"Encouragement" has always been a heartwarming word. It gives confidence, courage and strength. Both children and adults like to be encouraged. However, encouragement does not always lead to positive energy. The wrong way to encourage can hinder growth or even lead to disorientation.
Suzuki, a famous Japanese educator, believes that for children's education, parents need to cultivate their children's abilities with love and enthusiasm, and learn to encourage and appreciate their children. However, in daily life, many parents use seemingly useful ways of encouragement to stimulate their children's interest and self-confidence, which often backfire.
Here are some common ways to encourage mistakes:
**Empty encouragement**。Parents often say, "Come on! Baby, you're the best! But behind this kind of encouragement is actually the expectation of a successful outcome, not an encouragement of the child's ability.
**Inability to feel safe**。Parent's words, such as "Try again, you're safe!" "It actually negates the child's fears.
**Simple is not the same as simple for children**。Everyone defines simple differently. The simplicity of adults, for children, can make them frustrated, or doubt themselves.
In addition to this, there are also "motivational encouragement" and "contrasting encouragement". The former often encourages children by hitting and denying them, while the latter makes children often feel that their parents prefer other people's children and that they are inferior to others. In both cases, children can fall into self-doubt and denial, which can lead to self-loss.
The book Positive Discipline states that when a message of love is passed on to children, they are not only able to achieve positive results, but also experience more happiness. Therefore, effective encouragement should be to make children feel full of love in it and happily do what they think is "ideal".
I have two suggestions for this:
1.Give your child freedom. Parents should not "monitor" their children's learning all the time, and excessive attention will only increase their children's anxiety. We should give children a free and relaxed atmosphere to grow up, so that they can freely try and make mistakes, explore and reflect.
2.Listen to your child's heart. When children encounter difficulties, parents should listen to their hearts instead of blindly criticizing and scolding. Let children feel understood and seen, so as to get "psychological encouragement" from parents.
Wrong encouragement may be a temporary boost to a child's enthusiasm, but it can have a profound impact on a child's development. The right encouragement can enhance children's sense of belonging and identity, and make them more confident and happy.