Five Ways to Build Your Kids' Resilience This Summer
They will also make your life easier.
First of all, I want to give a hearty welcome to all my new subscribers. There are now more than 30,000 of you, and I’m so thrilled you’re here! I write Now What with the goal of bringing bringing science and nuance to parenting advice and challenging shame-inducing, fear-mongering content. I want to make your life easier and to make you feel better about your parenting.
School is already out for many of you — congrats and/or my condolences, depending on which way you swing — and although we still have three weeks of classes left over here in New York, it still feels like summer has already begun. Maybe that’s just because it was 80 degrees and sunny yesterday (finally!!!!!), but boy, I’m feeling it.
I’ve done a few events this past week for my new book, Hello, Cruel World!, and many audience questions have centered around what parents can do to build resilience. We all want to raise kids who can handle what life throws at them — but how do we actually do that? I have a detailed chapter in my book on the topic, and I’m going to delve into some additional nuances in my next newsletter.
Today, I am sharing my top five tips for building resilience in kids over the summer months. And, yay, most of these involve stepping back as a parent — doing less, rather than more. As you know, I’m all for parenting advice that makes our lives easier.
I also want to encourage everyone to share their thoughts and ideas in the comments. Let’s get a discussion going about how you handle summer and what works.
Let them get bored.
The school year is often chock full of scheduled activities. But downtime and boredom can be incredibly useful for building problem-solving and emotional regulation skills and for helping kids discover more about themselves. I think summer is the perfect time to give kids the gift of boredom.
When we feel bored, it’s often because we are feeling out of touch with our inner selves or because we’re dissatisfied. It can serve, then, as a kind of motivator — a prompt to reflect and consider what will actually give us contentment or joy. As the social historian Joe Moran has put it, the “experience of boredom is an indication that something is not perfect or satisfactory, thereby containing the potential to alert people to possibilities for rethinking their activities and lifestyles.”
When kids feel bored, it’s often because the activities they typically gravitate towards don’t seem appealing in that moment — so, then, they feel compelled to try new things. I remember being bored one summer in middle school and deciding to learn how to paint, something I’d never really done before. Boredom encouraged me to think outside the box and try something new. It inspired creativity and fostered independence.
This whole problem-solving process — "I’m bored, I guess I’ll try something else and see if it makes me feel better — is also a journey of emotional regulation. The discomfort of boredom coaxes kids to try out and develop new coping strategies, and we know that having an effective repertoire of healthy coping strategies is crucial for mental health.
Encourage free, imaginative play.
Bring on the summer playdates! (But solo play and sibling play are great, too.) Resilience can be thought of as a mastery of one’s environment — the ability to handle what’s going on around you. Imaginary, free play exposes kids to many different kinds of situations and experiences, giving them ample opportunities to build various skills.
Because free play does not have a priori rules, kids typically have to make up their own rules and structures as they go, which is a highly creative process. Kids have to learn to be fair and take turns, which develops co-operation and delayed gratification skills. Research finds that play also improves kids’ self-control, and that it can help kids persevere longer on tasks.
We often think of play as a “fun” activity that doesn’t involve much learning or growth, but many kids learn more through play than they do in more structured academic contexts.
Set limits and stick to them. Say no!
I’m going to start this one off with a big caveat: I’m very much in support of giving kids more freedom and relaxing some rules and limits over the summer. But I also know that kids (especially those prone to anxiety) do well with some structure, and that limits and saying “no” can help kids develop more emotional regulation, flexibility, and resilience.
An example: If your kid is demanding that you serve them lunch on the blue plate rather than the red plate, and you say no and hold firm, they are probably going to feel frustrated or disappointed. Yes, there may be some screaming, but remember that it’s yet another opportunity for them to practice those burgeoning coping skills. Your child will also discover that they can survive if they eat off the red plate, which will, over time, nudge them to be more flexible.
Encourage kids to do hard things, and try not to rescue or curate.
Summer offers a plethora of opportunities for kids to experience challenges. Maybe you’ve signed them up for day camp, and they’re nervous about who will be there or who their counselors will be. Perhaps you’re even sending them off to overnight camp, and they’ve never been away from home before.
These experiences are incredible growth opportunities, yet sometimes we as parents feel so uncomfortable with the possibility of our kids feeling uncomfortable that we try to try to …. well, eliminate some of the built-in challenges or differences, thereby tempering their growth potential. We absolutely can and should offer our kids emotional support and validate our kids’ feelings when they need it. But once they’re off doing their thing, we should try our best to let them be, and we should allow their experiences to be what they are designed to be. We probably don’t need to send them with eight “I love you notes” in their day camp lunchbox or decorate their bunk bed so that it looks and feels exactly like home. It’s okay for the experience to feel different: That’s kind of the whole point!
When you play games, don’t let your kids win. (Or at least, not all the time.)
Sometimes parents ask me: “If my kids have terrible meltdowns when they lose games or don’t get their way, what should I do?” My answer is always: Have them lose or not get their way more often. Because again, the best way for kids to develop the coping skills they need to manage disappointment is to ensure that they have lots of practice. This doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t support them when they are upset — totally fine to empathetically say, “I know, it’s so hard to lose, isn’t it?” — but we should still let them lose and experience that frustration and disappointment.
You can throw in some growth mindset language, too. Encourage them to consider that losses and challenges help them learn new skills. I’ll never forget the soccer season when my son’s team lost every single game and I kept using growth mindset language after each loss, hoping it would help. (I’m pretty sure his coaches did, too.) Then, one Saturday morning, towards the end of the season, he came in to my room and said “Mom, you know what’s weird? I kind of hope we lose today’s game. Because every time we lose, I know I’ll learn something.” I couldn’t believe he’d internalized the message… but by some miracle, he had.
Now I’d love to hear from you: What do you do during the summer to build resilience? Or just….. what helps you survive? Share your thoughts, ideas and experiences in the comments!
Yes, this is the perfect list for this season! Can we get one for the adults next? 😂
I NEEDED to hear (read?) #4 this morning. My anxiety-diagnosed 5 year old is going to summer camp. This is our first year dealing with the realities of Small Child Summer, (daycare, what a blessing you were), and I am so nervous about how he will handle day camp. But I am also the first one to always say he needs exposure to new things to make him resilient and help with his anxiety. I CAN be there for him emotionally and listen to him and help prepare him, but he can also do hard things, like meet new friends and play and have fun in a whole new environment!