creating a more caring world; a guide for parents & teachers in cultivating empathy in our children.

Photo by Juan Pablo Rodriguez

In the book Building Emotional Intelligence, Linda Lantieri references the growing body of research that suggests that when a child is supported in developing pro-social and emotional skills early in life, that there are better outcomes for that child’s long-term health and well-being.  Teaching children how to connect with their inner world supports the development of self-awareness, but it also helps lay the foundation for understanding the interplay between themselves and others.  Every child is born with the capacity to be empathetic, but empathy is a skill that requires nurturing in order to develop.   
 
As an adult in a child’s life, you can help foster the development of empathy by supporting them in building emotional awareness and familiarizing them with the thoughts and feelings of others. Dr. Daniel Siegel shares in his book The Whole-Brain Child  that  a child’s ability to be reflective of their own experiences and those of others helps builds resiliency and connection.   

“Empathy allows us to keep in mind that each of us is not only a ‘me’ but part of an interconnected ‘we.’ 
Recognizing this combination helps produce an integrated self, which leads not only towards caring for others 
but also towards living a life full of meaning, connection and belonging to a larger whole.”   - Dr. Daniel Siegel
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​THREE KINDS OF EMPATHY (Adapted from the work of Daniel Goleman)

1. Cognitive Empathy The ability to understand another's perspective or see the world through others’ eyes. Cognitive empathy is mind-to-mind, giving us a mental sense of how another person might be thinking, sometimes called perspective-taking.   
2.  Emotional Empathy This type of empathy helps people feel attuned to another person’s emotions, and provides the ability to feel others’ emotions quickly without thinking deeply, as though their emotions are contagious. This type of empathy is deeply rooted in a human’s mirror neuron system, the social brain. This empathy depends on a different muscle of attention: tuning in to another person’s feelings requires we pick up their facial, vocal, and a stream of other nonverbal signs of how they feel instant-to-instant.
3. Empathetic Concern  With this kind of empathy we not only understand a person’s predicament and feel with them, but are spontaneously moved to help, if needed. This type of empathy is “other-oriented” where you feel concern about another’s suffering, but from more of a distance and with a desire to help the person in need. This type of empathy, research shows, can help reduce empathy fatigue; the residual of feeling another person’s suffering.

 
We can teach children to develop and regulate empathy, just as we do other emotions. That is, if we only cultivate emotional empathy “putting ourselves in someone else’s shoes” and feeling what they feel, we run the risk of truly experiencing the heartache, pain and distress of others. Neuroscience research suggests that when a person is emotionally empathizing with another person, their own brain is activated in very similar circuits as the brain of the person with whom they’re empathizing. This can result in higher “fight-or-flight” physiological responses and if we share the emotional suffering of others too often we run the risk of elevated stress response activation. Solely mirroring the emotional state of another person isn’t all that helpful, empathetic concern however is a good antidote. It allows us to connect to someone else's suffering but with equanimity and having the drive to want to help. This sort of compassion activates the area of the brain associated with motivation and reward.  

In my work with children I’ve found that action can be very powerful. When we allow children to do something with their feelings it can be very empowering. We don’t negate feelings; we bring mindful awareness to our thoughts and feelings and validate what ever it is we are experiencing in the moment then we can take action to care for our feelings and the feelings of others.  
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​10 STRATEGIES FOR CULTIVATING EMPATHY IN CHILDREN

• Teach kids about their emotions. Kids can’t empathize with how someone else might be feeling if they don’t know how to put words to their own emotions. Help children explore and name their own feelings, this is an important first step in understanding the feelings of others.  Consider having a feelings chart in the house or in the classroom to reference. 

 

• Encourage perspective-taking. Ask children to reflect on how other people might be thinking or feeling or how they might feel and act in certain situations. One of the best ways to help cultivate empathy with children is to help them associate feelings and actions with their favorite stories - a character from a book or movie can stir a child’s empathy. Go to Well-Bean's resource page for a list of books.

