Raising Resilient Kids | Expert Tips for Parents

Building resilience in children is essential for helping them navigate life's challenges with confidence and adaptability. Begin Learning offers expert-backed strategies to support parents in fostering resilience in their kids.

Quick Answer

• To raise resilient kids, establish predictable routines, teach emotional regulation techniques, encourage open communication, model resilience, and provide consistent support.

1. Build Resilience With the Three R’s

Dr. Erin Brickley introduces a simple framework for building resilience:

• Return to Routine: Predictability provides kids with a sense of safety. Establishing consistent routines, such as after-school sequences or weekly activities, helps children feel anchored even when their day outside the home is full of change.
• Regulate: Children need tools to manage their big feelings. Parents can model strategies like box breathing, belly breathing, muscle relaxation, and stretching to help kids physically release stress.
• Reassure: Kids need to know they are loved and safe. Incorporating reassurance into everyday rituals, such as using matching bracelets or morning songs, can provide comfort during challenging moments.

2. Help Kids Name and Manage Emotions

Dr. Mamatha Chary emphasizes the importance of helping children identify and label their emotions. Providing words for what they’re experiencing can help them feel calmer and more in control. Techniques include:

• Reassure: Let your child know you're there to help them work through their feelings.
• Validate: Acknowledge their emotions by saying things like, "I hear you saying you feel nervous."
• Normalize: Reassure them that it's okay to feel nervous, as everyone experiences such emotions.
• Accept: All feelings are valid and make sense in the context of their experiences.
• Utilizing resources like the "Name My Emotions" printable from Learn with Sesame Street can assist children in recognizing and naming their emotions.

3. Practice With Trusted Tools Like Learn with Sesame Street

Dr. Chary notes that familiar, research-backed resources can make practicing emotional skills easier for kids. The Learn with Sesame Street app helps children:

• Recognize and label emotions
• Practice calming strategies
• Build empathy and confidence
• Studies have shown that using Learn with Sesame Street improves preschoolers’ ability to understand, express, and regulate their emotions. Children also begin using emotional regulation strategies from the program and talk about emotions more frequently and deeply.

4. Use Conversations to Build Connection

Brian Matthews, MSEd, emphasizes the power of open, ongoing conversations in building resilience. Starting with gentle, open-ended questions like, "Tell me about your day," keeps the door open for honesty.

• Listen first, validate feelings, and then move to possible solutions.
• This approach fosters a strong connection and supports emotional growth.
• By implementing these strategies, parents can help their children develop the resilience needed to face life's challenges with confidence.