Tuesday, July 4, 2017

How You Can Build Confidence In Your Teen

Regular readers know how much I love the work of Tim Elmore and his Growing Leaders blog is a weekly must read for me.  Confidence is an issue that I have worked to develop in young people long before I became a teacher.  In reality I did it as a peer as that was my leadership style growing up and playing a number of team sports.  It also took place in the neighborhood playing in the vacant lot or someone’s backyard.  I was very confident in my abilities and I worked hard to instill that in my friends and teammates too.  Over the years I cannot count how much work I have done with this, and for the most part it has been successful, though in reflection, my efforts have failed more than I would have liked.  Different personalities require different approaches and sometimes I took the wrong one.  Most recently though I have worked with a few young ladies teaching them to become better softball pitchers, and in my approach I have stressed the importance of the mental approach to pitching as well as the mechanics.  Foremost in these lessons has been confidence. 

In the article below Elmore does an outstanding job summarizing key points in helping young people develop confidence.  I have made a copy of this to refer to as I continue in my work.  One bit of advice that I will give you is to read every word and don’t go halfway with any of them.  Too often we only take bits and pieces and then wonder why something doesn’t work.  These are good things to do with your child and I strongly encourage you to use them!