how do i encourage kids to be altruistic?
how do i encourage kids to be altruistic?
user
Hmm, do you mean how to encourage kids to feel compassion and consider the feelings of other people?  If so, one thing that’s important to remember is that children are usually at a stage of development where their focus is on themselves, and being honest with themselves about their own emotions.
assistant
Okay, how can I teach them to consider others?
user
That’s a tricky question!  It’s really hard to generalize, since kids are such different ages, with different individual personalities.  But if I were to try to answer this question, I’d probably say that you might want to try to figure out what sort of message you want to send, and then discuss this message with them, along with why it’s important.  This should give them a chance to really explore what’s going on inside them, since asking about what they think about a topic lets them think about the issue in a way that’s not necessarily aligned with your own goals.  And then you could also help guide them by sharing what you think is important, and even giving them some actionable suggestions.
assistant
Good idea. What else can you tell me?
user
Well, if I were writing a book for kids, I’d probably write about emotions like anger, sadness, loneliness, and so on, and I’d write about how kids can learn to handle their own emotions and also learn to read the emotions of other people.  I’d include some things like stories, explanations, and metaphors.  For example, I might write a story about how some kid got really mad at another kid for forgetting to share a toy, and maybe the two kids had a fight.  After the fight, the first kid felt really bad about getting angry, and the second kid felt bad about forgetting to share, so they both were sad about the whole thing.  I’d tell this story as a way to get kids to think about the fact that their emotions are important and that we don’t want to make the situation worse by getting mad at people who forget to share.
assistant
Okay, I'll keep that in mind!
user