In an effort to develop a child’s intelligence, many pay attention only to the child’s cognitive abilities. However, we should not forget about such an important concept as emotional intelligence, that is, the ability to recognize one’s own and other people’s emotions, manage them and understand the reason for their occurrence. In many ways, these abilities are the key to a successful and happy human life. You can start developing emotional intelligence at an early age. We will tell you how to do this in this article.
Types of intelligence
For a long time, the concept of “intelligence” included only the IQ level, on which it was believed that the child’s success in the future would depend. Basically, IQ tests included tasks on logic and mathematics. But thanks to the American psychologist Howard Gardner, the author of the theory of multiple intelligences, the understanding of intelligence has expanded significantly, and it has quite a few types:
- Logical-mathematical intelligence
- Emotional intelligence: - intrapersonal - interpersonal
- Naturalistic
- Practical
- Creative (musical, artistic, literary...)
- Bodily-kinesthetic
- Linguistic or verbal
- Spatial
- Existential or spiritual
Howard Gardner believes that intelligence is the ability to solve problems that is conditioned by the social environment. This means that a scientist who studies nuclear physics and a musician who plays in an orchestra solve different intellectual problems. Therefore, different specialists require different types of intelligence in order to have abilities for specific areas of activity.
And here the personal responsibility of parents is very important - in order to see in time what the child is talented at, what he gravitates towards, what kind of intelligence he needs to develop.
It is impossible to solve all life's problems only through logical intelligence. For example, poets, artists and musicians have a completely different type of intelligence - creative. And those who have a well-developed practical intelligence can easily run a business and manage other people - even if they were not successful students in school.
Develop self-control in your child
Have you ever met children in a supermarket who lie on the floor at their parents’ feet and beg them to buy this or that thing? Probably even the parents of these children understand that their child’s behavior goes beyond the bounds of decency. If you do not want your child to behave this way, you should carefully study programs for developing emotional intelligence in children. Any of them will include self-control. It is necessary to explain to a child from a young age that one should not always openly demonstrate one’s emotions. Sometimes you need to put feelings into words, but not make the words too expressive. You should express yourself softly and clearly. For example, if a child doesn’t like something, he doesn’t need to cry right away. First, you should explain to the parents what exactly the child is not happy with and what the child wants from the parents. And if adults say something very unpleasant, the child will have to come to terms with the verdict, and not throw a tantrum.
Self-control is a useful quality that many adults sometimes lack. And if you don’t instill it in your child in childhood, then you may miss the moment and not have time to do it. In this case, your child will have to change his character on his own as a teenager. And this will be very difficult to do.
Emotional intellect
The American writer, psychologist and science journalist Daniel Goleman is traditionally considered to be the popularizer of the definition of “emotional intelligence.”
Read his book “Emotional Intelligence. Why it can matter more than IQ." But social psychologist Peter Salovey and psychology professor John Mayer were involved in developing the very concept of emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence consists of two types, which most often develop sequentially - first intrapersonal, then interpersonal intelligence. Although there are exceptions, and then the sequence changes.
Intrapersonal intelligence consists of two components - self-awareness and self-regulation. Self-awareness is the ability to discern and interpret one's own motives, desires, needs, moods, impulses and predict their impact on other people. And self-regulation is the ability to regulate one’s emotional reactions and states, and manage one’s mood. How to have breakfast, how to wake up correctly, how to react to worsening weather - such a person has his own little secrets, from which his whole life is built.
“People with a high degree of intrapersonal intelligence find it easier to build relationships with others - they are honest within themselves, friendly, open and optimistic. For example, parenting, teaching and other communication activities - professional and life - are easier for them.”
Interpersonal intelligence also has two components - empathy and social skill.
Empathy, or understanding of others, is social sensitivity, the ability to read the emotional state of other people, the ability to empathize. Social skill is the ability to manage the emotions of other people and relationships with them. Social skill also has a dark side.
A person who uses this ability for selfish purposes and in dishonest ways can manipulate people.
Why do you need a high level of emotional intelligence?
Firstly, when a person has developed self-awareness, he has good self-esteem and self-confidence.
“The normal level of self-esteem is zero. It should not have a “+” or “-” sign. But at the same time it has flexibility - it changes depending on the situation. When an artist gets into the company of nuclear physicists, he will feel modest - and that’s normal.”
And self-confidence is a basic feeling that for many children and even adults is based on some external assessments, other people’s criteria for success.
But ideally, self-confidence should come only from one’s own uniqueness. This uniqueness implies that absolutely every person has his own set of potentials, which will be the best when solving a certain range of problems. Secondly, a person with a high level of emotional intelligence is capable of self-management - the ability to control his emotions and be adaptive, open, proactive, optimistic, highly self-motivated and productive.
Thirdly, developed emotional intelligence allows a person to show social sensitivity: courtesy, tact and delicacy, understanding of relationships in a team and the ability to get along with people. It is pleasant to communicate with such a person; you want to listen to him and interact with him.
And finally, fourthly, relationship management: influence, inspiring leadership, conflict management, helping others develop and improve, cooperation and teamwork, promoting change.
How can you keep your living room from looking like a scene from Mad Max?
