 How can we enable children to feel genuinely seen and heard within our homes and education settings? That's what we're gonna be thinking about in today's podcast episode. So let's dive straight in. It's possible for our children to feel quite invisible. And one of our jobs as the adults who care about them, love them, either personally or professionally and want them to do okay, is to enable them to realize that within the world they matter, that people care that they exist, that what they say is gonna be heard and that when they do things it makes ripples. And there are quite a few different ways that we can do that. But the first is just to be aware that there are these invisible children. There are children that float by under the radar who go unnoticed, who feel that they don't matter and who will benefit hugely from even just the tiniest bits of connection from us. So here are some ideas for making those kids feel seen. The first one is to take an interest in their interests. So every kid has a thing that they would like to be doing, would like to be talking about, that they might have skills in or might be really passionate about. For some kids that is more obvious than others and for some kids that is deeper than for others, our neurodiverse kids will often have areas of high per focus and special interest. Negatively, some people might see those things as obsessions or something really boring that we don't wanna hear about for the child. This is something that they get deeply. This is something that when they are in that zone, in that flow with that topic, nothing else matters. And sometimes these kids live in a world that feels pretty hard, except when they're engaging with whatever that special interest or hyper focus might be. And when they're doing that thing, everything else melts away into the background. And suddenly they are in command of their own world and they're lost in this world of special interest and time goes by and we forget to eat and drink and go to the toilet because we're just in that zone and that's wonderful. And this thing is something that a child would love, love to share with other people. Sometimes depending on what those interests are, those interests don't tend to get heard particularly by adults. And so if we can suspend our disinterest just for a few minutes and invite the child to invite us into their world, then they can feel really, really seen and heard, sometimes for the first time about that topic. And sure, a child's area of particular interest, the thing that they could talk about for hours might not be a thing that floats your boat. However, if you can suspend your disinterest and actually get really, really curious about this topic with the child, you'll often be surprised about how interesting even the seemingly most mundane things can be because suddenly you begin to see this child in a different light. This is a child who maybe doesn't say a lot about a lot of the time and then you get them onto their favorite topic and they come alive and their knowledge is deep and their passion is really there. So take an interest in their interests, ask questions, allow them to teach you just for a few minutes. That will make them feel really, really seen and heard. The next idea is I saw this and I thought of you. And this is about enabling children to know that just because we're not in the room with them, we don't stop thinking about them. For some of our children, this is particularly important. So if for example, you're working in an education setting or other youth setting and you might have children there for whom you are a key adult in their life and they might not have lots of other adults like that, then there can sometimes be an assumption that you're only in their lives because you're paid to be because it's your job and that you're just doing what you have to. And when we can show them that, well, actually I was thinking about you at the weekend I saw this movie poster and it reminded me of a film that you said you liked or an advert came up when I was watching YouTube for this thing that you've spoken about or whatever it might be, little things. Little things do make us think of other people in our lives when we have a relationship with them. And our job here is just to repeat those things back to this child. So they know that just because they weren't in the room doesn't mean they weren't in our minds. Them knowing that they matter beyond the moment when we are doing our direct job with them in the room makes a really big difference. And again, parents and carers can use this same strategy too. It can show that we've heard, that we've listened, that we've connected with the things that matter to our child and we've noticed things in the world that brought them to mind. So I saw this in thought of you letting our children know that just because they're out of sight doesn't mean they're out of mind. Can enable them just to feel like they matter that little bit more in the world that we heard them, that we saw them, that we thought of them. The third idea to show on this one is about sincere, specific praise. We could do a whole episode on praise sometime. Getting praise right makes a really, really big difference to children. But the thing here is about when we do come to those moments of praise, just thinking about the things that we're praising and how we're praising them. When a child's working really hard at something, regardless of the outcome, that process and the efforts that they're going to, the attitude that they're bringing is something that we can notice and praise. So when we tell a child, well done for an outcome, actually that's just a sort of standard praise and that's good and important too. But the child who's trying really hard, who's stepped outside their comfort zone, who's doing something that doesn't come easily to them. When we notice that and we specifically look to give sincere praise about that process, about that effort, about that different attitude, then that child will feel really, really seen in their efforts. And the thing here for us as adults as well is just thinking about what are the behaviors and the attitudes that we would like to see developed, repeated, nurtured in this child. And it normally is those ones of wanting to try again of being a little bit bold and a little bit brave in our learning of not being afraid of the fact that maybe we might not get it right the first time and of stepping outside of the comfort zone. So this kind of sort of sincere, specific praise that notices the process is actually a win-win because it helps to nurture exactly those attitudes we would hope to see in our children as well as allowing the child to realize that we saw that they were working really hard on this. We noticed how much effort they went in. We're aware and perhaps we'll say it, I know you find this really hard and validating that, acknowledging that, letting them know, this must have been tricky for you, but you kept going, well done. We'll make them be seen in their efforts. Next, in jokes and rituals. I seem to be talking about this all the time at the moment, in jokes and rituals are so important for belonging, so important for connection, they can generate laughter and rituals and routines will create a feeling of safety because a child kind of gets comfortable and sort of knows what to expect from us and from a situation, but in jokes and rituals can also help children just to sort of feel seen because they feel like a part of something. When we're able to join in, when we're part of things, when we connect with others in a way that kind of makes sense and it's as expected, then we feel kind of seen as part of that environment. So it's kind of in jokes, those rituals, those things that make us just feel a part of something, make us feel seen and heard with that environment just because it kind of fits and it feels comfortable. Then you asked, I did. We are very good generally, not all of us all of the time, but many of us some of the time at actually listening to our children and following up on what they have to say. So if something's bothering them or they want us to do something differently or something needs to change, really, really often actually, we take away what we've heard and we do something differently as a