What is it about a good night story that appeals to children all over the world? We all know how deeply comforting it is to close your eyes at the end of the day with peace in your heart and hope for tomorrow. While a good night story can certainly help you achieve this, the benefits of listening to a good night story, for both the individual and the community they live in, are multifaceted and profound. Research, presented here and elsewhere, shows listening to good stories can contribute not only to a child’s academic success, but to their emotional well-being and social advancement; his/her overall happiness and, in turn, to happy families and community relationships.
Loving Hearts [click to continue…]
What can you do to help your child when they are having a bad day? Firstly as a parent, understand that there is a whole range of emotional reactions to learning. Negative emotions may include showing anger, anxiety or frustration.
Some children react by avoiding or blaming the task or other people. Others may give the impression of being unenthusiastic or uncooperative.
We may think that negative emotions from our children are bad
I like to think that knowing how you feel is the first step towards changing things for the better.
In my eBook, How to Motivate Your Child, I invite you to share, with your child, an empowering message, “It’s OK to feel like that.”
Building emotional resiliency [click to continue…]
I often talk about the importance of really listening to your child. To me, really listening means actively and reflectively listening to what your child is saying.
It sounds simple, doesn’t it? But, all too often as we listen, we quickly spin off into our own thoughts and interpret what we hear. Then we start to frame an answer, to solve our child’s problem for them, even before they’ve even finished telling us!
Do you find yourself doing that? I know I do.
Why do we go into our own thoughts instead of staying present with what our child is saying?
Often it’s because we want to save them! We want to soften their load and save them from hurt, but what we can actually end up doing is diminish their opportunity for self growth, hinder their problem-solving skills and lessen their independence.
How do you listen effectively to your child? [click to continue…]
One of the easiest things you can to build your child’s self belief as a learner is to show them, “how they are smart”.
To me, each child is unique. Each have their own personality and interests and their own unique learning style.
You can see my “smarts” in the diagram. Answering a few simple questions online can give your child a visual sense of how they are smart. This can lead to your child opening up about what they love to do and also give you both a clue as to the best way for them to learn.
An example of this, if I see one of my students scores highly on “Body Smart” and they have yet to develop automatic recall of number facts (like …three, twos are six) then I’ll go outside with them and play handball and we’ll say the number facts, in rhythm, as we play. It’s fun and takes advantage of their learning style.
If you’d like to use this simple tool with your child to find out more about their unique learning style, go here. There’s an audio as well as a written version, and it’s also available in some community languages. Let me know how you go.
A few minutes ago I listened to a post-match interview with Roger Federer at the Australian Open. Federer had just defeated Andy Roddick and progressed to the final. One of Federer’s first comments was how he played well because he had confidence. Self-confidence is the result of positive self-talk.
How do we help our children to develop self-confidence?
Here’s a 4 step plan. Awareness → Understanding → Skills → Practice
To develop positive self-talk your child needs to:
Step 1: become aware of what they are saying to themselves, in their thoughts.
Step 2: understand that those thoughts influence their behaviour, for better or worse
Step 3: develop their own set of positive self-talk phrases, for example;
Step 4: practice, catching themselves being positive with their self-talk
I have found some great action plans and although they have been written for classroom use, you can easily adapt to use at home with your children. They are suitable for children of school age, 5-18 years. You can Download Your Positive Self-Talk Action Plans here.
The lesson plans are copyright of the Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations.
What is it about a good night story that appeals to children all over the world? We all know how deeply comforting it is to close your eyes at the end of the day with peace in your heart and hope for tomorrow. While a good night story can certainly help you achieve this, the benefits of listening to a good night story, for both the individual and the community they live in, are multifaceted and profound. Research, presented here and elsewhere, shows listening to good stories can contribute not only to a child’s academic success, but to their emotional well-being and social advancement; his/her overall happiness and, in turn, to happy families and community relationships.
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