How to Teach Children to be Kind

Developing empathy and kindness into a child helps in the long run as at every stage of life, one benefits when being the giver. Teaching small acts of kindness and niceness is essential in child development, and the sooner you educate them on good deeds, the deeper the message penetrates into their minds and stays put there.

You can begin teaching a child about being kind by applying these ethics into their lives:

• Practice the art of kindness through caring for others. Making your children help you around the house with chores can do this. They can help you clear the table, aiding their younger siblings’ with their homework, watering the plants, or asking to fetch something from the neighbors house are some basic steps. They learn about gratitude this way and what it means to care for others.

• Grow their circle of care by adding other people to the family members and friends he concerned about. Mention the importance of everyone in their lives, like the school custodian, or the garbage collector. All these people interact in their lives for which they should acknowledge and be aware about. Teach them to care about those who are vulnerable, like a new child in their class.
  

  Two happy sisters smiling and hugging each other outside

• Be your child’s role model and their mentor with your ethical values. Children look up to those raising them and learn from them. Whatever immoral acts you may commit, they will soon pick up. Keep good terms with neighbors and be friendly to everyone in your society. Most importantly, be kind to your parents so that they learn to be kind to you when you are old.

• Talk about their feelings with them when they try doing an act of kindness. Most children are shy to help others or may feel jealous in sharing. Discuss what they feel and teach them how to cope with those feelings.

• Forgive their mistakes so they learn to forgive others too. If they do something wrong, ask them in a gentle way why they committed the act. Give them a chance to explain instead of getting angry. Forgive them for then instead of holding a grudge for hours. This way they will learn to go soft if you do something wrong to hurt their feelings.

• Teach them to always use “please” and “thank-you” as basic manners. Embedding these as magic words into their minds from a young age automatically teaches them about being grateful and asking for something from an elder.