result. What we're not so good at with all due respect is letting the kids know that we've done things in the different way. So actually, you asked, I did, is about completing that circle. It's about letting them know. You told me that you wanted this done differently. I listened and as a consequence, this is what's happening differently now. And this matters because if we don't complete that circle, if we don't let children know what's happening differently as a result of what they've told us, asked us, shown us, then they actually don't know that things have changed. They don't know that their voice was actually heard. So this is important. This is important both in a little day-to-day way when we make small changes, perhaps to our environment, in order to enable a children to function better, enable children or a child to function better. But it's also really important in a big way as well. So you might be doing, I don't know, surveys of children to try and have that genuine sort of young person voice within some work that you're doing, say. And sometimes what we do is we take that information and we go off and we use it, but we never feed back to the children that we heard from. So enable them to feel seen. We need to let them know, what do we do with that survey that we took? What happened with that research they participated on? What changed in the world as the result of something that they said, did or shared? So you asked, I did, follow through. As an aside, if you're working in an education setting, this is also super important when working with parents and carers. If you're listening to their voices or indeed the voices of staff, tell them, show them, let them know what you did as a result of hearing their voices. Don't just quietly do it. There are no prizes for quiet endeavor here. We need to celebrate the things that have changed as a result of hearing those voices. Otherwise, the people who took the time to share their voice will not feel that there was any point in that and they're less likely to do it again. Finally, in terms of enabling our children to feel seen and feel heard, whether that's at home or at school or in other environments, start with their strengths. Get curious about who this child is. What are the things that they love? What are the things that they're good at? What are the things that they try really hard at? What are the things that make them uniquely them? What are the things that you love about them? What are the things that their friends would love about them? What's great about this kid? We need to try and flip that narrative and stop thinking about children as lists of problems and acronyms and issues to be solved. And instead, think first about what's brilliant about this child? Why do we wanna work with this child? What are the things that inspire us to be with them? Work with them? What's the thing that gets us excited about them? This really, really, really, really matters because the stories that we tell about children are the stories they, in turn, will tell about themselves. So starting with their strengths, starting with the good stuff is great because then the child starts to see those good things in themselves rather than seeing themself as a list of acronyms, issues, and problems to be solved. And when we start with strengths, it really begins to change those conversations and those relationships too because instead of seeing a problem, we see someone who's gonna be really exciting and fun and interesting to work with to care for to be a part of their lives. So start with their strengths. And in order to do that, of course, we've got to learn what those strengths are which will involve listening, it will involve getting curious, it will involve going beyond the absolute surface and exploring with this child. Well, what do you like to do? What are the things that you feel that you're good at or that other people would pick out as your strengths and just really getting to know them on a slightly different level? That takes just a little bit of work and it might be time that you feel that you don't have but this time that's invested earlier on in a relationship with the child and of course ongoing, you'll go deeper with them but this time at the beginning here when you build that connection and you get to know the real them, you just go beyond the surface, you scratch a little bit deeper, this will form the bedrock of a much, much more positive relationship going forwards and will give you loads and loads of jumping off points and suggested directions for the relationship and any work that you might be doing with them. So it's a really important investment of time that you will reap many, many dividends for. Just take in a moment to get to know them and start with their strengths. If you're supporting a child who doesn't really know what their strengths are, for whom this is a question that feels alien and where self-esteem is so low, then we're gonna hunt them out with them. We might talk to other children or adults in their lives and see what they think the strengths are of this child or we might just spend a little bit of time getting to know them and naming those strengths out loud and starting to enable that child to tell a different story and own those strengths and be proud of them and lean into them. So there we go. Those were the ideas for enabling children to feel seen and heard within our environment. We were gonna take an interest in their interests, suspend your disinterest for a moment and talk to them, listen to them, let them be the teacher about the stuff that makes them tick. I saw this in thought of you. Letting our children know that just because they're out of sight doesn't mean they're out of mind. Specific, sincere praise, letting children know that we have noticed how hard they're working, the behavior and the attitude that they're taking to a task rather than just noticing the outcome at the end. In jokes and rituals, enabling children to feel part of something, leaning into laughter, letting them feel that sense of connection and feeling seen and part of their environment and group. You asked, I did. Letting our kids know that when they used their voice, when they told us what they needed or wanted, we did something different as a result, completing that circle and making sure we don't just quietly endeavor to do the things, but we communicate them back as well. And finally, starting first, always with a child's strengths. Looking for those strengths, searching them out and using those as our starting point rather than the negatives, the acronyms, the lists, the issues that a child might bring. Starting instead with the stuff that makes them unique, brilliant, interesting, funny, you name it, those great things starting there and letting this be the story that we tell about a child and they, in turn, tell about themselves. I hope there were some ideas in here that you feel you can pick up and take away as ever, cherry pick. Do the things that feel like they'll work well and you can always come back and listen again another time if things change for you and you want some new ideas. If you would like to support my work, I'm always very, very grateful when you do. The easiest and best thing you can do is to share what I'm doing. Put it on your social media, send it out on your emails, just tell a friend, encourage them to use my stuff. I love it when my stuff gets shared. The further it goes, the happier I am. Feel free to take it, use it, adapt it, whatever. You can also support me on Patreon if you would like to for a pound a month or a little more if you want. And then finally, you could invite me to come speak at your setting or your next event. The thing I'm very best at in the world and where I come alive and where all the really exciting stuff happens is when I'm put on a stage in front of hundreds of people. So maybe do that with me. It brings me great joy and I'm told it brings other people great joy too. So there's a few ways that you can support my work should you wish to, but just share it. Share it is the number one. Have a great week. You will hear again from me next week as ever on the podcast and thank you for all that you are doing each and every day for the children and young people in your care. Until next time, over and out.