As parents, it’s natural to want to protect your kids from difficulties, but allowing your child to face age-appropriate challenges is essential to their development and will help them become resilient adults.

From academic pressures and friendship challenges to competitive disappointments and family stressors, children and teens are navigating complexities that can affect their emotional and physical wellbeing.

But, when children face challenges like these, they are opportunities for them to learn they have the capacity to overcome them.

As parents, your goal isn’t to eliminate obstacles from your child’s path. It’s to teach them how to navigate through those obstacles so they can succeed in life.

The Importance of Resilience in Kids

Resilience is more than just “toughening up” or “getting over it.”

Resilience is the ability to adapt to difficult situations, recover from setbacks, and develop strength through overcoming challenges. It’s like developing emotional muscles that grow stronger with exercise.

And, it can be really important to your child’s long-term health.

Resilient children and teens typically:

• Experience lower rates of anxiety and depression
• Develop healthier relationships with peers
• Show better academic performance even during stressful periods
• Make safer choices when faced with peer pressure
• Have better health outcomes overall

The Seven Building Blocks of Resilience in Kids

Parents can help their kids build resilience by helping them to recognize their personal strengths, help them build skills, and recognize what they are capable of.

Kenneth Ginsburg, a pediatrician specializing in adolescent medicine at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), became known for identifying the seven “C’s” of resilience that you can help your child develop.

1. Building Competence

Children need to recognize their abilities and develop confidence in their capacity to handle different situations.

You can help them by:

• Identifying and nurturing your child’s unique strengths and interests
• Allowing kids to make mistakes and guiding them in fixing it
• Allowing children to make age-appropriate decisions and learn from the outcomes
• Teaching kids skills so they can do things on their own (such as household chores)

You can help your child identify areas where they feel competent and build from these strengths, especially when addressing challenges in other areas.

2. Fostering Confidence

Confidence develops naturally when children have opportunities to demonstrate their competence.

To build genuine confidence:

• Offer specific, authentic praise for real accomplishments
• Avoid comparing siblings or peers to each other
• Set realistic expectations that challenge without overwhelming

Imagine these small moments, where you may notice or comment on a child’s helpfulness or abilities, as building a child’s confidence brick by brick.

3. Creating Connection

Having strong connections with family, friends, and their community, provides children with a secure base from which to develop independence.

To foster these connections:

• Prioritize family time without digital distractions
• Create environments where all emotions are acknowledged and accepted
• Address conflicts directly with an emphasis on resolution
• Help children develop meaningful relationships with extended family, teachers, coaches, and friends

4. Developing Character

Children with a strong moral compass have an internal guide that helps them navigate difficult choices. This becomes more important as kids get older. Adolescents with a developed sense of character often make healthier choices regarding risk behaviors.

You can help your child by:

• Having explicit conversations about your family’s values
• Discussing how actions affect others, both positively and negatively
• Finding opportunities for community involvement appropriate to your child’s age
• Modeling ethical behavior in your own choices

5. Enabling Contribution

Children who believe they can make a meaningful difference in their world develop greater resilience.

Consider ways to:

• Create regular opportunities for children to help at home and in the community
• Discuss how their actions positively impact others
• Expose them to age-appropriate awareness of challenges that others face

6. Teaching Coping Skills

You can help your kids develop coping strategies to help them manage stress and difficult emotions.

Help them develop coping skills by:

• Teaching age-appropriate calming techniques like deep breathing and progressive muscle relaxation
• Helping children identify their emotional responses and healthy ways to express them
• Modeling healthy coping in your own life
• Recognizing that risky behaviors often represent attempts to manage overwhelming feelings

7. Promoting a Sense of Control

Children can feel like they are passive recipients of what life deals them and they have no control of the outcome.

As a parent, you can help your child to see that they can affect their circumstances and bounce back when things go wrong. The key is teaching them that their choices influence outcomes. You can do this by:

• Helping children understand cause-and-effect relationships
• Using discipline as a teaching opportunity rather than punishment
• Providing choices within appropriate boundaries
• Allowing children to experience natural consequences when safe to do so

Be a Model of Resilience for Your Kids

Children learn resilience primarily by watching their parents navigate challenges. You can normalize talking about challenges so your kids can learn not only from your experience but also that challenges can be overcome.

We encourage you to:

• Reflect on how you handle your own disappointments and setbacks
• Consider what messages your stress responses send to your children
• Practice and verbalize healthy coping strategies
• Show appropriate vulnerability while maintaining a sense of stability

When to Seek Additional Support

At Pediatrics West, we want families to know that sometimes additional support is needed, and seeking help demonstrates resilience rather than weakness. If your child is struggling with feelings of hopelessness, anxiety or depression, please contact your provider at Pediatrics West at (720) 284-3700.