Educating our children is a complex task that demands more and more skills from us to be able to teach the little ones all the necessary tools for their future.
And within an upbringing based on values , one of the most important aspects is teamwork. Teamwork can help your children learn to be more collaborative, empathic, know how to listen and express their ideas more clearly.
It will also allow them to have a much more open mind to accept other opinions and be able to resolve conflicts . But, how to encourage this teamwork among the little ones?
We give you some keys and we also describe some of the benefits of this practice that can be applied in the game, in the academic field and, why not? In the workplace when they are older.
“Teamwork is the secret that makes ordinary people achieve unusual results.”
-Ifeanyi Onuoha-
How to encourage teamwork in children
It is a natural tendency of human beings to socialize and want to be part of groups, so it is not surprising that teamwork is a fundamental part of our development.
However, there are some cases in which this is a bit complicated for us with our children. If this is your case, do not worry, with these recommendations you can help your children learn to work as a team:
teach by example
Nothing works better, in the case of children, than teaching them by example. Our little ones learn more from what they observe about us, who are their role models or role models , than from what we tell them or teach them at school.
The game is fundamental: use it in your favor
The natural means of learning for children is play. So, use it to teach them about teamwork.
Do activities that are collaborative and limit competitive and/or individual games as much as possible.
teach them skills
Assertiveness and empathy are tools of emotional intelligence , essential for teamwork, so it is of great importance that children learn these skills at home.
You can help them recognize their emotions and manage them assertively, at the same time that you indicate that what everyone feels is important and that, therefore, it should be valued and recognized.
Involve them in household activities
When you go to do any work at home, like preparing food or doing laundry, involve your children. Assign them tasks and explain that when we all collaborate, things work much better; emphasize how good it feels to help.
Strengthens your confidence
Teach your children to trust themselves and their abilities.
In the same way, tell them how important it is to trust the abilities of others, and let them know that we can trust their abilities so that together we can resolve the conflicts that arise.
Also work on their self-esteem and reinforce them a lot.
Team sport: a great ally
An excellent strategy, and also very fun, for our children to learn to work as a team, is for them to practice some sport (in which they do not compete individually).
This will encourage them to develop interpersonal skills that allow them to play with their peers while having fun and learning.
“Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships.”
-Michael Jordan-
Benefits of teamwork
As social beings that we are, people have an innate tendency to relate to others. And it is that it is part of our nature, and our way of being, to try to belong to a group, to share with others and to work collaboratively.
So, the natural thing is to feel attracted to teamwork, although as we have already seen, in some cases it can be a bit complicated , but nothing that cannot be solved by applying the aforementioned recommendations.
And it is that teamwork represents great benefits for your child, among which are:
Improve communication skills
Teamwork requires that we learn to communicate our ideas assertively, that we can express what we think and/or want in such a way that others can understand us.
All this at the same time that it demands of us to have a good ability to know how to listen to others (active listening). In this sense, we are not only referring to paying attention to them while they speak, but to going further and trying to really understand what they want to tell us.
Increase efficiency
When we work as a team we can achieve the objectives set much more easily, and that is that, that saying that: “ two heads are better than one “ , is a very successful premise.
Thus, collaborative work allows children to enhance their abilities to resolve conflicts and see the same situation from different points of view ( which also favors cognitive flexibility ).
This facilitates the task of making a much more accurate approach to fulfill the proposed task.
“Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision.”
-Andrew Carnegie-
Encourage empathy and diversity
Working as a team requires an effort to understand others, since it is not about imposing our ideas, but about reaching a consensus among all, understanding each individual.
This type of collaboration helps our children to put themselves in the place of others and understand that each one of us may have a specific point of view , skills or a way of seeing situations that is different from our own, and that all of this It’s good (and also enriches!).
“We are all different, which is great because we are all unique. Without diversity, life would be very boring.
-Catherine Pulsifer-
Improves interpersonal relationships
When our children work as a team, they put their social skills into practice to establish interpersonal relationships , and even improve them; in some cases they can also acquire them in a natural way.
Having to share with other children and agree to achieve a common goal will be a great help for them to practice and enhance their abilities to create and maintain healthy and equitable relationships among their peers.
Teamwork and open-mindedness
In this way, it is easy to understand that, taking into account all the aforementioned benefits, teamwork is very positive for our children to broaden their vision of life .
Sharing and having to agree to collaborate with other people helps children to have a much broader perspective of how everything works, and can even help them to have more tools to manage conflict resolution.
“Unity is strength. When there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved.”
-Mattie Stepanek-
Photos | Cover (freepik), Image 1 (freepik), Image 2 (freepik), Image 3 (freepik), Image 4 (freepik)
