1. POSITIVE COACHING SCOTLAND MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT CONFIDENCE
There are many misconceptions associated with developing confident young people, as a parent it is important that you understand them and support your child to develop their confidence levels. Common misconceptions with confidence are:
Only positive feedback builds confidence
It is important to ensure that young people feel good about themselves – positive feedback is important to this, however when a young person makes a mistake or has a fault, there is a need to make them aware of this mistake/ fault – often this means criticising their performance. It is important however that parents use this as a learning opportunity, ask them how they could have improved, what they could do differently next time – by involving them in the conversation they are actively involved with correcting a fault and the negative criticism will not impact their confidence levels.
Success always builds confidence
Being successful is often related to the scoreboard, however what if your child was competing against opposition who were younger and less experienced, can this be defined as success? During your child’s developmental years, parents should define success as personal challenge – are they better than they were yesterday, and how can they improve on that for tomorrow?
Mistakes inevitably destroy confidence
Mistakes can destroy confidence; however, parents should recognise mistakes as a learning opportunity – seeing this as chance for your child to improve. When a young person recognises that mistakes are part of the learning process they understand where they must improve and importantly don’t let it affect their confidence levels.
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