Tips for raising a confident girl
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- Encourage assertiveness
- Be specific in your compliments
- Make your praise match reality
- Help her understand why she sometimes gets left out
- Encourage competence
- Encourage her to play sports
- Don't make assumptions about her strengths and weaknesses
- Encourage a healthy body image
- Prepare her for sexism
- Point out positive female role models
When girls start preschool or primary school and later a larger secondary school, they can lose their spark a little bit as social pressures and high expectations in the classroom take their toll. Here's what you can do to build your daughter's confidence and resilience for the tricky years ahead.
Encourage assertiveness
Teach your daughter to express what she needs to adults and stand her ground with her peers. If another child is being mean to her, encourage her to say, "I don't like the way you're talking to me".
Be specific in your compliments
Use solid examples when you tell your daughter how smart or pretty she is. It means so much more to hear you say, "You are so clever with numbers", than just a general "Good work".
Make your praise match reality
Your little girl will know that she's not really a musical genius or the best artist in the world, so don’t say she is. She’ll appreciate it far more if you instead notice and comment on her improvement from one month to the next.
Help her understand why she sometimes gets left out
Explain to your daughter that it’s not an insult if she isn't invited to every birthday party or to join in every game. Let her know that when another child says, "You can't play," it probably has more to do with that child's bad mood than with your daughter as an individual.
Encourage competence
Don’t be too quick to step in if your daughter is struggling to figure out how a game works. When she asks you for help, suggest she spends a couple more minutes trying to work it out on her own. She’ll feel a real sense of achievement if she then cracks it. She’ll also realise that she’s much more capable than she thought.
Encourage her to play sports
At school these days, girls can play anything from rugby to hockey. Don’t decide which sports are right for your daughter. It’s much better if she chooses herself, as she’ll be far more enthusiastic in the games. Being part of a sports team will do wonders for her social skills and help keep her fit and healthy.
Don't make assumptions about her strengths and weaknesses
Just because your child is a girl doesn't mean she'll struggle with fractions and that she'll excel at reading tests. It also doesn't mean she won't want to go fishing or camping. Follow her cues to nurture her strengths and work on improving her weaknesses.
Encourage a healthy body image
With magazines, music videos and adverts all promoting images of women looking thin, flawless and sexy, it’s no wonder that girls are becoming more concerned with their appearence at an earlier age. Make sure you regularly tell your daughter that she’s beautiful to encourage her self-confidence. When you praise the way she looks, try to highlight actions, too: "You were so graceful at gymnastics today" or "Your eyes really shone on the stage".
It can also be helpful for older girls to hear that models and actresses in magazines don't really look like that. Let your daughter in on the secret of airbrushing and make it clear that to be that thin really would not be healthy.
Prepare her for sexism
Even today, some people think that girls can't do a number of things that boys can. If you notice your daughter watching television shows or films where girls stay in the background while boys save the day, point it out and talk to her about how different things are in the real world. Emphasise to your daughter that nothing is out of her reach because she’s a girl.
Point out positive female role models
Take every opportunity when you're watching the news or reading a newspaper to show your daughter that women can do anything. Point out politicians, doctors and athletes in particular.
Reading books with strong female characters is another great way to get the idea across without lecturing. If you can't think of enough books like that, ask your local librarian. They often have lists of books to choose from and can make recommendations.
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