposition is very attractive to others and is encouraging a more peaceful, mature way of being.
At school, teachers can see how influenced children become of others from the images formed by their parents. Once a child has such an attitude, they are working from the negative and not the positive.
A classroom is an excellent setting to teach children about accepting differences and growing to like the difference.
Consider:
Developing the habit of making quick judgements on people can become a life habit. It closes doors mentally and disengages from learning more about people.
Take care with what is said about others in the presence of your child. You may have strong opinions about someone, but I think it best to be subtle and careful in expressing them in front of your child. Let them slowly and gently form images of others for themselves.
Encourage an attitude that everyone is different and I may have some thoughts about this situation or person but there are many opinions to be considered.
Encourage your child to have an open mind when they encounter people with different views or perhaps ways of communicating.
Teach them that having an opinion is natural, but making judgements that damage can be harmful and lasting. Once judgements are made, opinions are sealed and limited understanding comes from making a judgement.
If your child talks negatively about a child in their class, discuss if they can see the good in that child and encourage them to be open to learning more about that person. A closed mind at an early age is not a healthy way to grow mentally and emotionally.
Social media sadly encourages judgment in all sorts of areas to do with people. Monitor what your child watches and have an open outlook on opinions and attitude about others. Teach them to be open to differences and to find some positive in difficult discussions about people that are controversial.
Developing the habit of making quick judgements on people can become a life habit. It closes doors mentally and disengages from learning more about people.
“If you judge people you have no time to love them.”
How does one tackle this immense topic with a child? Quite simply we should be starting at an early age as there are so many examples of discrimination in the life of a child. Some are subtle, some more blatant.
How does one tackle this immense topic with a child?
A great sadness for me as school principal was to see how prejudice and discrimination could so easily creep into the life of a child. It was ever present through media, television, poor modelling from families and extended networks. It was often subtle but children learnt quickly to align themselves to groups and cultures that felt comfortable, seemed similar and made them welcome. Such alignment sometimes led to reduced understanding and tolerance of difference. It quickly shut down interest in other viewpoints.
Now having said that I can assure families that the best way to strengthen children’s understandings of the complex world is to expose them to as much as possible. For example, if you do not have aged family, grandparents etc, in the life of the child, align yourself with older people. Children enjoy their company and come to value and appreciate the aged.
If your child has little understanding of disability, perhaps watch the Paralympics or talk to neighbours with disability. Here we again remind our children that aligning with difference makes us richer.
There are many examples I could state about bringing your child to the table to understand and value the differences in society. Starting at an early age is the key. You may have a favourite charity in which the family contributes, talk about why this charity is so important to you.
Schools frequently take on projects to raise the awareness of social differences, especially social disability and if the family keeps up the dialogue at home and capitalises on opportunities to engage with social difference, they are encouraging their child to develop a broad appreciation of life.
Of course, everything we say and do as parents can potentially demonstrate bias. It’s unavoidable at times. However, we can take care to watch how we talk about groups that are different or challenging. If the child hears that you are open to differences and respect the variance in society, they are more receptive to not taking on bias themselves. They are also more inclined to talk to you about such matters.
A few tips in this important area.
Talk positively about differences in our society.
Always tell your child that whilst I feel this way towards an issue, there are other perspectives that could be considered.
Watch programs together that cover important areas of discrimination.
In a child’s friendship group there will be children of various races, attitudes, social status etc. Embrace the differences that your child brings home. Learn from the acceptance your child shows towards matters of discrimination.
Be an opportunist. When you see a chance to engage with someone or something different, include your child.
Demonstrate to your child that discriminating in any form limits a person’s capacity to understand the bigger world. Of course, I will have my opinion on certain matters but I welcome the opportunity to listen to others. Here you teach your child to open their thinking to a bigger world.
This article is about keeping the pilot light on for your child to explore, respect and value differences in our world. The danger comes when they choose to undervalue matters of discrimination with little knowledge. Our objective as parents is to ignite a desire in our children to learn about all that is different. May they come to it with compassion and understanding.
“No one is born hating another person, be of their colour of his skin or his background or his religion. People must learn to hate and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”