Develop the emotional intelligence in children It is very important, as it is one of the skills that will help you the most to develop personally, have healthy personal relationships and be successful in life.
When there are emotional imbalances, the behavior of children and adolescents is altered, it affects family, school and social coexistence and also their psychological well-being.
These imbalances appear when the child does not recognize their emotions properly, does not express them or does so in an inappropriate way or misinterprets the behaviors or emotions of others, for example. For all this, building adequate emotional intelligence in our children can help them to be emotionally healthier.
Self-knowledge or self-knowledge is the cornerstone of emotional intelligence. Not because it is the most important, but because without it the others can hardly exist.
To develop an adequate emotional awareness, where the person is aware of their own internal states, their emotions, their resources, the effects that emotions have on them, it is important to name them.
To be able to properly manage your emotions, you must first recognize them properly, and in this lies the best knowledge of yourself..
If we say that emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize our own emotions and others, respecting them, it is necessary, first of all, to know our own.
Self-awareness is one of the basic pillars of intrapersonal intelligence, one of the intelligences proposed by Gardner in his theory of multiple intelligences..
To do this, name everything you feel. Every time a certain situation arises where your child is feeling an emotion, even if he expresses it in an inappropriate way, act.
Instead of trying to eliminate and minimize the negative emotion, start from it to name it and explain to your child what it feels and why. In this way you will be working on self-awareness.
One of the most appropriate tips to build emotional intelligence in children is that you attend to emotional literacy.
Emotional literacy is getting children to have a wide and fluent vocabulary about emotions is a basic issue throughout their development stage.
Knowing how to name the emotions we feel is the first step to recognize and accept them. Children often do not know what emotion they are feeling. They do not know how to identify the physical or emotional part of each emotion.
For example, if your child is sad because he wanted to put on a sweatshirt that is dirty and cannot put it on and he has broken down into tears, work on that emotion with him..
For example, you can take the opportunity to talk to him that he is sad, that is why he has tears, that you understand that he is sad because he likes that shirt a lot and would like to wear it.
Although it may not seem important to you what your child feels at certain times, it is important to him, so you must take it into account.
Taking the example above, validate your child's emotions. In that case, in which your child breaks down crying because he wants to put on a sweatshirt that is dirty, don't tell him "don't cry about that, it's silly, you have this shirt that is exactly the same as the other one".
It is important that you acknowledge his emotions, that you tell him that you understand his emotion, and that you help him find a solution. Many times, since we do not like children to suffer, we try to directly eliminate negative emotions (when they cry, when they are angry).
We distract them with other things (a toy, with the television, etc.). Anything goes so they stop crying, for example. On other occasions, some people tell them that “crying is when they are little” or phrases like “that is silly”.
It is important that you keep in mind that everything that your child thinks and feels you must take into account, respect and enforce. It is important for you to grow up with strong self-esteem and for you to feel that it is important.
Self-esteem is an essential aspect of the child's personality, which is developing throughout childhood. If a person accepts himself, he will be able to advance and mature and continue to fulfill himself personally..
The child and the adult who will be needs to have a positive self-esteem and a good concept of himself, which will allow him to overcome the obstacles he will encounter in life and solve conflicts.
Self-esteem is the appreciation of one's own personal worth. And the child's self-esteem is formed from the experiences they also live with their parents.
Showing him that he is important and that he learns to accept himself for who he is is a good way to develop positive self-esteem..
If the person feels and perceives that others accept him, love him and consider him important, he will feel competent, secure and with good self-esteem.
Knowing your own strengths and weaknesses is also an essential aspect of self-awareness..
When you know what your strengths and weaknesses are, you feel more confident about yourself, your abilities and your abilities. You know how far you can go, what you can expect and what you need to improve.
We must teach our son that we all have positive aspects and weaknesses and that this does not make us better or worse than others. We do not have to be good at everything and neither do our mistakes or our weaknesses define us as people.
Helping your child to detect his strengths and weaknesses will help him to recognize when he needs help, how he can cope with difficulties, when he can give the best of himself and you will be contributing to his personal development.
Self-control is also one of the main characteristics of emotional intelligence. Self-control and self-motivation are part of the intrapersonal intelligence that Gardner already named.
Self-control is part of self-management, of knowing how to properly manage one's own emotions.
Having self-control does not mean that you should suppress or deny emotions or that your child does not express them. Proper management of emotions is learning that requires time and effort.
First of all, the child must recognize the emotions he has, and if he is not able to do so, he will hardly be able to manage it properly..
Self-control can be worked on, but not through repressing or denying emotions. They must be accepted, and although they come out in an appropriate way in our child (for example, in the form of tantrums), they should not be punished, but rather work on the underlying emotion from that behavior.
Having self-control means understanding the emotion and transforming the emotion to our benefit. Requires the person to be flexible, open to new approaches, and adapt new perspectives on problem solving.
Self-motivation is another component of emotional intelligence, specifically intrapersonal intelligence proposed by Gardner.
Being self-motivated is emotionally empowering yourself to maintain goal-oriented behavior. It is about the child having the goal in mind and remembering the rewards that it will achieve.
