Collaborative Post
A kind and compassionate child is what every parent wants. It is a difficult trait to develop though as it can take children a while in their development to understand why people feel the way that they do. In their early stages, they’ll be able to recognise the different faces but struggle beyond that. All that practice and the encounters that they have will help to make it easier. Here is some guidance from an independent school in Hampstead on this.
Demonstrate Compassion to Them
Receiving compassion is one of the nicest feelings and showing your child it can set an example for how they should treat others. To do this, talk to them about their feelings and offer emotional support with words of comfort.
Show Compassion to Those Around You
It’s important that you also live up to the standard that you’ve set by being compassionate to those around you. Whether that be your neighbour, friend, or pet, they all deserve to be treated with compassion and your child will learn that from the way that you interact with others.
Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence is an important part of being compassionate. To support those around you when they’re not feeling their greatest, you will need to identify and understand how they feel. This is something that you can train your child to do by helping them to familiarise what the different emotions look like. Point them out when you see them around you, when in social situations where it’s appropriate and doing things like watching TV.
Correct Them
Children can be mean unintentionally and while they don’t know, it’s important to teach them that it’s not okay. Doing so will act as a reminder for the future and ensure that they treat others well.
