8 Parenting Strategies To Give Your Kids An Empowered Childhood

When you think about parenting, does it take you back to your own childhood? Considering the way you were raised? Or maybe, like me, your mind goes to the stories that made you who you are.

Like catching fireflies when you were young. Watching the night sky come alive, and wanting to be a part of the magic.

It was a simpler time. A slower time. When kids were allowed to be kids, and neighbors looked out for one another. And though it wasn’t so long ago, the world is a different place. Just as our world was different than the one our parents were raised in.

Our children are growing up in a time where people live in a perpetual state of busyness. Where growing demands on our time and finances leave us without the capacity to prioritize fun and games. But our kids deserve to have a childhood filled with magic to light up their world.

Because when kids are given the chance to really be kids, to explore and wander and wonder, in a place where they’re safe to make mistakes and fail because they always have someone in their corner, they’ll grow up strong and confident. Ready to own their lives.

With all the information out there on how to raise your kids, it’s easy to feel like you’re not measuring up. But when we get back to those basics – the ones that our parents were raised on, and they raised us on – it’s easier to sort through all the noise and begin to raise our world changers with intention.

Here are 8 practical parenting strategies to help you give your kiddo an empowered childhood!

1. Let Them Play

“Play is the highest form of research.”

Albert Einstein

Play is vital to a child’s development.

Fine motor skills are refined through things like art and sensory play. Gross motor skills are built through big body movement like running and jumping. And executive function in the brain is strengthened through activities like playing pretend.

As adults with never ending to do lists, we’ve forgotten the benefits of play, but our children need time to explore their world if they’re going to find their place in it. 

2. Get Outside

Is there a better way to inspire wonder and exploration than the sensory rich environment of your own backyard?

I want my children to understand the value of the dirt, and the majesty of the heavens. To understand the blessing of life in their limbs and breath in their lungs.

What better way to marvel at God’s creation then when they’re running down hills and climbing into trees?

3. Embrace Simplicity

As parents, it’s easy to get wrapped up in wanting the latest and greatest for our kids, fearing that we’ll somehow fail them by keeping it simple. But kids are simple, and it’s our shortcoming as a society that we’ve forgotten the beauty in simplicity.

Passive toys make active learners, yet we fill our playrooms with loud, flashing, “educational,” toys. Plastic things that provide no sensory experience. And loud colors and sounds that overstimulate.

It’s no wonder we find our children at our feet fifteen minutes after sending them to play. They don’t know how to entertain themselves because we’ve surrounded them with toys that do the entertaining.

We’ve forgotten the value that can be found in plain wooden blocks as we imagine worlds and construct them with our own two hands. We’ve forgotten the beauty in getting dirty as we feel the earth between our fingers. And we’ve forgotten the peace found in solitude as we lose ourselves in a book.

I want my children to learn critical thinking and deductive reasoning by letting them experience life and its many puzzles. I want to bring the outdoors into their playspace, surrounding them with beauty. I want them to create with real materials, knowing I value their capability. And I never want them to stop dreaming. Ever.

4. Be Their Hero

Our kids will grow up. We can’t stop it or slow it down. But we can play a role in who they become.

Part of the magic of childhood is believing in heroes, but kids these days think heroes only exist on TV. By living lives of generosity, courtesy, and valor, we can teach our children that everyday heroes still exist. 

Our boys need to know that chivalry is still important in a world where people rarely stop to acknowledge one another.

Our daughters need to understand that accepting the generosity and courtesy of a man does not make them weak. That they should accept nothing less than a husband who will champion them.

We need to show our children that a husband should stand in the fire for his wife, and that marriage is not to be discarded like so much rubbish when it gets hard.

They need to understand that being generous is not a burden but a gift, and that courtesy and kindness are not optional, but something we should extend to everyone.

“And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’”

matthew 25:40

5. Let Them Be Bored

I want to teach my kids the value of boredom. The television was invented in 1927 and the first wireless radio transmission was in 1880. It’s hard to imagine how people entertained themselves for thousands of years before modern technology, but they did. 

And I would argue that modern technology was probably a direct result of their boredom.

Boredom fosters creativity. When you have no one to keep you occupied, you learn how to occupy yourself.

I’m by no means anti-technology. We watch TV, and my boys have iPads and video games. But we’ve made the choice to give our children a vintage childhood. One where they value being outdoors more than sitting on the couch. One where they’re allowed to stomp in puddles without worrying about getting dirty. One where they can slay dragons with the help of a paper towel roll, and create kingdoms with the swish of a paintbrush.

If your child is never allowed to be bored, they’ll never imagine. They’ll never create. And that’s the essence of childhood.

6. Believe In Them

When I first started homeschooling my oldest in preschool, I discovered the schools of Reggio Emilia in Italy. They are unique in the way they value the child’s opinion and voice, believing children to be capable and important to the community as a whole.

It was the first I truly understood that when we believe in our kids and treat them as capable, they can do amazing things.

Think about the way your parenting could change a child’s life when you simply believe in them, even when they don’t believe in themselves. Imagine how much a child could achieve if they were told their potential is endless.

Don’t let your own fears for your kids stop you from allowing them to soar!

7. Speak Life Over Them

“The tongue has the power of life and death.”

proverbs 18:21

Words are powerful. We were created in the image of God who spoke the entire universe into existence. And we have hold that same power to build up or tear down with our words.

The story you tell your child is the story they will carry with them throughout their lifetime.

Let’s make sure we’re telling them a story of affirmation and empowerment. That our parenting is reflecting in words that they matter and that we care.

When we speak life over our children from a young age, we give them an incredible gift. Planting the seeds of truth that will one day grow into their inner voice.

8. Love Them Fiercely

“‘Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?’ Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.’”

Matthew‬ ‭22:36-40‬

Jesus calls it the most important commandment.

Love.

Fancy toys and sophisticated games won’t make our children thrive. It’s our love. The single most important thing you can give your child is yourself.

As moms, we need to make sure that we’re taking care of ourselves well, so we aren’t barely making it through our mom life, but creating space to be present with the ones who need us.

Parenting is hard. It’s not easy to slow down and be with your kids, especially when the responsibilities of being a grown up are beating down your door. But she’s still in there. That little girl. The one who marveled at the night sky as it came alive with the light of fireflies.

You’re kids want to know her. They want her to teach them the magic of laughter, and the freedom in letting go. They want to know you, mama.

Life is crazy. But the most important lesson I hope to teach my kids is that as long as we have each other, it can be crazy beautiful.

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