Tonight I taught a class for mothers on how to keep the closeness with their 9 – 14 year-old girls. This was at the Parents Place which is part of the Jewish Family Services in San Mateo, CA. Here are some key points I covered. Cynthia Klein, Certified Parent Educator, bridges2understa.wpstagecoach.com.
Give our girls power to develop their own identity.
- A. Empowering versus Enabling
Empowering When we empower our daughters they have a tendency to:
- Develop courage
- Feel a sense of high self-esteem
Ways We Empower Girls
- Turning control over to our daughters as soon as possible.
- Hanging in there when the going gets tough.
- Let them face their mistakes and use them as an opportunity to grow.
- Teaching them problem solving skills
Enabling When we enable our children, they have a tendency to:
- Become immobilized
- Feel a sense of low self-esteem
Ways We Enable Girls
- Doing too much for them
- Giving them too much
- Overprotecting / rescuing
- Lying for them (making excuses for their behavior.
Discussion Activity 2: In what ways can you start empowering your daughter more?
Special Developmental Stages of Girls
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Ages 9 – 12 |
Ages 13 – 16 |
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Forming an Identity as an Achiever |
Skill Building for Self-Esteem
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Dr. Sally Archer states in Interpersonal and Identity Development New Research Directions that in order to achieve an identity a person must:
« explore
« experiment
« contrast self with others
« sort through identifications
« choose those that seem to fit
« discard those that don’t
« integrate the identification into a unique individual
Women and Men’s Typical Conversation Goals
Males and females have both abilities. Choose according to the situation.
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Women |
Men |
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Intimacy |
Solve Problems |
|
Support |
Give Advice |
|
Reach Consensus |
Show Superiority |
