Most parents hope and pray that their child will be on a happy and successful path in life. But, what constitutes a recipe for your child’s happiness and success? The answer is ‘life skills,’ which are an amalgamation of seven critical skills.

7 Cs

The seven Cs refer to seven important skills that your child needs to master. These skills are essential, not just in an educational context but in everyday life. The 7Cs not only help children build confidence and self-esteem but they also encourage healthy emotional development.

So, let’s take a closer look at the 7Cs that can bring this continuity to your child’s crucial years of growth, learning, and success.

• Critical Thinking

  Critical thinking refers to higher-order thinking skills that your child needs to think rationally and effectively. Critical thinking skills help your child develop the ability to analyse points of view, evaluate arguments, challenge assumptions, consider issues from various perspectives, identify links between ideas, support evidence and reasons, and explore possible alternatives. When children start to think critically, they begin to enjoy more challenging tasks.

  Key takeaway: Critical thinking enhances your child’s ability to ask questions, evaluate, analyse and classify information, justify ideas and solve problems.

• Creativity

  Many people associate creativity with only being good at drawing or painting, but creativity is a lot more than that. Creative thinking has various attributes that involve imagination, innovation, flexibility, divergent thinking, and the tolerance of ambiguity.

  Creative children can express their ideas better through drawing, painting, writing, drama, dance and other artistic or scientific exploration. They tend to be less frustrated and easily develop a joy of learning. Creative children can use their newly created content to participate in creative activities and solve problems.

  Key takeaway: Creativity allows your child to generate and explore new ideas, be resourceful and take risks.

• Communication

  Communication is a lot more than speaking and listening. It encapsulates reading, telling stories, sharing ideas and experiences, eye contact, facial expression, body language, and tone. As children learn and practice this skill, they learn to decipher the world around them. Therefore, strong communication skills in kids are essential for their literacy success. Through this skill, the child learns to articulate their thoughts and ideas effectively and listen attentively to decode meaning. Developing strong patterns of verbal and non-verbal communication also enhances social skills and self-esteem.

  Key takeaway:Children with solid communication skills work in different modes, develop an individual voice, and engage positively with digital technologies.

• Continuous Learning

  Continuous learning is about expanding or improving your child’s skills through constantly learning new things and building upon their existing knowledge. As your child grows, continuous learning helps your child adapt to the changing or emerging personal and academic environments.

  Key takeaway:Children with a continuous improvement mindset reflect on their past learning, create new goals, and do their personal best in whatever tasks they undertake.

• Conversation

  Conversation skills are about being able to talk and listen well. Good conservation skills not only support the learning curve of your child but also help build strong relationships. In a nutshell, learning how to have conversations is important for your child’s development, relationships and overall wellbeing.

  Key takeaway:Children with conversation skills know how to start conversations, take turns when talking and listening, speak politely, use eye contact, and know when to stop talking.

• Commitment

  Commitments are powerful because they influence how we think, how we sound, and how we act. Children are not born with character traits like commitment, but it needs to be purposely developed through targeted learning methods. A child who understands the value of commitment will try harder, look for solutions when faced with challenges, won’t consider quitting as an option and won’t look back at all.

  Key takeaway:A child empowered with the value of commitment displays consistent efforts towards learning by planning and organising work, completing tasks, regardless of obstacles faced, and paying attention to details.

• Collaboration

  Collaboration is how your child begins to build relationships with others. Collaboration helps children think more deeply and creatively about a topic or situation and develop more empathy for others’ perspectives.

  Key takeaway:As your child learns collaboration skills, they learn to respect others and control their emotions.

5 steps to the seven Cs

These five steps provide a framework that challenges and stimulates children to develop the 7Cs.

• Step 1: Determine what skill you want to teach your child and define what behaviours your child should exhibit.

• Step 2: Encourage your child to think critically and creatively through various types of questioning.

• Step 3: Choose activities that promote active learning.

• Step 4: Give your child an opportunity to review and refine their ideas by encouraging communication and collaboration.

• Step 5: Create an opportunity for your child to present their work, get feedback and self-assess their work.