Nurturing a Growth Mindset in Your Child

In simple terms this is all about encouraging positivity and a belief in your child’s ability to be an achiever.

Consider the following:

• Explain to your child the concept of a growth mindset versing a fixed mindset, highlighting the importance of believing in one's ability to improve through effort and practice.

• As a parent celebrate when your child tackles a difficult task or shows resilience in the face of challenges. Let them see that effort is rewarding.

• As the parent, help your child re frame statements like "I can't do this" to "I can't do this yet," emphasizing the idea of growth and progress over time. It’s about never say never.

• As the parent model a growth mindset in your own life. Share stories of your own challenges and successes, demonstrating perseverance and a positive attitude towards learning.

• Parents can provide constructive feedback to their child that focuses on effort, progress, and specific actions rather than fixed traits or abilities. Use phrases like, "I noticed you worked really hard on that" or "What strategies did you try?"

• Set realistic, achievable goals that align with your child’s interests and abilities. Involve your child in the goal-setting process and celebrate milestones along the way. All goals should be reasonable.

• Provide a supportive home environment that encourages exploration, curiosity, and a love for learning. This could include having a designated study space, providing access to educational resources, and engaging in activities that foster creativity and critical thinking.

• Re frame mistakes as valuable learning opportunities rather than failures. Discuss strategies for helping your child learn from their mistakes, such as problem-solving, reflection, and seeking help when needed. Making mistakes is a human process.

• Celebrate your child's growth and progress, no matter how small. This could involve creating a growth mindset journal where children document their achievements and areas of improvement or holding a "growth mindset celebration" to recognize efforts.

• Offer consistent support, encouragement, and reassurance to your child as they navigate challenges and strive for growth. Not everything will be perfect but their efforts are given much encouragement.

As your child grows they need to grow with a positive mindset where there is much personal belief and a sense that all is possible.

“Courage to continue matters more than success or failure”

— Winston Churchill

Supporting your child’s individual learning style

We are not all learning like robots. We all develop our own individual learning style which needs to be nourished and encouraged from an early age. If we block our child’s ability to learn in their own way it can inhibit their ability to learn, it will devour their self-confidence and their interest in learning will spiral down very fast.

Here are some sound reasons why supporting their individual style will accelerate your child’s learning: Let them take ownership of their learning style.

Optimised Learning: Tailoring your support to your child's learning style ensures they can absorb and retain information more effectively. This optimisation leads to better academic performance and a deeper understanding of the material. A child will remember much more if they are in control of their learning. The brain is wired to connect to the child’s learning in a way that will be deeper and richer if the child is in control of what and how they learn.

Boosted Confidence: When children are taught in a way that aligns with their learning style, they tend to feel more confident about their abilities. This increased self-assurance can lead to a more positive attitude toward learning and taking on challenges. A confident child will learn with more gusto and memorise the content for longer.

Reduced Frustration: If a child's learning style isn't accommodated, they may become frustrated and discouraged. Shutting down to learning could be the outcome. Understanding and supporting their preferred learning approach can reduce their frustration and make the learning process more enjoyable. Try not to understand their learning style and accept that it works for them.

Enhanced Motivation: Children are more motivated to learn when they find the learning process engaging and relevant to their interests and preferences. Catering to their learning style can spark their curiosity and enthusiasm for learning.

Improved Communication: Understanding your child's learning style allows for better communication between you and your child's educators. It enables you to advocate for your child's needs and collaborate effectively with teachers to create a conducive learning environment. Accept that your child is unique and in the classroom teachers know how to accommodate such variation in a child’s learning. Be there to talk to the teacher about how your child chooses to learn.

Personal Growth: Supporting your child's learning style fosters their ability to adapt and learn independently. They develop problem-solving skills and the capacity to explore various learning methods, which are valuable life skills. Your child’s individual style when encouraged strengthens their sense of self-worth and they value how they learn.

