#6 Lay Down Your Verbal Weapons: 6 Ways to Stop Sibling Wars
6. Play to Each Child’s Strengths not Weakness.
Each sibling deserves and needs to be seen as special and unique. They need to know that they have talents and skills that no one else in the family has. They also need to know that other family members from older generations share some of their traits, skills, and talents that they have. That gives them a strong sense of belonging.
The best way to create high self-esteem in a child, of any age, is to play to their strengths much more than their weaknesses. You can easily do that by using specific praise versus global praise. The way to do that is to complement your child on a job well done using details and the word “because”. When you add the word “because” to a sentence it forces you to insert the reasons why you think the child did a good job. Those details are truly what fills a child’s needs. It’s what tells them how to duplicate the process next time, it gives them courage and fills in the details of how to do something. It sound like this:
Global Praise: “You are the best car washer I have ever seen!”
Specific Praise: “You’re great at washing the car because your little fingers get into places I can’t reach and you find dirt in hidden areas that I don’t see. Nice job.”
If you want more information on how to use specific praise instead of gllobal praise read, The Key to Building Your Child’s Self Esteem on this website.
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