It is about working persistence in children, the fact of not being discouraged, of being applied, of achieving despite mistakes, etc..
Motivation will help your child achieve his goals in life. To do this, help them assess effort, set realistic and specific goals, and prevent them from putting off the tasks they need to perform..
Empathy is one of the components of interpersonal intelligence proposed in Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences.
Empathy helps children to understand others, to put themselves in their place, to understand their moods and also psychological or motivational states.
In order to recognize the emotional states of others we need to be understanding, sensitive, have perceptual skills and the ability to adopt different roles.
Developing empathy is essential to be emotionally intelligent, since it is the point from which satisfactory social relationships with our peers start..
Communication skills in children also play an important role in their social competence, and therefore, in emotional intelligence.
Within communication we refer to basic non-verbal skills (for example, eye contact or gestures), competence in conversations or language skills.
Communicating with your child is also important because it will help you to connect and express feelings, to detect emotions that paralyze, block or matter to them.
In order for the child to learn to properly manage their emotions, it is necessary that parents and educators have information to manage their emotional states and facilitate learning for children..
It is also important that you let him talk, and some tricks you can use to communicate properly with him is to use messages that reflect feelings.
Social skills are a fundamental component of emotional intelligence.
They are the set of behaviors that a subject emits within an interpersonal relationship where he is able to express his emotions, desires and opinions, taking into account others and solving immediate problems and preventing future problems.
Interaction with other people is essential in the development of the person and conditions their socialization process. Social skills can range from simple to complex behaviors: greeting, expressing opinions, making friends.
For this, it offers an adequate model of social skills, the child will learn by example when he sees in his parents expressions of courtesy, respect, solidarity towards other people.
Also, value the positive aspects and reinforce your child and provide him with occasions where he can relate to social situations.
Conflicts often take place on many occasions due to poorly managed emotions. Teach your child that anger is a normal emotional and that it is okay to get angry.
What you must learn is to manage that anger. To do this, show him that although everyone gets angry, the way we act afterwards determines the consequences.
Teach him to detect the signs that lead to anger and that can lead to conflict, as well as different ways of acting than he always does..
Show him how to manage anger and avoid problems that lead to conflict. Help him to avoid with impulsive acts, to calm down with different techniques (breathing, relaxation).
Teamwork is fundamental in the society in which we develop and is constantly present in the lives of children.
Learning to manage in a group, to deal with other people, resolve conflicts, communicate, etc., are necessary skills to work in a team.
When we work as a team, emotional intelligence is very present. And being emotionally intelligent can help your child to function in groups in a more optimal way..
You can work with your child about teamwork: the importance of establishing good communication between colleagues, the fact of working with different solutions, the importance of maintaining a commitment, of knowing how to resolve conflicts.
Active listening is one of the pillars of emotional intelligence. Listening requires more effort than speaking. Knowing how to listen requires learning, and refers not only to listening to what the person has expressed but also to attending to the feelings and thoughts that underlie.
Being able to listen actively also requires empathy.
Active listening is learned and beginning to develop it in childhood with children, will help them understand the importance it has to be able to relate properly with others.
Teach them the importance of respecting the turn to speak, not interrupting other people, focusing attention when someone is telling us something important, maintaining eye contact.
Assertiveness is also part of emotional intelligence, being one of the basic pillars of it.
If you work on assertiveness, the child will be sure of himself, will express himself clearly and will be a person capable of expressing his desires, motivations and needs, while taking others into account.
For this, it is important that you respect your child and that you show him that his opinions are important, but that at the same time he must take others into account.
An assertive child will be able to express himself adequately, say no when he needs it, defend his rights and express his feelings, all according to his interests and objectives and respecting the rights of others.
To build adequate emotional intelligence, self-confidence is also necessary. We refer to the security that one shows about the assessment of what he does and his capacities and competences.
A child who trusts himself is a child who feels capable of achieving the goals that he sets himself, who is strong to face the obstacles that life offers him and therefore, can develop optimally.
For a child to trust himself, you must trust him. So have high expectations of him, but keep them realistic, otherwise he might get frustrated..
If you trust him, the child will too and will not give up, always looking for alternatives that help him achieve the goals he sets for himself.
Unconditional love is something that must be expressed and that must be shown on a day-to-day basis. Love should not be given in exchange for anything, and should be expressed both in everyday examples and with the word.
You must respect your child for being the way he is, tell him how much you love him and put words to how you feel.
In your relationship and yourself, in the things that happen to you every day, many and very varied emotions arise. Sometimes you are sad, other times happy, sometimes you get angry, focus on yourself and how you feel and express it to the child.
Telling them how we feel, what emotions are called, and why we feel that way also helps them develop their emotional intelligence..
One of the main tasks of successful parents is to train them in emotional competencies so that they are responsible and emotionally healthy adults.
Parents should help their children to identify and label emotions, to respect their feelings, to help them cope in social situations.
The way in which parents attend to the needs of their children, show empathy for what they feel and need, regulate their emotions, express themselves with them or talk about emotions, for example, will help their children to exercise it in themselves.
Children also learn by imitation, and if they see certain attitudes in the example of their parents, they will end up incorporating them into their own repertoire.
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