How do we teach our kids to bounce back from a bad situation?
Building Resilience in Children and Adolescents – Help Your Child Learn to Deal With Stress by Miranda Kucera, PhD, school psychologist in Placer County
Resilience is necessary to handle the everyday unpleasant events and larger crises that may come our way, to “bounce back.” This skill is something that can be improved upon throughout the lifespan and includes internal (e.g. hope, optimism), and external forces (e.g. supportive family and friends). So, how do we encourage our children to be resilient and teach them to bounce back?
Adults, especially parents, are the best role models for children. Let’s think about an example with an unexpected negative event that most adults have had to deal with: unexpected car repair that stressed finances. How did you think about the event? Likely, you experienced some levels of disappointment, frustration, or anger. How did you express these emotions? Negative emotions are expected, and it’s important to express them. However, like all emotions, the key is appropriate expression. For example, screaming and throwing your coffee mug across the room, while tempting, is not an appropriate emotional reaction. More appropriate ways of handling frustration may include talking with a family member or friend about your frustration, going for a walk, taking a “time out” and allowing yourself time to calm down. Talk through your strategies with your children. For example, keeping in mind the age of the child, you could say: “I’m really frustrated about this car repair. I need to think of some ways to calm down so I can think about how to handle this problem. I’m going to go for a walk to try to clear my head a bit.”
Our problem solving usually occurs inside our heads and children do not always get the chance to see how we handle stress. Talk through your emotions and how you handle them. Ask your children for ideas of how to calm down. Remember how many times you’ve handled difficult situations in the past and have been successful. When your child experiences a negative event, you can draw on the past for positive examples on how to cope with the situation.
Feeling competent is also an important component in building resiliency and bouncing back. Children need to feel that they have skills and talents and can be successful. Areas of competence may include academics, sports, music, art, and any other activity that your child enjoys. When a negative event occurs, draw on examples of when they have been successful to help them remember they can be competent in many areas, and they can also be competent in recovering from a difficult event. Just as your child will improve in swimming with practice, resilience is something that builds with experience.
Children (and adults) need strong social connections to support them through the good and not-s
o-good times. Having a wide base of support through multiple avenues (e.g. school, neighborhood, family, etc) helps children feel supported and cared for no matter where they are. Help your child foster emotional attachments with neighbors, school peers, family members, and others by spending time and arranging activities so your child can develop bonds with multiple people in their lives.
As adults, we are the best model of how to teach children to be resilient and bounce back. Remember to take care of yourself as well!
For more information on building resiliency, please visit the following:
The Penn State Resiliency Program
The Penn Resiliency Program is a group intervention for late elementary and middle school students that teaches cognitive-behavioral and social problem-solving skills. National Association of School Psychologists Fishful Thinking
This program is dedicated to helping parents and educators raise resilient and optimistic kids who can achieve their best at school, at home, and in life.
