How Can We Help Our Kids Grow in Emotional Intelligence?

Photo by Andriyko Podilnyk on Unsplash

As parents, we all hope that our kids will do their best, get along with others, know how to communicate well, be kind and loving, etc. We are also often thinking about our kids’ intelligence, their brains, and their academic achievement. We start as early as possible, trying to teach them the ABCs, 123s, hoping that our babies will be the best and brightest as soon as they peek their heads out of the womb.

What if all the parents in the world were as concerned and interested in their children’s emotions as they were about their intelligence? Perhaps children’s emotional intelligence quotient (E.Q.) should be as much, if not more, of a priority than their intelligence quotient (I.Q.).

When we think about emotional intelligence, we probably think about adults rather than kids. However, what if we could begin teaching and helping our kids grow in this very important area at an early age? What if raising highly emotionally intelligent children could result in a world full of highly emotionally intelligent adults? 

What is Emotional Intelligence?

Let’s first look at what we mean by “emotional intelligence.”

According to Harvard Medical School, emotional intelligence “refers to the ability to identify and regulate our own emotions, to recognize the emotions of other people and to feel empathy toward them, and to use these abilities to communicate effectively and build healthy, productive relationships with others.”

Here’s another simple definition from The Gottman Institute: “Emotional intelligence encompasses awareness, understanding, and the ability to express and manage one’s emotions.”

That sounds like something I want my four kids to be able to have and do. What about you?

Some of the Primary Components of Emotional Intelligence Include:

Self-Regulation: This is the ability to manage how we experience and express emotions. 

Self-Control: This involves resisting impulses that are usually stirred by emotions and avoiding distractions.

Healthy children naturally improve their ability and capacity for emotional self-regulation and self-control. Thankfully, babies and toddlers eventually grow out of the screaming and crying phase, the temper tantrum stage, and other, what seem like “out-of-control,” seasons. Typically, by age ten, children are consistently using more complex strategies for emotional self-regulation. These involve problem-solving or attempts to tolerate their emotions.

For those families living in cross-cultural settings, this ability to self-regulate and self-control our emotions becomes even more important as we experience continued change and transition and grief and losses. Helping our kids (and ourselves) grow in these skills can help us prevent our “Grief Tower” from tumbling down!

How Can We Help Our Kids Grow in Emotional Intelligence?

As much as we would love for everyone to be born with high emotional intelligence, that is rarely the case. Some people may be more naturally in tune with their emotions and have an easier time regulating, but rest assured, it is possible for anyone to learn the necessary skills to improve one’s emotional intelligence—even kids!

So, if our kids weren’t born with an extra dose of emotional intelligence helping them to easily self-regulate and self-control, what can we do practically to help them grow in these areas? 

First of all, we need to help our children understand and accept their emotions as a normal and natural part of who they are. Emotions serve a purpose, and we need them.

For example, sadness is an emotion that helps us to slow down—both in our mind and our body. This can help us to pause and process what is upsetting us. It’s not a bad thing. Just like other emotions, sadness has a purpose.

On the other hand, anger is an emotion that speeds us up. It helps us to quickly mobilize energy in our mind and body by rapidly flooding blood to our extremities. This allows us to move into “fight or flight” mode and can even help us to survive. 

So, the first thing that we can do is to encourage children to recognize, identify, feel, and name emotions. This is all about awareness—the first part of emotional intelligence.

If we are going to help our kids become “smart” about their emotions, we first need to help them know what emotions are and what they feel like.

We can become what Dr. John Gottman calls “Emotion Coaching Parents,” those parents who “value negative emotions, are not impatient with a child’s expression of them, and use emotions experience as an opportunity for bonding by offering guidance through labeling emotions and problem-solving the issue at hand.”

Dr. Gottman’s research shows that children of parents who “emotion coach” tend to succeed more in school, be more physically healthy, and have better relationships with their friends. 

I want that for my kids, don’t you?

If you haven’t watched the movie InsideOut, this would be a great time to do so. It’s the story of a kid who moves to a new location and a new culture. It’s a fun and relevant way to talk about emotions with your kids and help them to see that even the “negative emotions” can help us.

Five Steps to Emotion Coaching Children by Dr. John Gottman

1. Be aware of your child’s emotions. Parents should be aware of their own feelings first. They can then be aware and sensitive to the feelings and emotions present in their kids. 

Check out this article on how we, as adults, can also grow in emotional intelligence.

2. See emotions as an opportunity for connection and teaching. This follows the same line of thought that emotions are not an inconvenience or a problem. Rather, feelings are a bridge to help us connect with our kids by coaching them through their challenging emotions.

3. Listen to and validate their feelings. As your child expresses their emotions, listen and give your full attention. Reflect back to your child what you hear. This will help to validate their feelings and will reassure your child that you understand what they are feeling and experiencing.

4. Label their emotions. After listening, help your child identify the emotion they are experiencing. Try using an emotions chart. The one with faces and expressions is great for children of younger ages who might not yet have the vocabulary to express and name their feelings.

5. Help your child problem-solve, with limits. Recognize that all emotions are valid and acceptable, but not all behaviors are acceptable. An example of this is a child who is out of control and expressing anger and frustration through a loud temper tantrum in a grocery store. The emotions of frustration and anger are valid and acceptable. However, the way the child is expressing this is not acceptable. Help your child learn to develop problem-solving skills by limiting the expression of emotions to appropriate behaviors. Explore ideas of what the child could do with those negative feelings when they come up next time at the grocery store, so they are prepared. This skill can involve learning how to set goals and solutions to reaching those objectives.

These five “Emotion Coach” steps might sound easy, but in reality, it takes much time, energy, intentionality, and patience to help our children grow in emotional intelligence. May we all remember that, as adults, we are all still growing in awareness, understanding, and the ability to express and manage our own emotions. Just like others are patient with us, may we be patient with our kids too!

Photo by Giu Vicente on Unsplash

A New Priority?

What if everyone in the world made their kids’ emotional intelligence more of a priority, with less focus on their children’s academic performance and achievement?

Guess what? They are intimately connected, and both intelligence quotient and emotional quotient are related to later success in life.

Surprisingly, research shown in Daniel Goleman’s book, Emotional Intelligence—Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, actually suggests that “emotional intelligence is twice as strong a predictor as IQ of later success.” Maybe that will motivate us to make developing our kids’ emotional intelligence more of a focus in the coming days and years!