Boosting Your Child's Self Esteem

 As adults we know that our self esteem level is important. When we have low self esteem we feel poorly about ourselves and our abilities. When we have high self esteem we feel great and able. What we may not know, however, is that our children have self esteem too.

As parents we want our children to feel good about themselves. We want them to feel confident in themselves and their abilities. When our children have high self esteem they do better in school. They act better behaviorally. They feel good inside. This is very important.

There are several ways that we can boost our children’s self esteem. Many of these ways are very simple. Here are three great self esteem boosters...

1. Catch your children being good. Let them know about it too! Using comments like “Great job” or “Very well done” several times a day can do wonders to improve your child’s self esteem. Comments like these make your child feel good, like they are really doing a great thing by being good. Children crave this positive attention.

2. Discipline, don’t punish. All kids will act up behaviorally every now and then. When they do it’s very important to remember that kids will be kids. Discipline and punishment are two very different things. Discipline is a method of communication and guidance. We communicate why what the child did was wrong and why not to do it again. This guides, or teaches the child correct behavior. Punishment, on the other hand, is made up of things such as anger and yelling. Punishment scares children into correct behavior, rather than teaching. Punishment can reduce self esteem while discipline can increase it.