Self-confidence is essential for all aspects of healthy human development, especially in the development of children.

Confidence makes children more likely to be resilient and to pursue individuality, and less likely to develop emotional problems later in life.

They learn more, achieve more and are generally all around happier in life. Here are a few tips that parents can utilize to help develop confidence in their kids:

• Love & accept your child.
  • This tip may seem obvious yet cannot be stated enough. Unconditional love and consistency build a foundation for confidence. Love them well and love them consistently. Making sure that your children feel loved and accepted by you means they will be more likely to love and accept themselves.
• Let your child make their own choices.
  • When children are allowed to make choices from a young age, they gain confidence in their own judgment. This can be implemented in an age appropriate fashion, such as giving young children a choice between one or two options. However, the more you are able to give your kids the ability to choose, the more powerful and confident they will feel.
• Give your children responsibilities.
  • Giving children responsibilities around the house helps with development in many ways, including developing confidence. Give your children jobs that they can do successfully, and that will make them feel useful. With opportunity, good instruction, and patience from parents, kids can master skills in the home, which in turn, makes them more confident to master things outside of the home.

In the next part of the series, we will discuss the four remaining tips for building confidence in your children.

Today, I will discuss four more tips that parents may implement to help instill confidence.

These include:

• Give your child genuine praise
  • Love and praise are important parts of parenting. Giving your child compliments and positive reinforcement are very important; however, you want to be realistic in your praise. Your child will not be “great” at everything and a child will begin to read through praise that is not accurate. Instead, be specific in your praise and give genuine compliments when they are due. This will reinforce their confidence in areas where they succeed while reassuring them that it’s OK to not be “great” at everything.

• Help to set your child up for success
  • Don’t force your kids to try or even continue in activities in which they have no interest or ability. Instead, play to your child’s natural abilities and help them find activities or sports in which they can succeed. You can also help your child set realistic goals within those activities. Accomplishing small, attainable goals will help to build their confidence.

• Teach your child resilience
  • Every child will experience setbacks in life. Use those setbacks as learning experiences. Validate their feelings, which will help them learn to trust their feelings, while also helping them to understand that setbacks are a normal aspect of life and can actually be helpful. If they are able to persevere and succeed, they will be much more self-assured.

• Model self-love
  • This last tip is one of the most important tips. You, the parent, are the role model. Your kids are learning every day how to interact with the world simply by mimicking your words and actions. If you model self-love and self-acceptance day in and day out, your children will receive the message that they should love themselves too. If you become stronger and more confident, your kids are likely to follow in your footsteps and become more confident too.

Written by: Amanda Dempsey, LAMFT