4 ways to support your child’s development

It seems that the world is brimming over with talk about how to help people reach their full potential. In fact, that's what coaching is all about - whatever the context - helping people to discover, plan, and take action towards reaching their full potential. Helping people identify what matters to them, develop goals and take action is an important part of coaching.

Of course you want that for your child. But engaging a coach to work with your toddler to help them articulate their values and life purpose isn't likely to help much! So what can you do?

The theory

In her book The Needs of Children, psychologist Mia Kellmer Pringle proposed four developmental needs that she believed were important in supporting children's development. Her framework offers one way of thinking about the experiences and support that may help children develop.

Pringle suggests that you can do this by:

1. Providing love and security

The relationships that a child has and is exposed to as they develop can influence how they experience and develop relationships as they grow. Providing a stable, continuous and dependable environment for a child can support their sense of self-worth and help them develop their identity. The security of a familiar place and/or routine can provide a sense of certainty when everything else around them feels new and unpredictable.

2. Allowing your child access to new experiences

New experiences can play an important role in children's learning and development. They help children understand the world around them.

Giving them access to opportunities to role-play and experiment safely can help them become more familiar with new experiences. For younger children, this might happen with you there through play and make-believe, whilst older children and teenagers are more likely to experiment with new roles with others, like a first boyfriend/girlfriend or job.

3. Giving praise and recognition

Do you remember how hard growing up was?! It takes a huge amount of emotional, social and intellectual learning. And it can help to have encouragement through all the wobbles and challenges.

Encouragement and recognition from adults who love and support a child can help them acknowledge their achievements and progress, and may support the development of confidence when dealing with difficulties.

4. Encouraging a sense of responsibility

Giving a child the opportunity to safely increase their responsibility can help them gradually develop independence and responsibility.

You can support this by helping them to move from a sense of personal independence (e.g. brushing their own hair) to responsibility for their own decisions (e.g. when to brush their own hair), and ultimately to taking responsibility for others (e.g. taking full responsibility for the care of a pet).

Applying the theory in your context

Each of these needs is likely to be filled in a different way and to a different level in each family. What fully satisfies the needs of one child may not satisfy the needs of another. Words like 'love' and 'recognition' mean slightly different things, even to two people who have grown up together and had similar experiences.

Take a few minutes to think about what each of these needs means to you, then ask yourself these questions:

• What would meeting each of them for your child look like?
• If you're the primary caregiver for more than one child, what would be different for each of them?
• How would you know that you were meeting your child's needs - what would they do, say and feel?
• How would you feel?
• Which of your child's needs are you meeting?
• What could you do to more fully meet your child's needs?

If in doubt, and you're able to, you could always ask your child what they think too. Try asking open questions (ones that can't be answered with yes or no) and make a commitment to really listen to their responses without interruption. It might help to keep asking 'What else?' until they tell you they have nothing else to say before you speak again.

How might youth coaching help?

Youth coaching may support young people with areas such as developing life skills, building confidence and working towards age-appropriate goals. To find out more about how coaching could help support and guide your child as they grow and develop, visit our Youth coaching page.