Steps to boosting child’s self worth

Recently a reader made the following request “Dear Dr. LeCrone, I am a single parent of three young children ages eight, six and four. My middle child is a six year old boy and he lives in a small apartment with his two sisters and me. He has no significant male role models in his life, has asthma and is not able to participate in a lot of outdoor activities with his friends. I know he feels isolated and suffers from a poor self concept. Could you please give some general information on helping improve a child’s self concept?”

Dear Reader: Providing a warm, nurturing environment with unconditional love as a foundation is the place to start.

Following are some specific guidelines that you may find helpful:

• Provide positive forms of communication to the child far more often than negative feedback. Sometimes parents may need to practice “catching” their children doing something good and build on this event. This may be especially important for children who have a poor self concept.

• Keep your promises. Children should feel that they can trust and believe their parents. This trust needs to be accompanied by consistency, boundaries, limits, and consequences that are clearly stated.

• Help your child view their less than satisfactory performances as opportunities for learning rather than mistakes or failures.

• Show appreciation and approval for your child’s efforts. Try to hear the words, but listen for the feelings behind the words too. Preoccupation, “rushed” listening and responding with only yes or no comments will not achieve the desired result.

Listening – really listening – is one of the most powerful ways that parents can show respect and develop good communication skills with their children.

• Keep expectations reasonable and appropriate. Recognize the different developmental stages that children go through. Don’t expect a three year old to react like a 13 year old or a 13 year old to see the world in the same fashion as a young adult of 20.

• Involve children in decision making and problem solving when possible and appropriate.

• Avoid making adverse comparisons between one child and another. Remind yourself that each child is unique and makes unique contributions to the family.

Hopefully these suggestions will provide a beginning approach to healthy parenting.


Harold H. LeCrone, Jr., Ph.D. Copyright 2000