As a parent, we want our kids to be kind and compassionate to others. Unfortunately, in an age of Me First and a pandemic that prevented kids from being together, a lack of empathy is arising. The good news is that it’s possible for parents to encourage your child’s authentically empathetic nature to help them understand the feelings of others — and their own as well. Dr. Michele Borba, Ed.D., an educational psychologist, parenting expert, and author 24 books including Unselfie: Why Empathetic Kids Succeed in Our All-About-Me World explains step by step how to cultivate empathy in your kid and why emotional literacy is so important.
Michele, what I love about Unselfie is that it shows how empathy is not only something you’re born with, but how parents can create conversations to tap into this innate ability.
Oh, thank you for that, because I think that empathy is the superpower trait that is lacking in today’s world. It’s one of the major reasons why anxiety is so up in our kids. They’re looking at screens more, having less playdates which leads to a lower chance of being able to connect with others.
By the way, empathy is step number two in Thrivers because it’s such a key to thriving. And in Unselfie, it’s the entire package. It can be cultivated. Thank you for bringing that up. We’re raising our children in a very narcissistic culture where we’re raising them to think me, not we. As a result, division happens, and our children aren’t practicing social skills.
Here’s another thing that’s powerful. Almost every principal I work in hundreds of schools across the world is seeing a change due to the pandemic. That means that the kids aren’t practicing the social skills well. In all fairness to a child, they’ve been kind of roped inside. They’ve had a mask in front of their faces, and you’re looking at a screen your entire life, so it means they’re a little more socially anxious, right? Maybe a little clingier. They may be a little more narcissistic, because when your stress builds, you dial your empathy down. You have to take care of yourself. You’re in survival mode, and if you don’t have the coping skills that we just talked about, what happens is narcissism is the outcome, and your empathy levels go down, and there goes your superpower. So that’s another reason why you teach self-control. They all go hand in hand.
Absolutely. How can parents nurture that in their children. After all, I believe we’re all inherently born good people.
We are and we need to keep boosting that. Our children are born and hardwired with the traits for empathy, right? Unless we cultivate it, it lies dormant, and there’s a tragedy to our children’s ability to thrive and get that humanness in life. In Unselfie, I identified nine traits, and each chapter is one of those traits.
The easiest one to start with is the one that’s really tanking with our kids and ourselves is emotional literacy. Just talk about emotions more. At six o’clock, for example, we’re going to learn emotional literacy, but instead, you do it naturally with your kids. You’re watching Inside Out. What a fabulous movie to talk to kids about! “Oh my gosh. Look at her. How does Riley feel right now?” As you’re walking into WalMart, say something like, “Hey, let’s look at that woman over there. Look at her face and her body language. How do you think she feels?” Ask them to describe the emotion as if you’re feeling detectives.
You’re reading books with your kids, and when Sally gets really mad, make your face look like Sally. There are dozens of ways to do it naturally, but your child can’t feel with another person, and that’s what empathy is, unless they can turn and go, “I wonder how he feels?
He looks upset. What is facial expression looks like?” And when we do that, we also create bonds with our children, because it’s one of the best ways to boost a relationship with our kids, to be able to say, “You look upset, is everything okay, sweetie pie?” It’s all about talking about emotions naturally.
By the way, kids at a very early age can do this. I remember my two-year-old. I had just gotten a phone call from my dad, who told me that my mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. I was a basket case. My two-year-old didn’t know what to do. He saw the tears and he ran for the Band-Aids and started putting them on my face. Oh, he felt my pain. And I said, “Mommy’s sad right now.”
Our little ones learn sad, mad, scared, and happy are the four they learn. It’s the easiest and fastest. But older kids need lots of them, and there’s a reason for it. Middle school and high school kids say they just can’t read each other like they used to anymore. I go to high schools, and if it’s passing period, if they have their cell phones, it’s the quietest thing I’ve ever seen. Nobody’s talking to each other.
In your carpools, in your family meals, or right before you go to sleep, check in with your kids. You can misinterpret their feelings, and they can also misinterpret your feelings. So say, “I may look like I’m upset, but I’m really, really tired.” And you can say, “Thank you for pointing that out.”
I think it’s good to clarify too, because if Mom looks upset, they might think it’s because of me, and so by having the conversation, they’ll understand and it takes the onus off the child who might thinking they did something wrong.
Oh, I so agree. Just give your kids emotional cues in everyday context. And it’s nice too, because it creates a connection. Emotional literacy might be in a dormant stage, but we can tune it up
I have four kids, and if I see that my older daughter looks upset, I’ll approach her and say, “Are you okay? I’m noticing something, and I’m here to talk with you about it.” She might tell me that she’s upset, but she needs a little space to sort of process her feelings. I find that this works for us because she realizes that I’m acknowledging that she’s upset. And part of all this is being seen. Empathy is being seen.
Yes, yes, that’s exactly what it is. Remember, though it’s seeing with your face, but also look at the body language of the person and then listen to their voice tone. Those are three things we sometimes overlook, but those are day-to-day moments. If we just put it on our radar, we can weave it in simply by talking to our kids, and it’s the first step to boost empathy.
I love that everything that you’ve described is so actionable. Parents are so stressed and teaching your child empathy or perseverance might feel overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be.
Well, thank you for that, because there’s some other things that we overlook when we look at the nine steps to be able to teach empathy. One of the things that we overlook is, as I love as a former teacher: Read books with your kids. Emotional literacy, stepping into the shoes of the character is one of the best ways to boost empathy. And that’s why Wonder and Harry Potter are some of the favorite children’s books right now. They love them because they’re feeling with the character. Film can do the same thing, but just don’t stop reading out loud.
But as your kids get older, I have more parents say, “But he’s a teen. Now what am I going to do?” Well, here’s a sneaky thing to do — keep reading the same book your kids are assigned. Make your kid read it himself, but if you’re reading the same book, I can’t tell you the conversations I’d have with my teen sons. “Are you on page 53? Can you believe what’s happening?” It was glorious. Their friends would come over and we’d get into these conversations, because I’d always look at the sheet of what the teachers were assigning, and they were always emotional literacy type books that helped my kids, as well as me.
By the way, Moms, Dads, get yourself into a book club. They help us develop our own empathy, enhance it, and then enhance our children as well.
I think the most important thing is, and I’m so glad you brought it up a few times — is to make it doable. We overwhelm ourselves with trying to do too much, go and read Unselfie or read Thrivers, but don’t read it from first to last page. Instead, read it and then stop and go. That’s the strategy my kids need and zero in on it. Maybe put it on a Post It note, and put it on your mirror, put it on your screen saver, because these are skills that we know are crucial for humanity. We know they’re crucial for resilience, and every teacher would say they’re also crucial in a classroom for performance, but our kids are lacking them. The only way you acquire them is by simple practice. And if you say, “Okay, we’re going to do 30 minutes on that,” you’re going to have every kid packing and going next door, right? Easy, easy ways.
If you model it yourself, you’re so far better off, because that’s the first way to catch it. Some parents say that their kids teach the dog! As soon as you teach someone else, it reinforces it. Go teach your teddy bear and for older kids, you’re babysitting the kid next door, and you think she needs this skill. So how can you help her? Teaching the skill is always one of the best ways to learn it yourself. So find simple little ways to do it as a family, and that’s how we raise up the generation of thrivers and kids who are Unselfie.