In summary, recognising and supporting your child's learning style can lead to more effective learning experiences, increased confidence, reduced frustration, enhanced motivation, improved communication with educators, and personal growth. A child will perform better when happy and are more conducive to learning when they feel confident that they know how best to learn. Give them space to experiment with how they learn and you will see a child taking more ownership of their learning.

Help your child improve their mental capacity

We can do many things to help our child improve their mental capacity. Some of them are very simple and are already in place. However, each day in different ways, we can keep building that capacity by challenging them across different formats.

• All children need adequate sleep. The rest they get will influence how they operate the next day. Teachers will tell you the difference it makes when a child comes to school having not slept well. Their learning capacity is considerably down and their mood and temperament makes them have quite a sluggish and dull day.

• Teach your child different ways to self-regulate. This is all about being self-disciplined and emotionally capable of controlling themselves. In the home, there are many ways in which your child can be disciplined and together work on their ability to manage themselves, show independence and take ownership of jobs and duties around the house. Your patience and tolerance are needed here.

• Play games with your child. Read with them and challenge each other through board games. All this is about building mental capacity and teaching them to work on problem-solving and healthy competition. Let them see that you enjoy problem-solving with them.

• Conversations at home should be open and as positive as possible. Give your child plenty of room to talk and tell their story. Be an effective listener so they feel that they are taken seriously. Having family discussions and debates stimulates their thinking and encourages healthy dialogue. Allow them to be confident in what they have to say.

• Challenge them through problem-solving of all sorts. This could be driving in the car and searching for addresses. It could be working through a recipe, fixing broken toys, building Lego shapes etc. When you see an opportunity for them to problem solve, invite them to have a go. Look to them for assistance in solving the problem. Let them know that you work through the solution together.

• When they ask questions throw the concept back with another question:‘You want to know why that lid doesn't open? Have you seen other jars like that before?’ It’s all about posing inquiring questions that make them think through solutions themselves. Let them accept that you will not always give them the answer.

• Laugh a lot and enjoy the jokes that you share with each other. Developing a sense of humour also enlightens the mental capacity to see the world from a different perspective. The world is not always black and white.

• Do crosswords together. Perhaps a jigsaw or have an ongoing game of Scrabble on the table. Keep them working on thinking through the process.

• When school problems arise, especially with friends, talk through possible solutions that can be managed by your child. Let them see that you expect them to have an idea of how best to solve it. Emotional challenges are sometimes difficult for children but mentally, they need to work through the process as best they can. The more they can regulate their emotional responses, the stronger their mental capacity.

• Teaching gratitude in your child is also a strengthening mental process. People that show and demonstrate gratitude have a stronger mental approach to life. 

Finally, there are many and varied ways to strengthen a child’s mental capacity. Just be the catalyst that presents challenges and doesn't always offer the solution. Value what contributions they make. After a while, the child takes more ownership of themselves and feels mentally safer and confident.

‘Be the catalyst to a healthy mental approach for your child.’

                                             -Gail J Smith

Slow down and gain more time. It makes for better parenting and personal growth

There are so many varied reasons why slowing down is almost impossible when living a busy life as a parent etc. However, should you learn some skills to slow down, who knows, you may regain some precious parent or personal time. In small ways, it may be possible to reclaim some time and to enjoy your child just a little bit more. Childhood moves quickly and soon we will be looking back and wondering where did the years go, did I parent well? What did I miss?

The following thoughts may trigger some thinking for yourself in finding strategies that can simply help slow you down a little to smell the roses with your child:

• When feeling stressed, take your mind to a place where you were very happy. Think about it for a while and you will be surprised how it eases some tension.

• Think about the pace that you keep. If others demand more of you, consider if that it’s fair and reasonable. Why should I change my pace which works for me? Everything has their pace in life. Be comfortable with yours.

• Take little moments of time out. Step into the yard, look at the flowers or simply enjoy the breeze. Those moments are great to reduce moments of stress.

