Can Character Building Start with a Click?

When it comes to raising kids who are genuinely caring and connected to others, there’s no shortage of online tips and strategies for parents to follow. But how often do parents actually use these resources — and then adopt them?

That’s what the authors of a recent paper in the Journal of Child and Family Studies wanted to find out. The paper, “Online Strategies to Promote Children’s Empathy, Gratitude and Diligence: A Feasibility Study Exploring Parent Implementation,” was co-written by Harvard Graduate School of Education Professor Meredith Rowe and Senior Lecturer Richard Weissbourd; Milena Batanova, Making Caring Common’s director of research and evaluation; and Naalia Hudani, Ed.M.’12, Parenting Mindfully CEO.

The goal of the study was to determine whether parents — the primary influencers in a child’s development — would take on (or at least try out) brief, simple activities provided to them online that could cultivate traits like empathy, gratitude, and diligence in their children ages 4 to 10. Parents, based in the United States, were able to choose the activity they most wanted to try with their child and do together at least once a week. Parents were also asked (with two reminder prompts) to send weekly feedback.

Below is the activity list used in the study but that all parents might find helpful as they try to help their children develop these skills.

Activity List

Empathy (the ability to share, understand, and care about the experiences of others): 

• Capture Caring Moments: Parents look out for caring things their child does throughout the week, take a real or pretend photo of their child, and then praise their child for being a caring or helpful
  person, rather than praising the behavior alone.
• Just Like Me: Parents ask their children to think about someone they regard as different or gets excluded in some way, to think about how that person is “just like me,” and to look for things they have in common.
• Story Reflections: Parents read, watch, or listen to any medium with their child, and then with the help of a list of questions about a characters’ feelings, relate the conversation to their and their child’s own life experiences.

Gratitude (a moral emotion and process of appreciating others and what one has):

• Gratitude Conversation Cards: Parents write or print out conversation cards and with their child pick out cards to spark meaningful conversations. Parents are encouraged to prompt their children to think about the “why” behind their gratitude.
• Gratitude Scavenger Hunt: Parents talk about why they want to try a gratitude scavenger hunt (“we’re doing this because we want to start noticing things to be grateful for more often”) and once everyone has completed their hunt, players are asked to share and dive deeply into the “what” and “why” behind their gratitude.
• Show Your Thanks: Parents ask their child to think about someone who has helped or made their life better in some way, motivate their child to create a thank you message for that person, and then help them send or express it (ideally by reading it aloud).

Diligence (the ability to work hard and persevere through challenges):

• Learning from Mistakes: Parents tell their child (or family) that they want to make it a habit to learn from mistakes and ask their child to talk about what they learned from their mistakes.
• Stick With It: Everyone agrees to “try a hard thing” for the next few weeks, with guidelines like “it’s something you genuinely want or need to do” and “it’s a goal you can accomplish.” There are suggested prompts for how to encourage each other throughout.
• Try it as a Hero: Parents start by asking their child to think of someone (fictional or not) they admire who does not give up, even when times get tough. Then, when they notice their child struggling with something hard, they remind their child of that person (or character); parents also share about their own struggles and who they look up to for inspiration.