Nurturing a Child’s Spirit: Tips for Parents and Caring Adults
Nurturing a Child’s Spirit: Tips for Parents and Caring Adults
Birth to Age 3
How Children May Be Developing Spiritually
• Discovers the world through warm, caring relationships with parents and other caregivers.
• Experiences life through what she or he sees, hears, smells, touches, and tastes.
• Finds out whether the world is safe and predictable by how parents and caregivers interact with her or him.
What You May Experience
• A sense of wonder at what your child sees and notices in the world.
• Pleasure and comfort in the simple spiritual rituals that are important to your family.
• Ambivalence about how you may want to nurture spirituality and religious practices in your family.
• The challenge of adapting your spiritual or religious practices to include a young child.
Nurturing Children’s Spiritual Development
• Engage in spiritual practices (e.g. music, service, worship, prayer, meditation) as a family so that they become a regular part of family life.
• Adapt your religious and spiritual practices to the developmental abilities of your child. (For example, young children cannot sit too long.)
• Participate in rituals and practices that involve the five senses.
• Enjoy toys, stories, and music that engage and comfort your child.
• Surround your child and yourself with warm, caring people who value and nurture young children and their spiritual lives.
• Encourage your child to be gentle, caring and empathic towards others. Model these practices.
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Nurturing a Child’s Spirit: Tips for Parents and Caring Adults
Age 4 - 6
How Children May Be Developing Spiritually
• Has an active imagination and is open to the supernatural.
• May say insightful or profound things about God, the world, and life.
• Responds to concrete stories, symbols, and experiences.
• Tends to be a black-and-white thinker.
• Begins to use the religious or spiritual language of the family.
What You May Experience
• Satisfaction when your child expresses spiritual insights consistent with your beliefs.
• Openness by your child to spiritual beliefs, stories, and practices.
• Comments by your child about spiritual or religious concepts that may or may not fit with your beliefs or with reality.
• Some resistance from the child who starts to become more independent and begins to ask questions.
Nurturing Children’s Spiritual Development
• Give your child more ways to participate in family spiritual practices as he or she is able.
• Use concrete stories, games, and crafts to introduce the family’s beliefs and practices.
• Accept your child’s interpretation of spiritual or religious concepts, asking her or him questions about them rather than correcting or judging.
• Encourage questions about the world, life, death, and other spiritual matters.
• Ask young children to draw pictures to express what they experience and believe.
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Nurturing a Child’s Spirit: Tips for Parents and Caring Adults
Age 7 - 9
How Children May Be Developing Spiritually
• Is a concrete, literal thinker, and cannot understand abstract words and understandings of spirituality.
• Begins to wonder more about the world around her or him. Why do things happen?
• Asks cause-and-effect questions about good and bad, life after death, and other big issues.
• Starts to make sense of the world by learning and retelling stories.
• Becomes aware that friends may have different spiritual practices.
What You May Experience
• Satisfaction when your child learns spiritual or religious stories, music, practices, and knowledge that are important to your family.
• Discomfort as your child asks questions about the world, God, and other spiritual matters that are difficult to answer.
• Frustration when your child becomes bored or disinterested in spiritual practices or rituals.
Nurturing Children’s Spiritual Development
• Maintain a warm, caring relationship, even when you’re frustrated.
• Read stories and enjoy music or other arts with religious or spiritual themes.
• Make conversations about spiritual matters a regular part of family life. Listen to your child’s perspectives and questions. Share your perspectives in ways your child can understand.
• Find activities that interest your child and reinforce your family’s spiritual commitments.
• Encourage your child to participate in activities and peer groups that nurture her or his spirit. Affirm growth and leadership.
• Link with other parents and families who share your spiritual beliefs, practices, and priorities.
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Nurturing a Child’s Spirit: Tips for Parents and Caring Adults
Age 10 - 14
How Children May Be Developing Spiritually
• Starts to see contradictions he or she sees in the world and in religious or spiritual beliefs and practices.
• May question or reject childhood beliefs as he or she moves beyond black-and-white thinking.
• Can also develop strong, even contradictory beliefs as he or she “tries on” different ideas.
• As part of forming a distinct identity from her or his parents, begins to rely more on friends and other adults to shape beliefs and practices.
• Begins to identify or develop interests or gifts about which he or she is passionate.
What You May Experience
• Anxiety as your child appears to question or reject your family’s spiritual beliefs, values, and practices.
• Frustration with not being able to get your child to participate in religious or spiritual activities.
• Accomplishment (and relief) as your child begins to articulate her or his own spiritual beliefs—often similar to your own.
• Pride in seeing your child develop unique gifts, talents, and passions.
• Encouragement if your child takes leadership roles in encouraging peers to participate in religious or spiritual activities and practices.
Nurturing Children’s Spiritual Development
• Keep communication open, even if your child says things that scare you or disappoint you.
• Support your child in expressing her or his own emerging sense of spirituality through journaling, music, or other creative expression.
• Model your own spiritual beliefs, practices, and commitments.
• Find spiritual mentors you trust who connect with your child.
• Encourage your child to be part of positive peer groups that reinforce her or his spiritual commitments.
• Talk with other parents about what you’re experiencing, including parents with older teenagers.
• Cultivate and encourage the things that nourish your child’s passions and gifts.
Nurturing a Child’s Spirit: Tips for Parents and Caring Adults
Age 15 - 17
How Children May Be Developing Spiritually
• Seeks to resolve differences and conflicts between different parts of self, including those shaped by family, peers, faith community, and other influences.
• Begins to make choices about where intentional spiritual practices fit (or don’t fit) in her or his life.
• Becomes clearer about the things that bring joy and energy in life, including a sense of vocation.
• Begins to internalize personal beliefs and practices, which may be similar to or different from those of parents and peers.
• Can develop strong convictions regarding social and political issues, and may become deeply committed to service and social change.
What You May Experience
• New confidence as your child begins to express her or his own spiritual commitments.
• Potential for new agreement or new disagreement in conversations about spiritual matters.
• Deep concern or sadness if your child sets aside your own spiritual beliefs and practices.
• Joy in watching your child develop her or his own unique identity and path.
• Ambivalence, change, or growth in your own spiritual path as you watch and wonder about your child’s spiritual development.
Nurturing Children’s Spiritual Development
• Continue modeling the spiritual beliefs and practices that are important to you, including community service.
• Follow your child’s lead as he or she introduces you to the passions and commitments that are important to her or him.
• Find support from friends, religious leaders, or other trusted sources if your child moves in a spiritual or life direction that you see as negative or harmful.
• Encourage your child to connect with peers and mentors who have deep spiritual commitments or practices—even if they are different from your own. Exposing a child to different culture or belief system can trigger them to re-evaluate and reclaim their own.
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