Giving Compass' Take:

• Developmental psychologist, Helen Shwe Hadani, shares tips from her research on how parents can best support their children's' development as more schools close due to coronavirus.

• What resources are available for parents to improve home-based learning environments? Can donors help make more learning tools accessible?

• Read how school districts can prepare for coronavirus. 

I am a “glass is half full” kind of person. While uncertainty and fear from the coronavirus epidemic is of course top of mind, I have also seen many acts of human kindness on social media and on trips to the supermarket, library, or just walking my dog that give me hope. One of the biggest stories along these lines was the recent announcement that Eric Yuan, the CEO of Zoom, is giving K-12 schools free access to videoconferencing tools to help support learning for the millions of out-of-school children across the U.S. On a more local level, it has been inspiring to see posts on my neighborhood Nextdoor group of people offering to do grocery runs, pick up prescriptions, or lend a helping hand to anyone in need.

As a developmental psychologist with expertise in creativity and playful learning, I wanted to do my part and offer some tips based on research for supporting young children’s learning through interactive and fun activities while families shelter in place at home.

Increasingly, research indicates that children with social-emotional skills do better in school, in the workplace, and in life. Fortunately, like many other skills, social-emotional skills are malleable, and caregivers can foster them in young children through everyday interactions.

The simple act of talking about emotions and mental states in everyday contexts can develop children’s “helping” tendencies. Research measured toddler’s empathic response (e.g., bringing a blanket to the experimenter when she shivered) and found that when parents elicited talk about their emotions while reading a book together, children helped more quickly. When reading a book or watching a movie with your child, pause to ask questions like, “How do you think that character was feeling?” or “How would you feel if that happened to you?”

Read the full article about supporting children's development at home by Helen Shwe Hadani at Brookings.