 

• Be a role-model. Children learn how to be caring, empathetic and compassionate when they see it in the adults around them and are treated in that way. When our children feel loved, seen and understood that connection makes them more available for learning and receptive to what you teach them.

 

• Give kids “do-overs.” When we notice a child acting or speaking insensitively it can catch us off guard and generate feelings of disappointment or anger. Remember that empathy is a skill that requires cultivation. Shaming will not teach a child to be empathetic. View these moments instead as opportunities to teach. Bring attention to the behavior with care, exploring how the behavior might affect others helps the child with perspective taking. Collaboratively work together to explore ways that the child might re-do the action next time. Practice, role play and/or have them try again and do-over. Use these moments for skill-building.

 

• Give Back. Children often need help from adults to put what they’ve learned into action. Explore service projects or provide opportunities for them to care for animals or plants. This helps children understand the role they play in helping others thrive and reinforces our interconnectedness. Volunteerism is a beautiful way for children to experience the joy in helping others.

 

• Notice Good Character and Behavior. Look for those moments when you notice children acting kind, with care or responsibly and say something; it feels good to be noticed!  “Holding the door open was thoughtful.” or “Taking care of your plate was responsible, thank you.”

 

• Recognize and Talk About all the Goodness Happening in the World. With ample opportunity to see and hear the opposite, it can be both reassuring and helpful to see goodness modeled in the world. Check out Good News Network for encouraging stories www.goodnewsnetwork.org

 

• Facilitating Moral Development. Morality is an individual’s growing sense of right and wrong and develops across a lifetime. It’s influenced by an individual's experiences and their behavior when faced with moral issues and can be facilitated through the support of parents and adults in a child’s life. Have conversation around how we treat ourselves and each other and how our behavior impacts one another. Creating Community or Classroom Guidelines is a great way to facilitate these ongoing conversations and helps children see themselves as part of a community that cares and values others.

  

• Make it a Routine. Children need to regularly see it, receive it and feel it; this increases the internalization of the skill and just like any skill worth developing, it needs to be part of their regular life experience. Providing opportunities and making it part of a routine makes living it a greater reality.

 

• Honor individuality and differences. Helping kids discover what they have in common with other people and seeing ourselves in others is important, but honoring our differences and celebrating individuality is equally important especially for children who may by marginalized. Conversations around how we can be different and coexist helps build a more compassionate world.  

“When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it's bottomless,
that it doesn't have any resolution, that this heart is huge, vast, and limitless.
You begin to discover how much warmth and gentleness is there,
as well as how much space.”  - Pema Chödrön

Last year I had the opportunity to spend a week in meditation with two-hundred individuals on the lovely grounds of Omega Institute learning from esteemed teacher, Jon Kabat Zinn. Each sitting practice started with the following invitation, “lay out your welcome mat and fall madly in love with yourself.” This message was a reminder that we have a choice in how we connect with ourselves in each moment. And just like anything we want to develop, learning to greet oneself with an attitude of love and care takes practice. Jon’s invitation, was a lesson in how we move towards extending the same grace out into the world. His teachings that week focused on healing ourselves and the world through mindfulness, reminding us that the work starts within. When we plant the seed for deep and compassionate connection with ourselves we begin to erase the illusion of separation. We are reminded that all things are interconnected. We can awaken to a kinder and wiser relationship with ourselves, one another and with the world.
 

“When people go within and connect with themselves, they realize they are connected to the universe
and they are connected to all living things.”  -Armand Dimele  


© Copyright 2018 Well-Bean, LLC.  All rights reserved.  www.wellbeankidsyoga.com
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Author

Jen Rapanos, LMSW, RCYT is a child and adolescent psychotherapist working in private practice.  She is the owner of Well-Bean, LLC committed to programs and services that foster the emotional and mental well-being of youth.  www.wellbeankidsyoga.com