The Importance of Resilience and how to work with young people to foster
well-being, self esteem and resilience
Adults can foster a strong sense of identity and increased self-esteem in children
by:
using positive feedback, positive language
focusing their praise on children’s efforts
hard work
patience
capability to learn from errors (rather than: ‘Oh! You are so clever’
Role modelling
Children will learn that hard work pays and they will work hard to achieve their
goals, thus fulfilling the high expectations. The self fulfilling prophecy concept
does work the other way around as well, which is why labeling children as
naughty, slow, lazy, average is likely to result in poor performance. However, the
child retains the individual capacity to accept, reject or challenge
expectations. For example, a verbally abused child (‘stupid’, ‘lazy’, ‘useless’),
might accept the labels and sink into a state of hopelessness or reject the
offending labels, try and succeed to prove the offender wrong. Verbal abuse is
an adversity and the child’s course of action in the face of adversity, might be
down to his level of resilience.
Resilience and positive self regard are interdependent. A strong sense of
identity in turn builds up one’s sense of identity. Those are key features a
child ought to develop in useful in adverse circumstances because it
provides the child with resilience.
Resilience in order to overcome the inherent adversities of life. Physical and
verbal abuse, traumatic events, living in poverty, bullying, and disability are just a
few examples of adversities.
But life is full of circumstances that only some perceive as adverse while others
perceive as simple challenges of life: learning to walk or to ride a bike, going to
school, learning to swim, examinations. Some children become overcome by
their emotions or burst into tears while waiting to participate in a competition,
for example. They might be overcome by a fear of failure or the tension of
the waiting to perform.
well-being, self esteem and resilience
Adults can foster a strong sense of identity and increased self-esteem in children
by:
using positive feedback, positive language
focusing their praise on children’s efforts
hard work
patience
capability to learn from errors (rather than: ‘Oh! You are so clever’
Role modelling
Children will learn that hard work pays and they will work hard to achieve their
goals, thus fulfilling the high expectations. The self fulfilling prophecy concept
does work the other way around as well, which is why labeling children as
naughty, slow, lazy, average is likely to result in poor performance. However, the
child retains the individual capacity to accept, reject or challenge
expectations. For example, a verbally abused child (‘stupid’, ‘lazy’, ‘useless’),
might accept the labels and sink into a state of hopelessness or reject the
offending labels, try and succeed to prove the offender wrong. Verbal abuse is
an adversity and the child’s course of action in the face of adversity, might be
down to his level of resilience.
Resilience and positive self regard are interdependent. A strong sense of
identity in turn builds up one’s sense of identity. Those are key features a
child ought to develop in useful in adverse circumstances because it
provides the child with resilience.
Resilience in order to overcome the inherent adversities of life. Physical and
verbal abuse, traumatic events, living in poverty, bullying, and disability are just a
few examples of adversities.
But life is full of circumstances that only some perceive as adverse while others
perceive as simple challenges of life: learning to walk or to ride a bike, going to
school, learning to swim, examinations. Some children become overcome by
their emotions or burst into tears while waiting to participate in a competition,
for example. They might be overcome by a fear of failure or the tension of
the waiting to perform.
