How to Raise a Child With a High EQ

How to Raise a Child With a High EQ – A Parent’s Guide to Emotional Intelligence.

By Lawrence E. Shapiro, PhD

Here’s a bold statement:  IQ is up but EQ is down.   We are better able to teach our children school skills, but having more trouble on the morality side.  And another bold statement:  EQ will have more impact on your child’s success in life.

Moral Development, which is loosely defined as learning right from wrong, is the key to raising healthy members of a larger society.   Empathy plays a large role in this, and children are really only able to understand how other’s feel around the age of 6.  Children can have sympathy before that, which is displayed in a wide range of behaviors, but empathy is learned and developed as a primary school aged child.

Random Acts of Kindness.   One way to actively encourage empathy is to discuss and record random acts of kindness, both towards you and from you.   Relate how these acts effected you and the other, and if you are inspired, create a Random Acts of Kindness book and write out the most inspiring.

The Optimistic Child, one of my favorite parenting books which I read years ago (by Martin E. P. Seligman), is often quoted and elaborated.  One piece of emotional intelligence is learning to interpret what happens around you.  Optimism is learned by example, so it is up to the parents to help their children by example.   My favorite suggestion from this book is to discuss “Highlight of My Day” every night at dinner, and everyone gets a turn.