5 Tips for Parents To Boost their Kids’ Self Confidence

Self-confidence and self-esteem are important markers of personality growth in children. A child’s self-confidence helps them grow in every facet of their life and helps them feel more self-assured. Positive parenting entails the creation of an environment that enables children and young kids to feel empowered in their personality and being. In an age where there is a lot of discourse online, it is easy for your child to feel nervous and insecure. Further, low self-confidence is also detrimental to their emotional and social growth. It hampers skill development as your child is not self-assured that they can learn properly. As parents, we not only act as their caregivers, but we also act as their biggest cheerleaders. If you want to know essential parenting tips to help your child achieve optimal self-confidence, then keep reading!

Self-Disclosure - Kids often look up to their parents as their most significant role models. Albert Bandura, one of the most celebrated psychologists of all time, talked about modeling and observational learning. Children often set themselves up to impossible standards. In most cases, it is their parents. They feel insecure and defeated if they do not live up to those expectations. As a parent, self-disclosure is vital as it teaches your child to be confident in their flaws. Telling your child anecdotes about your mistakes and quirks makes them feel confident in their own. It builds a solid ground for parental connection.

Maintain A Healthy Balance - Often, as parents, we forget that we were kids in the past too. To build a child’s confidence, we often push them to the breaking point to build skills so they can outshine others in the class. Before a parent argues that structure and routine are essential, one must ask oneself- isn't free play equally important? Pushing your child to do multiple things at once can take them to their breaking point, cause burn-out and lead to a severe nosedive in confidence.

Talk To Your Child About Their Genuine Interests - Before enrolling them in that piano or public-speaking class to increase their self-confidence, TALK! Parents know best, an idea we have been carrying for generations, and do not get us wrong, there is a lot of truth to that. However, it is time that we give our children autonomy and independence in their decision-making. It will allow them to do what they genuinely like and provide them with control and confidence over their schedule!

Public and Private - A child’s self-confidence gets severely shattered if they are reprimanded or scolded in public. There are certain boundaries that you should, as parents, maintain with your child. If you want to build your child’s self-confidence, you mustn't scream or scold your child loudly in front of an audience. This only goes a long way to making them feel insecure and underconfident, and a pervasive pattern of shame sets in.

Let Your Child Take Initiative - One of the most important parenting tips relating to self-confidence is just letting your child take the reign. Start slowly by letting them decide where to sit for dinner, giving them minor chores, and taking it from there. The philosophy of "Do It By Yourself’ never disappoints as it builds autonomy and confidence from an early age while also building important skills.

For more information about positive parenting, visit the Podar International School website!