In life, two kinds of skills will help us to face the world, either in real life or in school events. Talking about school, the acquisition of academic and professional skills is very important, but there are others, which must be developed since the early childhood; these are also known as soft skills or core skills.
However, how can we identify them? Should I be teaching my kid these skills? Am I doing it right?
Well, let us get into that… Hard skills are those we can gain through training programs, academic education, certifications and in situ trainings. These skills are easily quantifiable, defined and evaluated, for example a hard skill for a doctor might be to master contents of anatomy; while a hard skill for a plumber might be specific knowledge of pipes.
On the other side, soft skills are more like “people skills”; they can be harder to evaluate, measure or define, but can be plenty defined as personal attributes, abilities inherent to the social sphere, which will help a person to interact with others.
Some of the most common soft skills are communication abilities, ethics, teamwork, problem-solving, creativity, critical thinking, time management, among others.
Now you must be wondering, how can I approach my kids to soft skills?
Easy! We can approach our kids to a wide variety of activities that help them to practice and master these valuable skills, in order to help them interact and succeed in this globalized world. We assure you, that right now you are already doing it. Let us tell you how:
- Imagination and pretending play: Do not forget that imagination is limitless. Picture your kids imagining during play, that the old fridge box is a huge castle, which has to be provided with doors and windows, by using markers, crayons or whatever you have at home! Moreover, they are knights, kings, and queens… through a happy day of play, they are developing: Creativity.
- Remember those days of puppet shows in the living room performing to an audience? (mom and dad, or even the stuffed toys). Your kids are learning to be confident in front of an audience at an early age. They are also learning to communicate feelings, ideas, thoughts, in other words: Public Speaking Skills.
- When playing with others, your kids have to agree on rules of the game, wait for turns, collaborate to win or to score a goal, completing a puzzle or building Lego together… this is Collaboration and teamwork. Let’s play!
- Making mistakes is OK because we get to learn from those experiences. We, as parents must let our children make mistakes and let them know that it is not the end of the world. They also learn to express their frustrations, while learning to manage and regulate emotions, in order to build Resilience. During the process, they will learn to move on from stress and overcome whatever life might throw to them.
It is that simple! But also that important to do! Now that we now this, let’s put hands on and get started! Enjoy a purposeful play with your children!
In Kinder del Real, we are happy and proud of striving daily in order to become experts in new trends and be able to walk you through this important information, so that parents and school can work together as a great team, building new great minds and hearts for an amazing future. If you feel identified, feel free to click on the link below to make an appointment with us.
