We all know the look on a child’s face when she or he has mastered something s/he has been trying to learn or do, whether stringing some beads, cutting with scissors, pumping on a swing, writing his name, or tying her shoe. There is such pride and a sense of accomplishment.  Mastery is a wonderful feeling and it enhances a child’s self-esteem.

Children innately have the desire to master their own bodies, the objects around them, and their feelings.  As they grow, young children progressively expand the world they seek to explore, understand, and master. They both experience satisfaction from their own accomplishments and respond to the praise and encouragement of the people they love.

The other day a three year old in our group learned to pump on the skateboard swing. She had been practicing for weeks and one day it came together. She called out to the teacher and the other kids “ I CAN PUMP.” A big cheer went up. The teacher commented on how she had really worked hard and had learned to do it. But her peers comments were the best. “Cool”, “Great Job”, “Way to go”. Without any external praise, her satisfaction had been huge. The positive response of others was a lovely icing on the cake. Her own self-esteem and her esteem within the group soared.

Preschool and family life should be filled with these moments.

Mastery, a sense of accomplishment and competence are vital ingredients to a child’s self esteem and participation in life.  Each success along the path tells the child that he or she is a capable person with good ideas who can confidently try something harder or new.  The positive responses from the people they care about tell them that those accomplishments are valued by not only themselves but by the outside world.

For a child to achieve mastery of something, she or he must bring together many elements: initiative, focus, adaptability, practice, frustration tolerance, persistence, and delayed gratification. These emotional skills are as necessary as the physical and cognitive skills that are needed.

As teachers and parents, it is a challenging task to find the right balance of responses to support a child’s efforts and help develop those skills. We want to praise our child’s efforts and successes as well as to provide help as he seeks to master something or some feeling.  Children benefit from both, but in the right amount.

Encouragement and belief in a child’s capabilities are invaluable. Delight in his success shows that you value his choices as well as his accomplishments.  He will feel both good about himself and glad you are pleased. Too much praise or over involvement in a child’s activities, however, can rob him of his own initiative and internal drive towards mastery. If he feels something is only worth doing if it gains praise from the adults, he will lose his internal motivation and do only those things that receive praise,  in order to feel good about himself.

Involvement and guidance are also important teacher and parenting skills; it can be challenging to offer them in the right amount.  When too little help or guidance is offered, a child often becomes too frustrated or gives up trying. If too much help is offered or too much of the activity is done by the parent, the child may end up feeling helpless or incompetent; in the extreme, he may learn helplessness.  The goal is to offer just enough help to bridge the child through the difficult moment to a part he can do for himself. Ideally, at the end of the experience, the success is perceived by the child as a result of his own efforts.

Life and learning are a series of mastery steps. In a preschool or kindergarten, play is the medium through which children most often learn and develop mastery. Take for example, a typical preschool activity- puzzle doing. In small increments of increased difficulty, children move from doing a six piece puzzle to a 110 piece one. Each step adds new demands, from the strategy of turning the pieces and using the context of the picture to help them, to learning about corners and edges, to grouping pieces by sections of the puzzle.

Once a child really masters one level of puzzles and can put the puzzles together quickly and easily, it is very satisfying. She knows know that she did it by her own ability and effort. Self-esteem soars. After that, she is ready to try something harder. Each success builds her sense of self and sense of competence.

This is true not just for accomplishments but also for feelings. As a child develops, he begins to develop mastery of his many feelings and needs. Through play and the use of language, a child can increasingly learn how to meet his needs and solve the problems that arise. He can learn how to self- regulate and channel his emotions into constructive modes of expression.  Instead of hitting, a child can learn other ways of expressing anger, such as using words, pounding dough, or reading a book that helps him understand his feelings. Instead of grabbing a toy, she can learn to ask for it, take turns, and use the toy in play with a friend.

Helping a child to develop this increased mastery over  the feelings of impulsivity, anger, aggression, and frustration, to name just a few of the challenges facing a preschooler, requires the same careful balancing of support and guidance.

As with all teaching and parenting, there is no perfect formula and we never get it right every time. However, if we keep in mind our goals and support children towards mastery, they will increasingly develop the mastery and self-esteem that will serve them so well in their next steps in school as well as in life.Tweet