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Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Emotion Coaching Parenting: Raising Emotionally Healthy Kids



My local news station website had a super great article on how to respond to your child's emotions.

Here's a couple quotes from the article:

"Imagine growing up in a home where your parents expected you to always be cheerful, happy and calm. In this home, sadness and anger are wrong and seen as signs of failure....
This gets complicated, especially as you age and you discover that life is not easy. Still, you're not supposed to feel all those bad feelings, so you become a master at covering up. Better yet, you do your best not to feel. You avoid situations that lead to conflict, anger and pain."

{I for one am probably guilty of  telling my kids to calm down and be happy waaay more often than I should. I could definitely work on helping them to sort through their emotions instead of just brushing them aside so I don't have to listen to crying and whining}

On the opposite end of this you have what is called "Emotion Coaching Parents"

"When parents offer children honest empathy and help them cope with negative feelings like anger, sadness, and fear, parents build bridges of loyalty and affection."

-------> {get this!} "Children who received emotional coaching from their parents also reported fewer infectious illnesses. They were better at focusing attention. They related better to other people, even in the tough social situations like teasing. They were better at understanding people. They had better friendships with other children. They also performed better academically"

To get the 5 tips on how to become an Emotion Coaching Parent and to see some other amazing benefits of doing such CLICK HERE


P.S. I have some free Montessori-inspired Emotion Cards to help teach your littles more complex emotions.

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