The development of a strong and positive sense of self occurs as a result of your child’s life experiences being acknowledged and validated by significant people around him, including his parents, teachers, and peers. One of the best self-esteem builders is the use of affirmations or validating statements like: “I really love the way you smile!” or “You’ve got such a great sense of rhythm!” or “Hey, you were great in yesterday’s basketball game!” Validation is different from praise, which is often used in a manipulative way to reinforce positive behavior. Validation should emerge out of a genuine and spontaneous feeling of appreciation for your child’s existence as a unique and special person.

The development of self-esteem ultimately needs to go beyond a collection of activities. At its heart, self-esteem education should touch every part of a child’s life, and should manifest itself in all the ways parents help a child handle conflict, overcome obstacles, and meet challenges.

Children may find their true place in life only when they get out into the real world and discover a vocation that allows them to do what they do best. In order to ensure that they find their true vocation, however, we parents should begin stimulating their career aspirations from an early age. That does not mean pushing them into a job description that matches our idea, as parents, of what they should do. Rather, it means letting them know that the traits they possess are valuable in the workplace.

We can help stimulate career aspirations in our children by exposing them to a wide range of these and other high-variety, high-action, high-movement vocations through trips to the library and exposure to vocation-oriented movies and television programs.

From time to time, let us ask our children what they would like to be when they grow up. Let us, for example, suggest that they draw a picture of what they see themselves doing twenty-five years from now. Then, let’s talk about their aspirations and take their comments seriously. We should try not to discourage them if they seem to want to take up a vocation we consider unsuitable or unrealistic.

Over the past few years, cognitive psychologists have encouraged children and adults to engage in “self-talk.” Self-talk represents a process whereby an individual develops key phrases that can guide him through a complex task or difficult situation.

Self-talk has proven quite useful in helping children with attention and behavior problems develop self-control and reflection skills. For one, it can be employed as a means to control anger.

Self-talk can also be used to help children organize themselves. If you want your child to clean up his room, for example, the question “Now, let’s see, where do I begin?” could prompt him to initiate a coordinated set of actions, and might be followed by “Okay, that’s done. What do I do next?”

This process of internalizing language is seen as a key to helping children develop self-control strategies. Let your children develop their own phrases (after you give some examples) rather than have them use the ones you give them. These unique expressions of their own personalities are more likely to be remembered than externally imposed phrases. Finally, have fun doing this with them!

In continuing pursuit to quality education through the realization of our student’s individuality, we are again inviting all concerned parents, guardians, teachers, school officials, researchers, lawmakers and policy-makers, government and private educational institutions to another wonderful week-long event on the City of Pines this come July 25-29, 2010. Aptly dubbed, “One Nation Learning- National Educating for Life Conference”, the conference aims to connect the dots between education and industry needs- a growing concern for every school in the country.

For more details, kindly text us through Smart (0909-1234-247), Globe (0906-9341-322), Sun (0932-6039-931) or email us through onenationlearning@gmail.com or me personally at htenedero@yahoo.com.

(The author Henry S. Tenedero is the president of the Center for Learning and Teaching Styles, an affiliate of the International Learning Styles Network, based at St. John’s University in New York. He is a graduate of the AIM Masters in Development management and of the Harvard Graduate School for Professional Educators. He is the author of the following books: Cooking Up A Creative Genius; The HI CLASS Teacher, Breakthrough Ideas in Education; and Using Passion and Laughter in Your Presentations. He can be reached at htenedero@yahoo.com.)