Teaching Emotional Intelligence (continued)

Carter: I hear you. I find it incredibly hard to control my emotions when my kids are melting down, even though I fully understand how important it is to do so. But the true masters are able listen to their children empathetically, helping to explore and validate their feelings.

And they don’t stop there. First they help their children verbally label the emotions they are feeling, and then they set limits (e.g, in my house: “it is NOT okay to hit your sister”) while helping them problem solve (“if you feel angry, what else can you do besides hitting?”).

Kelly: Oh dear. That sounds exhausting, simple but exhausting. I have never been known for great patience.

Carter: Changing our habits is exhausting, but once you’ve got emotion-coaching down it is probably far LESS exhausting than losing your cool. Just think:

Option A: Scream and yell and otherwise escalate emotions.

Option B: Really listen and try to understand what is happening with your kids.

Often for me, that is enough to get me on the emotion coaching path – I hate for my kids to be feeling badly, and I know I can help them start to feel better by helping them understand what they are feeling, to help them understand that there are limits in our household (which makes them feel secure), and to facilitate their problem solving.

Kelly: So there’s losing your cool, which I need to work on, and then there’s the matter of expectations. It’s hard for me to gauge whether my expectations are reasonable. I would hate to think I am putting too much pressure on my kids. I heard a speaker recently, Madeline Levine, and she struck fear in my heart.

Carter: Let’s save a discussion about pressure and The Price of Privelege for next week.

Further Reading and References

Two great books about emotion coaching:
Gottman, J. M. (1997). Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child. New York, Simon & Schuster.

Healy, E. D. (2005) EQ and Your Child: 8 proven skills to increase your child’s emotional intelligence. San Carlos, CA: Familypedia Publishing. (Fiona and I are on the cover of this book – Eileen is a friend.)

Belsky, J. (1999). Interactional and Contextual Determinants of Attachment Security. Handbook of Attachment : Theory, Research, and Clinical Applications. J. Cassidy and P. R. Shaver. New York, Guilford Press: 249-264.

Gottman, J. M., L. F. Katz, et al. (1997). Meta-Emotion : How Families Communicate Emotionally. Mahwah, N.J., Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Hartup, W. W. and B. Laursen (1993). Conflict and Context in Peer Relations. Children on Playgrounds : Research Perspectives and Applications. C. H. Hart. Albany, State University of New York Press: 44-84.

Howes, C. (1988). “Peer Interaction in Young Children.” Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development (Serial No. 217) 53(1).

Howes, C., C. Rodning, et al. (1988). “Attachment and Child Care: Relationships with Mother and Caregiver.” Early Childhood Research Quarterly 3: 403-416.

Shonkoff, J. P., D. Phillips, et al. (2000). From Neurons to Neighborhoods : The Science of Early Child Development. Washington, D.C., National Academy Press.