The Importance of Teaching Empathy

“When you start to develop your powers of empathy and imagination, the whole world opens up to you” – Susan Sarandon

A central concern of our Building Learning Power (BLP) learning framework is with enabling our Wyvern boys to become more self-aware as learners. Providing them with learning activities that develop their empathic skills harks directly to this key objective. Empathy is one of our RECIPROCITY BLP ‘learning muscles’, an aspect of teaching and learning that considers the vitally important social aspect of learning.  Empathy starts with putting yourself in someone else’s shoes – a foundational step in understanding perspectives that differ from your own. This isn’t just a nice thing to do; it’s an essential, active skill. It’s crucial to embracing differences, building relationships, gaining a global perspective, conducting richer and deeper analysis and communicating more effectively. This skill is about as “21st century” as it gets! This is the muscle that allows you to stand up for something, not just stand by.

Wyvern staff are cognisant that encouraging boys to be more empathic will better equip them to interpret the experiences of others, especially when others’ attitudes, beliefs and ways of thinking differ from their own. It also allows for better intercultural understanding and community cohesion, a skill essential in our current society. However, relating the experiences of others to one’s own is a hard skill to master, especially if you have limited experience of the world due to your age. It is essential, therefore, that we build upon our boys’ pre-existing experiences when finding ways to develop empathy as a tool for improving their understanding of the world around them. We work hard in class to do exactly this but leaving the development of these skills at school at the end of each day seems a wasted opportunity. After all, empathy is important in all aspects of our lives, in and outside of the school day.

Developing your son’s empathy skills can easily be slipped into everyday family life. For example, when reading a book or watching a film with your child, ask questions such as:

• Can you put yourself in their shoes?
• How do you think that character feels at the moment?
• Why do you think that person reacted that way?
• Look at their face – how are they feeling? When did you last feel that way?

These discussions encourage children of all ages to reflect on how others feel, think and react. It’s a powerful way to help children construct a more comprehensive picture of our world. Consider these ideas for flexing your son’s empathy learning muscle:

Younger children might enjoy making their own pair of Empathy Spectacles, by cutting out a pair of cardboard glasses and decorating them, boys can pop these on whenever they need to consider a different perspective – great fun and an effective way to help illustrate this skill.

For those families with older boys, reading Voices in the Park by Anthony Browne is a terrific book to illustrate this same point.

If you are interested in finding out more about these and other valuable BLP skills, please come along to our first BLP workshop for the year – BLP at Wyvern on Thursday 5th March at 8:30am in the Library.

Cate Fryda
Learning Framework Leader