Often the cause of bad behavior is the child’s inability to cope with negative emotions. This problem is one of those things that we rarely intentionally teach our children—and when we do, we almost never succeed at it.
Showing your child how to recognize and manage their emotions can help prevent bad behavior from occurring.
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This skill will be useful to them throughout their lives. At 4 years old, it will help you avoid tantrums, and later it will play a decisive role in whether you save money for your child's college education or to pay his bail. Think of it as a kind of potty training—feelings only. But how can you do this?
Professor John Gottman is a man who revolutionized the study of human relationships. He can listen to a couple's story in just a few minutes and determine with alarming accuracy whether they will divorce or not.
Fortunately, Gottman's research interests also include the study of parenting. And the research he has undertaken is not just another newfangled theory someone came up with over lunch, but a real experiment of dizzying proportions.
He invited more than a hundred married couples with children 4-5 years old to fill out a questionnaire. He then spent thousands of hours interviewing them and also observing their behavior in his laboratory. Recorded children playing with their best friends.
Monitored heart rate, breathing, blood flow and sweating. Collected urine samples—yes, urine—from babies to measure the amount of stress-generating hormones. And he continued to follow the children and their families throughout their childhood and adolescence, conducting additional interviews, assessing their academic achievements and... Okay, that's enough. Did you understand.
Even Hollywood villains don't plan their plots so carefully. And when it came to studying emotions, Gottman identified four types of parents . And three of them don't look very good:
- rejecting parents: ignore, ignore, or trivialize negative emotions;
- disapproving parents: critical of negative experiences and punish children for showing emotions;
- non-involving parents: accept their children's emotions and empathize with them, but do not teach them how to cope with feelings.
Children of these three types of parents did not always succeed in life. They were more likely to exhibit bad behavior, have difficulty making friends, and have problems with self-esteem. One of them might be trying to break into your car right now.
But there is a fourth parenting style: ultra-parents. These fathers and mothers unknowingly used a technique called Goth. And thanks to this, they raised children with high emotional intelligence.
Such parents accepted their child's feelings (but not the totality of his behavior), helped him survive difficult situations and solve problems so that as a result the neighbor's child did not end up in the hospital emergency room. How did the lives of these children turn out?
- These children were better able to calm themselves when something upset them.
- They could cope with the increased heart rate faster.
- Thanks to their improved ability to cope with stress, they were less likely to suffer from infectious diseases.
- They were better able to concentrate.
- They were better at forming connections with others—even in difficult social situations, such as when they were ridiculed and extreme emotionality was portrayed as a weakness rather than an advantage.
- They were better able to understand people.
- They were better able to make friends with other children.
- They also demonstrated higher academic performance.
In short, they developed the type of intelligence that is responsible for relationships with people and the world of emotions, that is, emotional intelligence .
And all these successes were based on how parents dealt with outbursts of negative emotions in their children. These moms and dads did 5 things that other parents barely remember.
So let's take a closer look at them...
What hinders the development of emotional intelligence?
Factors that hinder the development of emotional intelligence include putting on someone else’s clothes, passing off external declarations - feelings, emotions, experiences - as your own (out of mental laziness or self-preservation).
Often, from childhood, a child gets used to this behavior, and tries to please and please first teachers and parents, and then bosses at work. But underestimating sensory experiences does not allow one to develop intrapersonal competence. Remember the phrase: “You never know what you want? MUST - that’s all!”?
Fear of emotional life also inhibits the development of emotional intelligence. Often this phenomenon is hereditary: parents were afraid to express emotions and the child is also afraid. But we all need to understand that emotions and feelings are a very important type of orientation. If emotions and feelings were not necessary for the survival of humanity, then they would have been leveled out long ago - but for some reason they are still with us.
The main question at an appointment with a psychologist is: “What do you feel?” This is how a person can penetrate into true experience and feel contact with himself. Experience is that area of human psychology that absorbs everything: the event due to which this experience occurred, and the people who are drawn into this experience, and the feelings that a person experiences while being in all this, and the person’s motives.
A few more negative reasons:
- inability to feel, alexithymia;
- not very developed reflection, lack of experience in describing inner life (a person cannot answer the question of what he feels and begins to describe what he thinks or the events that led him to such a state);
- haste and busyness, disruption of rhythms - focus on the “external and objective”, ignoring one’s own internal processes;
- demonstrative effectiveness and success, attempts to measure it (this factor can include, for example, the evaluation system at school);
- fear of being “different”, perfectionism, excellent student complex;
- ignorance of oneself: one’s own individuality, one’s own charm and charisma;
- ostentatious maturity and reasonableness.
And another important factor that negatively affects the development of emotional intelligence is a focus on results rather than on process.
Meanwhile, the most important thing that, for example, a primary school teacher can give a child is a love of learning, regardless of grades and abilities. The result is certainly important, but from the point of view of life strategy, the process is more important than the result.
