Teaching our children how to navigate life’s challenges is par for the course for parents. Arguably becoming increasingly more important with the rise of things like social media and cyberbullying. While we may not be able to eradicate these problems, we can teach our children the necessary skills to cope with adversity. I have teamed up with a private school near London to offer parents some advice with helping your child build resilience. Therefore better equipped to handle any hardships.

Make Time For Your Child

Make sure you are having regular one-to-one time with your child. Use the time to encourage them to open up to you about what’s going on in their lives, whether good or bad. You don’t have to carve this out of your already busy schedule and make a big deal out of it. There are plenty of opportunities to chat during everyday life. Such as on a car journey or during bath time. Children need to be nurtured in order to build resilience. Knowing that they have an honest, communicative, and supportive relationship with you will help. Having you or another reliable person to fall back on during tough times will help them feel more confident in tackling any issues.

Support Hobbies

Encourage your child to pursue their hobbies, try new things and take risks. Remind them that not everything will go to plan at all times. But giving it their best shot is what counts. For example, they may start having piano lessons and struggle to learn a tricky piece of music from time to time. However, committing to something and being offered constructive criticism will help them learn from their weaknesses and become more resilient. Alternatively, they may join a football team. Sometimes they will win matches and sometimes they will lose. However knowing that they were a team player, they tried their best and they’re always able to bounce back from a setback will, again, make them stronger.

Give Encouragement

Praise your child when you see them working hard or demonstrating an admirable attitude to something. Avoid focusing on the end results. Instead, let your child know that as long as they are trying their best, that’s what counts. As a result, rather than sinking into a pit of misery when they fail an exam or get a bad grade on their homework, they will be able to focus on the fact that they gave it their all. Remembering that’s all they could do!

There are lots of other ways to promote resilience. But it’s generally just about having the right attitude. Be a good role model and demonstrate kindness, gratitude and optimism around your child so that they can adopt the same mindset.