How to foster empathy in your kids

All of us here want to raise kind, empathetic kids who have a real, true sense of right and wrong. And it’s no easy feat to constantly reiterate morality to little kids, especially when they can have zero interest.

I recently had an interesting conversation with Dr. Richard Weissbourd, who teaches up at Harvard and is the co-director of Making Caring Common Project. He told me that while he applauds parents for (seemingly constantly) asking their kids to “name their feelings,” he’d love to see more parents turn that attention outward and, if their kids are with other kids, ask how others feel (especially if the parents are breaking up a tiff between a group). That way, he believes, kids will become more empathetic and, down the road, better friends, partners and, yes, parents.

I feel like my husband and I are constantly reiterating empathy and kindness at every turn, so I was curious what other parents out there were doing. I asked our Facebook community how they work to instill empathy and morality in their kids. Not surprisingly, they had some tricks up their sleeves.

Read their advice here, and if you have any thoughts, as always, email me at katea@huffpost.com.

Until next week,

Kate

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