After all, when the process is not interesting, a person cannot be productive in some area. It is the process that leads to mastery and success.
conclusions
Experts agree that a high level of development of emotional intelligence is the key to success in life. In preschool age, the development of the emotional sphere acquires special significance, since during this period the child actively develops his self-awareness and self-esteem. Parents have many opportunities to help develop their child's emotional intelligence. Discuss emotions and the reasons for their occurrence with your child, openly express your feelings and do not forbid your child to do so. There are also many special games for developing emotional intelligence.
How to develop emotional intelligence?
Look at photographs of people taken with a thermal imager. It's amazing how body temperature reacts to our emotional states. There are only 14 different examples of emotions in the picture, but Russian psychologists have identified as many as 80!
“Take it as an axiom: if you don’t develop emotional intelligence in yourself, you won’t be able to develop it in your children either.”
- Be aware of your strengths and weaknesses - be able to name them, understand the reasons, and give direction for implementation.
- Name your own and other people’s emotions - the larger the set of words, the higher the feeling. Answer yourself the question: “How am I feeling now?”
- Be observant, become responsive, be ready to help those in need.
- Pay attention to non-verbal language - facial expressions, posture, gait, poses, gestures, etc.
- When you fail, show gratitude for the experience.
- Create new learning conditions for yourself and try to adapt to them, go into your own fears, get out of your comfort zone.
- Learn to admit your guilt and at the same time try to overcome the fear of mistakes.
- Reduce perfectionism.
- Demonstrate the ability to switch off and switch.
- Be prepared to listen and hear.
“Type “list of human emotions” into a search engine. Copy to yourself and highlight in different colors: what you recognize well, what you are less familiar with, and what emotions you do not understand at all. This will make it easier for you to understand what emotions you need to develop and what your strengths are. Keep the list in front of your eyes to help you navigate what you’re feeling right now.”
Recommendations for parents
Developing emotional intelligence in children is not so difficult, but you should not expect quick results. Only parents can help their child by promptly introducing certain rules into life. Every effort should be made to ensure that the child has precisely those skills that are part of EI.
It is best to start classes to improve emotional intelligence in preschool age. If this period has already passed, then do not despair, because... It will still be possible to achieve the goal. When developing EI in older children, you just need to select methods more carefully, and also make every effort to convince the child of the importance of these activities.
The most important thing in the development of emotional intelligence is the attitude of parents. Without proper interaction with the baby, it will not be possible to achieve results. Adults must show the child that they are interested in more than just his educational success. To do this, you need to show special love, affection and care towards him, while you must take into account his opinion and perceive him as a full member of the family. The atmosphere created by these parental actions will make it easy for the child to begin improving EI.
For parents who want to develop EI in their child, there is a small list of recommendations that will help achieve the desired effect
It is very important to follow at least most of them, because... they are aimed at increasing the effectiveness of classes, as well as creating a favorable environment at home
Basic recommendations:
Accept the child exactly as he is. You need to have a positive attitude towards all the characteristics of your baby and in no case be negative towards any of them. Show all your feelings, don’t hide your emotions. The child must understand exactly what his parents feel. This will help not only create a good atmosphere within the family, but also develop EI. Discuss all controversial situations. We should discuss the problems that have arisen together and try to find a solution to them. If possible, the search for a compromise should be entrusted to the child. Teach your child to describe the feelings he is experiencing. Parents should regularly ask their child to talk about exactly how they feel. Associations can be a good help. Talk about your shortcomings
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It is important to convey to the child that there are no ideal people in the world. But one cannot mention its shortcomings, because
it may have the opposite effect. Show optimism towards the world around you. The task of parents is for the child to learn to independently find the bright side even in the worst events. It is important to show him this by example. Demonstrate determination. Just as in the previous case, adults should show everything to the child using themselves as an example. Determination of purpose is best instilled shortly before the first visit to school. Be honest. You should always tell your child everything exactly as it is. Frankness is very important for relationships and will help your child begin to perceive the world a little differently. You shouldn't hide even bad information. Control your time. Parents should ensure that the child does not devote too much time to useless entertainment, from which he could develop anger, and also sleeps enough hours every day. Stimulate social interaction. It is necessary to encourage the child’s desire to communicate with peers, provide him with such an opportunity, and also regularly arrange family vacations that involve communication.
The development of emotional intelligence in the smallest children should begin with the implementation of such simple rules, and only then move on to targeted training. These recommendations can be considered basic for achieving results.
How to develop emotional intelligence in children?
- Discuss books and films: determine the feelings of the characters, the connections between their feelings
- and actions.
- Discuss the child’s empathy for the heroes of the works. Express your attitude towards the characters.
- Practice teamwork built on cooperation, where each participant is motivated. Build an environment in which you want to learn and improve some skills.
- Organize mutual help in the classroom if possible.
- Set the mood of the lesson (through a funny joke, an entertaining story from the life of a scientist, a smart anecdote, comments on the weather or your mood...).
- Take moments of mindfulness. Together with the children, right in the lesson, you can be silent, breathe, calm down: clear your head of thoughts, look out the window.
- Give vivid examples-stories (even fictional ones) of how someone coped with a situation.
- Name your child’s feelings: “I see that you are angry, are you very upset?”
- Name your feelings: “I’m worried that you won’t cope, I’m worried how
- the lesson will pass." This brings contact with children to another level of openness.
