Education | ED04 | Summer 2017

Education Magazine
the ripple Effect
Hilary Wilce explains how a contented, well-connected childhood
could be the key to happiness in adulthood
is your child well connected? i don’t mean, do they go
to nursery with triple-barrelled playmates, or lounge
through their older years alongside celebrity teens.
neither do i mean, are they permanently on superfast
broadband with an ipad attached to their hand. i’m talking
about something much more important than that.
Every child psychologist in the world will tell you that
a child needs to feel well-anchored inside themselves
in order to grow up secure and well-adjusted. but one
well-known child expert goes much further than this,
saying a child needs to acquire many onion skin layers of
connectivity in order to become a strong, independent
adult at ease with themselves and in the world.
Edward hallowell is an eminent us clinical psychiatrist,
a best-selling author and adhd expert, who has wealthy
new york parents queuing at his door to discover the secrets
of successful child rearing. and he believes that bringing
up a well-connected child, with ever-wider ripples of
connectivity around them, is the key to adult happiness.
in his model, there are twelve distinct
circles of connectivity, some of them obvious
but some surprising. they are:
• HOME •
where your child feels loved,
wanted, understood and
paid attention to.
• SCHOOL •
where your child feels treated fairly,
able to make friends and get along
with other students and teachers.
• FRIENDS,
NEIGHBOURHOOD
& COMMUNITY •
where your child feels part of a
local or personal network
of interlinked people.
• WORK & RESPONSIBILITY •
where your child learns the feeling
of making a contribution.
• ACTIVITIES •
where your child learns to have a go,
and to learn and master new skills
through sport, music and hobbies.
• THE PAST •
where your child learns they
are part of history and that other
people have gone before them.
• THE ARTS •
where you child learns to connect
with beauty and the emotions through
music, dance, literature and art.
• NATURE •
where your child learns to respect
and feel part of the outside world,
and its natural rhythms and seasons.
• PETS & OTHER ANIMALS •
where your child learns about
responsibility, life, loss and
emotions through bonding with
and caring for an animal.
• INFORMATION & IDEAS •
where your child learns to feel at
ease with things such as learning,
debating, questioning and finding out.
• INSTITUTIONS &
ORGANIZATIONS •
where your child comes to understand
how these work, how societies are
organised and run, and the pitfalls
and pleasures of people coming
together for a common purpose.
• GOD •
where your child learns to feel
comfortable with the big questions
of spirituality such as why are
we here, does evil exist, and
what is the purpose of life?
• THEMSELVES •
where your child learns to know
themself, feel at ease with
who they are, and know they
are neither better or worse
than others, only different.
obviously all these are interlinked and crop up all the time in
growing children’s lives. and many of them develop organically.
but as parents it can be helpful to hold in mind that picture
of spreading ripples, and to consciously try to develop them.
this might mean double-checking that home and
school are providing the right sort of environments for
good connectivity. it might mean enrolling your child
in a neighbourhood scouts or guides group, or talking
about the affairs of the day around the dinner table. it
might mean initiating more family outings to concerts or
exhibitions, creating a chore rota for everyone who lives
at home, or deciding to spend more time out-of-doors.
perhaps more than anything, it might mean taking
care not to think that school grades and achievements are
everything in life, and making the effort to open up the
wider world to your child in every way possible.
17 wealdentimes.co.uk