Nicola Hacking: Building Emotionally Strong Children

Apr 07, 2020

Emotional strength is a funny old subject. I mean, what even is it? And how do we get it ourselves, let alone instil it into others?

It’s generally agreed that there is a rise worldwide in mental health issues, particularly amongst children and young adults. But I can’t help questioning the figures we base this on. According to data, about 13% of the global population, some 971 million people, are currently suffering from some kind of mental disorder. But… is this new? Or are we just more aware of it? Is it now more acceptable to admit that we’re struggling? Are there now more avenues we can access for help? Are we now perhaps more socially aware and recognise that men or children can have issues too? Dementia is apparently the fastest-growing mental illness but is it? Or are we living longer and therefore there are just more age-related issues in the demographic?

In all honesty I can’t quite formulate an answer to all these questions in my own head, but what I really do believe in, is that we need to do something about it, and I can do my bit through the children I teach.

So how can I provide opportunities for children to develop the skills they need to be emotionally strong, happy people? I’m told that “mentally strong children are prepared for the challenges of the world”, but we are prepping children for a future we don’t really have any concept of, so how do we determine what skills they need? They’ll surely need to be able to tackle problems, bounce back from failure, and cope with inevitable hardships. With the world becoming increasingly digital, perhaps our children will work at home on their own? Perhaps they will need coping strategies for loneliness? One of my personal bugbears is with children and technology, particularly when it comes to social media, and the glaring links I feel lie between this and poor mental health. But then the world children are growing up in now is so vastly different to the one I experienced (thank god camera phones didn’t exist during my teenage years!) and technology and social media is a part of life now. Is it down to the way we use it? Do we actually, before all else, need to teach children to be kind?

For me, the critical input is in emotional self-regulation: having the skills to understand and control their behaviour, emotions and thoughts, to manage these in accordance with the demands of the situation. Children need a set of skills that will allow them to recognise the way they feel, to resist highly emotional reactions, to calm themselves and adjust their expectations. The world will always be an unpredictable place, but if they learn to weather the storms then they will also learn to see the light that’s always there, even when the clouds mask it a little.

One of the best ways I feel we can approach this is through the provision of unregulated, child-lead play. Providing children with the opportunity to lead their own learning gives them the space to make their own choices without the external goals often set by adults. They create their own experiences that help them understand how society works and how to interact with others, to express their feelings and emotions. Social skills such as sharing, negotiation, and value for the thoughts and feelings of themselves and others can be learnt through self-directed role play.

Risky play is something I also consider to be hugely beneficial. Every situation a child incurs has a safety factor, as do many of the situations we encounter in later life. Whilst I’m not suggesting we shove them into an unsafe environment, I do believe that children need a certain element of risk in order to learn from it, developing essential skills to keep themselves safe. I used to work in a setting with a fabulous and much-loved tree. The bottom branches were really quite tricky to climb, and the children would often start off by falling repeatedly from the first one, about 30cm from the ground. It looked like a very frustrating experience, and occasionally lead to a very small ‘ouchie’ or two. But over time, and through perseverance and discussion with their peers, the children learnt to be careful, to find good handholds, to help each other, to balance and develop the physical strength to get up to the next branch and then further. One rather amazing little girl even learnt to dangle upside down from several branches up, giggling and shrieking at me to look, which took every ounce of self-will to not tell her to stop. She never ever fell, and always did it with the hugest amount of dexterous skill and self-pride. I have no doubt that this young lady is going to be able to tackle anything that life throws at her with that same level of determination and wild spirit.

The other thing that I think is crucial is unfettered quality family time. Maybe this is the silver lining to the coronavirus cloud? What will children remember when they look back at this time with their parents, when no one was too busy trying to juggle everything else? One of my favourite quotes is by Alvin Price - “Parent’s need to fill a child’s bucket of self esteem so high that the rest of the world can’t poke enough holes to drain it dry” and I was reminded of it when I read the most lovely post the other day. It was about the issues of social distancing and a few snippets really stuck with me; “what if instead of ‘behind’, this group of kids is advanced because of this?... What if they have more empathy, they enjoy family connection, they can be more creative and entertain themselves… What if they enjoy the simple things?”