• Try not to over plan. Leave some space, just for space itself. It certainly is easy to fill, but question is that really necessary?

• Your children are a great source of learning for you. The more you play with them, the more you become relaxed in their company. Allow it to just happen and enjoy the moment.

• Physical exercise is such a stress breaker. Even simply walking is life giving and takes your mind in fresher and healthier directions. Choose physical exercise that suits you.

• When we worry about something it can consume us. Let me ask you….. can you just let it go? Does worrying improve the situation? Do things change for the better when you worry? When you have those feelings simply look to your child. They are a warm, happy feeling.

• Are there some times when you can just stop the business and rest. Turn down the lights a little and reduce the pace. It can feel better because there is less.

• Some people like being busy with their hands and finding creative things to do. Giving time to chat with friends is a great stress buster. What do you like to do that makes you happy?

• Is it possible to give your self a full day off? How about half a day? Find a little more time for yourself not to do busy things but to enjoy yourself in your own space.

• Sometimes doing less and focusing on doing those things really well gives us more satisfaction. Being busy and doing more is a formula for lack of satisfaction in all areas.

• Are you tired from lots of talk? Busy conversations can be tiring and it is healthy to rest from talking. Maybe you can find some time to talk less, listen to music, walk etc.

• Think about two or three things that give you pleasure. Can you spend more time around those things. Be generous to yourself. Everyone likes a massage, but we can massage our sense of well being by having more of what makes us happy.

• Parents develop excellent skills in feeling guilty if they put themselves forward. This can be so destructive to well being, which after all, needs to be strong and constant to be an effective parent. Your personal well being is essential.

Finally, your child wants you well and happy. They become quite anxious when they see you unsettled and under pressure. They need to understand that your needs should be nurtured and that being a parent is balancing act between focusing on family and looking after yourself. That way everyone learns and benefits all round.

          ‘The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one                                             thought over another.’

                                                                                  -William James

Faults! We all have them.

Do we sometimes focus too much on the faults that we see around us? Children by nature of being children are frequently making mistakes from practical matters through to their fragile emotional growth. I say all hail faults! Have often do you hear your child say:

“It’s not my fault.” At an early age, a child struggles to own a fault.

The key here is to focus more on virtues and gifts that we see present in our children. We certainly teach our children to manage faults and we do this in a gentle and caring way. We teach them to manage their faults and we praise their efforts when they show improvement.

Now that school has resumed children are exposed to various learning situations that will challenge them both inside the classroom and outside. They begin to recognise through the support of teachers, that making mistakes is acceptable and that we learn to strengthen the fault line by practice, effort and determination. Their world in school will be a daily exercise of managing success and checking in when faults occur. Our job as parents is to support them by accepting that we all make mistakes and have faults that can be worked on with support and encouragement. Let us take out the negative undertone of the word, “fault” and see it as an opportunity to grow. I am inclined to replace the word with “mistakes”.

Consider the following thoughts:

• Are you a person who tends to notice faults before you notice the best of the person? If this is the case keep reminding yourself that focussing on faults only exacerbates one’s feeling of failure or disappointment in someone else.  It is not difficult to develop a negative mindset about someone if you just focus on their faults.

• Talk about how you have been working on yourself to improve in some area. Perhaps your fault is never being on time. Talk to your child about what you are doing to improve in this area. It’s important to show the child that naming the fault is the first job in taking control. Once named it puts things into perspective.

• When your child talks about how they are struggling to succeed in an area, talk about the times you have seen improvement. Build on the positive times when you did see improvement.

“I can see you are struggling with maths. I remember how you mastered the times tables last year. That was a great success”.

• Remind your child that we all have faults. It’s part of the human condition. Many of our great achievers over time struggled with faults and worked hard by taking risks and working on improvement.

It’s all about developing the best disposition and owning those faulty areas in which improvement can take place if you so wish to work on them.

“I think people who have faults are a lot more interesting than people who are perfect.”

— Spike Lee