You can give positive help towards your children’s personal, social and emotional development by:

• Giving praise and physical affection when possible.
• Listening to worries and concerns and discussing them in a respectful way.
• Taking time to talk about happenings, ideas, thoughts and feelings.
• Talking through mistakes or things that have gone wrong in a sensible way, and getting them to understand that a mistake is not the end of the world, and to respond accordingly.
• Encouraging them to practise self-discipline.
• Encouraging them to make choices and decisions about daily events and routines.
• Enabling them to solve problems for themselves.
• Showing them the consequences of their actions.
• Concentrating on positive, affirmative behaviour rather than constantly criticising negative behaviour.
• Using stories to help them understand sadness and pleasure, illness and loss.
• Playing board games together; inviting other children to play and encouraging return visits.
• Giving them individual responsibilities such as their own bit of garden to grow and look after, helping with shopping, looking after pets;
• Demonstrating how to treat possessions, people and places with care and concern.
• Teaching them how to wash and dress themselves.
• Encouraging ‘dressing-up’ activities, where they can pretend to be other people and look at life from a different perspective.
• Helping them to reassure and comfort other children during their ‘bad’ times.
• Remembering that you are always your child’s first role model.