Has your preteen or teen every declared they just weren't good at something? Maybe they tried something new, weren't great at it and gave up? Or maybe they admired a skill someone else had and wished they could do the same thing?
I'd encourage you to give your older kids time and space to practice to build their confidence.
Find things they are interested in, but aren't yet good at, and give them opportunities to practice doing those things in a safe place like home. Sometimes that means pointing out things they are naturally good at and suggesting things that they could do with those skills. For us it's things like fishing, riding a bike, painting nails on their own, doing their own hair, studying for tests, writing, crocheting, learning a new craft or hobby or talking to their friends on FaceTime.
Here are some more examples:
1. Help create a dinner menu so that they'll know how to meal plan when they are living on their own.
2. Practice learning how to ride a bike in the grass so that you feel confident when it comes time to riding on the street. Or roller blade on your patio before you head out to the streets.
3. Communicate your hair style preferences with whoever does your hair. That goes for hair cuts and for daily styling. Figure out how you like to wear your hair and ask for help making that happen. Olive will skip cuts for a trim. The boys will ask for a scissor trim on top to keep it longer and clippers on the side. I cut everyone's hair so it's been fun to see them get better at this skill.
4. Your teens might be wanting a new swim suit and want to shop online. Have them practice browsing and searching favorite shopping sites, pick out their favorites and present them to their parents. Olive loved this task!! She found 3 great swim suit options. We ordered them all, tried them on and she ended up with two swim suits that she is SO excited about. I wasn't sure she could find them on her own, but she did it. And next year she'll be ready to do this on her own (with the help of our credit card :).
5. You have a kid that wants to learn how to fish. He asks for fishing supplies for holidays and then practices fishing a lot. He's learning new skills and building confidence to become a better fisherman.
6. Practice talking on the phone, Face Timing and texting with friends on your parent's phone so that when you have your own phone, you will feel confident in communicating with people. We have had a lot of conversations about phone etiquette, talking to parents vs friends and texting.
7. If your kids need something at school or are having an issue, let them practice communicating with their teachers. Talk things through with them and then send them off to email or talk to their teachers to resolve the issue. This is a super important life skill.
8. One of our kids loves pocket knives. He's been learning how to store the, handle them and collect them safely. His confidence has grown and he has been so responsible with them. It's fun to see his hobby build confidence.
9. Travel together! Give the kids a map, point out landmarks along the way, have them make count downs, pack their own suitcases, plan intineraries and watch their travel confidence grow. My older kids love to pack for trips. I give them a check list or talk through our trip and they pack. They present their suitcases to me and we double check that they ar ready to travel. It makes trip prep so much easier for me and then they are confident that they are ready for the trip.
10. Share opportunities that come up and see if your kids are interested - church choir, tennis lessons, chess club, school choir, rec leagues, softball try outs, roller skating, archery, etc. Talk through what the commitment would mean and see if it is something that they would like to try. I've emailed coaches to ask questions and gathered more information. All those new experiences can bring confidence.
How do you help your older kids build confidence?
These are great ideas! I find that #7 is an especially difficult one for parents to do. We tend to want to jump in and fix things adult-to-adult, but the kids need to gain confidence in advocating for themselves. I work with a bunch of 15–16-year-old young men regularly and I'm always surprised that so few of them are willing to talk to the coach/teacher on their own - they want their parents to do it for them. At our son's school, the counseling staff does a great job of helping parents to "let go" and encouraging and teaching the boys how to "step up". I've always encouraged our son to talk to the various adults in his orbit to advocate for himself and he's done a great job, but being in high school and with the support from his school, he's really taking it to the next level this year. I'm super proud. My girls are 10 & 11 and they are really getting good at this too - in fact, they prefer to be the ones to handle situations at school or at their activities themselves and they just like to "let me know how it went" to keep me in the loop.
ReplyDelete