Boosting Self-Esteem in Children

One of the most important educational activities parents and teachers can put into action is building self-esteem in children. Their happiness and success as adults will be immensely influenced by this factor.

Adults that struggle with low-self esteem have often developed self-esteem problems in childhood. During that period, their fragile personality and lack of critical thinking made them highly suggestible and forming a negative self-image was easy.

However, the opposite is also true: if a child can easily develop a negative self-image, they can also easily develop a positive self-image. It is during this time of their life that people can be best educated in a way that stimulates their self-esteem.

Here are some of the key ideas to keep in mind and apply for boosting self-esteem in children.

1. Help the child learn and grow.

When a person knows they’re improving and developing as individuals, their self image improves alongside. Children naturally grow a lot, physically, mentally and emotionally. A smart parent or teacher can facilitate this growing process and help a child realize the incredible progress he or she is making.

You want to provide the child guidance, attention and access to proper learning tools so they can expand their mind and self. Also, point out for them the progress they’re making, acknowledge each step forward and reward them for it.

2. Help the child see their strengths.

As a coach, I often hear adults complaining that they don’t know their strengths or that they’re not good at anything and feeling miserable about it. Well, children are not strangers to this either.

In this significantly misguided world, it’s common for children to believe they don’t have any qualities just because they may not have those popular and easy to spot qualities and to feel bad about it. You can aid them enormously by pointing out the tasks they accomplish with success and the strengths those successes reflect.

3. Help the child understand intrinsic value.

One of the key sources of self-esteem is not competency and results, but ones unconditional inner worth as human being. When children are born, they naturally tend to have this sense of person worth, but under the influence of media, education and peer groups, they often misplace it.

This is where parents and teachers can come in to help a child realize that their core worth is not determined by how well they do in math class, how they look or how popular they are. The more a child accepts their intrinsic value, the slimmer the chances of them having low self-esteem.

4. Help the child avoid excessive comparison.

A major source of low self-esteem is constantly comparing yourself to others and noticing the positive things other have in their lives that you don’t. Some comparison is healthy, but most of us go overboard with it.

As they grow, children will tend to compare themselves more and more to others and develop anxieties due to the things they lack. It’s important to help them realize that every person out there is inferior and superior to us in some way and also to focus more on setting their own standards for success.

Children with good self-esteem tend to do better in school, make friends easier and enjoy life more. Further in life, self-esteem continues to influence every aspect of their existence. It’s worth investing in developing it at an early age.