When you talk about your child’s growth and development, you usually think about the physical and mental aspects of it. While this isn’t wrong, there are also other aspects that come into play. A perfect example of this would be their psychosocial development.
The term psychosocial pertains to the way a person views and perceives themselves and how they behave and interact with those around them. So, when you talk about a child’s psychosocial development, you talk about how they see themselves and how they interact with others in various social settings. School happens to be one of those settings.
The psychosocial aspect of a child’s growth and development is important as it can help influence how they’ll turn out when they get older. How they view and treat themselves to how they handle relationships are all affected by their psychosocial development. So, it’s important to ensure that this aspect of their development goes very well to ensure that they’ll turn out fine. This can also help ensure they’ll be able to thrive in environments like school.
There are several ways by which you can help aid in your child’s psychosocial development. One of the best ways you can do that would be by helping them with their overall attitude and their sense of self-confidence. However, helping a child establish a good overall attitude and a strong sense of self-confidence can still be tricky.
Despite this, there are still ways to make this task more manageable as a parent. This article aims to help you see how you can do that! So, if you’re looking to help find good ways to help your child establish a good overall attitude and sense of self-confidence, read on.
What Attitude and Self-Confidence Can Do
Attitude and self-confidence are two different things that go hand-in-hand when it comes to how your child sees themselves and how they interact in different social situations. In a way, you can say that they affect one another. This is because your child’s attitude can be affected by their self-confidence and their self-confidence can also be affected by their attitude.
A child’s attitude can be understood as their disposition towards things such as social situations, challenges, and the like. It can also be understood as their general disposition, like whether they’re usually just pleasant or more reserved. On the other hand, a child’s self-confidence pertains more to their belief in their own qualities and abilities.
If a child has an attitude that lets them see problems as things to be overcome or a disposition that makes it easy for them to make friends, then you know for sure they’ll be able to handle a lot of things well. This also means that they’ll most likely be confident in their own abilities, or at least trust that they’ll be able to accept things like failure. For school-age children, this can do so much to help them as they embark on their academic journey.
Establishing Good Attitude and Self-Esteem
Attitude and self-esteem are qualities that tell you that a child will eventually become well-adjusted in the sense that they’ll be able to navigate through various situations well. So, you can see why it’s important that these two are established well. With that in mind, how can you, as a parent, contribute to these aspects of your child’s psychosocial development?
1. Let Them Be
This might not seem like sound advice, but let us explain this a little more. One of the things that helps children build self-confidence is by allowing them to do things on their own. By allowing them to carry out and accomplish tasks on their own, they’ll slowly understand that they’re capable of doing things independently. As a result, they’ll get this idea that there are things that they’ll be able to do without your help.
With that in mind, it’s good to let them be when they’re doing certain things. Of course, you can start out with tasks like seating themselves at the table, dressing themselves up, and even washing up after themselves. You can start with tasks you’ve seen them do before. You can also watch over them at first. Then, you can slowly let them do them and let them know you trust them to do it. This simple act can help them believe that you believe that they can do certain things on their own.
2. Allow Them To Fail
Unfortunately, when you let your child do things on their own, there is a chance that they may fail. Failure is inevitable, no matter how old you are. Your child is not exempt from this, especially when they start going to school. So, it’s only right that you allow them to see this too.
Of course, failure will make anyone feel bad. However, children may take this a little harder than most grown-ups. However, as terrible as it may feel to fail, there’s always something to be learned from here. So, while you should allow your child to fail, you should also help them learn how to deal with failure. From telling them it’s a learning experience to letting them know it’s okay to feel bummed for a while, there’s a lot you can teach them about how to deal with these things. So, let them fail, but help them learn and pick themselves up from it, too. Doing so can at least help prepare them for how to deal with similar situations in the future.
3. Encourage Them To Try
Despite the reality that failure is inevitable, one shouldn’t be discouraged from trying. Aside from the fact that living life in fear of failure isn’t a way to live, that thinking also stops you from growing, learning, and experiencing new things. So, even if there’s a risk of failing the first time, you should still encourage your child to try.
By encouraging them to try new things, you’re telling them that it’s okay to go into something not knowing everything. You give them the idea that it’s okay to try, even at the risk of things not going right the first time. What’s more important is the fun you have and what you get in the attempt. Sometimes, that’s the best feeling.
So, be sure to encourage them to try new things, especially things they’re curious about. Doing so can show them the value of exploring new things and how fun that can be. This can help them keep an open mind about unfamiliar things and also see what good can come from it. They can also become more confident with regard to being capable of taking on new tasks, even if there’s a risk of failure.
4. Support Them
Aside from allowing them to do things on their own, letting them fail, and still pushing them to try new things, one of the best things you can do from your end is to support them. A child is a result of the experiences they’ve been through and the environment they’ve been raised in. So, it follows that they should have a good and supportive environment to help them continue to grow as best as they possibly can.
With that in mind, whether your child succeeds or fails, be sure to let them know you’re still there to support them. After all, your love for them should be unconditional. So, it’s good that they see that. By letting them know that you’re still going to be proud of them whether they fail or not, you’re telling them that they’re still worth love and appreciation. That can do a lot to help build on their self-confidence and also teach them to have an attitude that’s still positive towards adversities and hardships.
However, it’s also good to keep in mind that you shouldn't overdo things like praise. While it’s good to praise them for successes and good effort, you shouldn’t use it to sugarcoat things when they fail. Instead, when they fail, tell them that it’s okay and that they can always do better next time. Much like anything else, praise is good, but in moderation.
5. Model It
One of the other things you can do to help them establish a good attitude and sense of self-esteem would be to show them. Children are very observant and can pick up on things they see. So, it makes perfect sense that showing them a good example of what kind of attitude you want from them will help them learn it too!
So, when you fail, make sure they see that you aren’t hard on yourself when you fail. You can be sad, but you shouldn’t be discouraged. In terms of attitude, having an overall pleasant disposition towards things like people and problems can also show them how they should act towards similar situations. Let them see that you won’t let a new challenge get you down. Instead, let them see that you’re open and accepting of it and ready to take them on. Children look up to their parents, after all. So, it’s good to take advantage of this and show them how you want them to turn out too.
