children mental health slogans

The content for children should be concrete and warm, the content for parents and teachers should be sharp and resonant, and the content for public areas should be neutral and soothing.

Not long ago, I went to a public primary school in the district for a quarterly psychological screening. As soon as I entered the teaching building, I saw big words painted on the wall of the corridor: "Learn to manage your emotions and be your own master." A group of fifth-grade boys were graffitiing underneath. Someone scrawled next to it, "I can't be the master, my mother is." It was funny and sad to everyone who saw it.

Most academic child psychologists insist that slogans must comply with the laws of child development psychology and give priority to concrete expressions - for lower grade children, instead of saying "Be brave to overcome setbacks", it is better to directly print a cartoon pattern with the sentence "You can cry if it hurts. It's great to get up after crying."”； For adolescent children, instead of writing "Avoid puppy love and concentrate on studying", replace it with "All your little thoughts are worthy of respect. If you need help, you can find a psychological teacher", and the acceptance rate will be increased several times.

But front-line moral education directors have completely different concerns: Will too loose slogans cause trouble in daily management? Last year, a school wanted to post "You can rest at any time when you are tired from studying" in the corridor, but it was rejected before it was put up on the wall, because it was afraid that the children would actually run out of the classroom in the middle of class. I have tried a compromise plan myself. I posted a sentence on the door of the psychology room of the pilot school: "If you feel out of breath, come in and sit for 10 minutes at any time, no need to ask for leave." After running for more than half a year, there has been no "trend of skipping classes" that everyone was worried about. Instead, the number of children taking the initiative to talk to the psychology teacher has tripled. You see, there is no need to go to extremes.

As for the slogans for parents and teachers, don’t make the correct nonsense. "Parents are their children's first teachers" and "Caring for children's mental health starts with me" are not posted at all. I previously changed two sentences on the bulletin board of the community parent school. One sentence was "If you casually say 'so stupid', the child will remember it for at least 10 years." The other sentence was "Children are not emotional trash cans. Don't take your work anger out on them."

Of course, there are different voices. Some family education researchers say that this is "moral kidnapping of parents." After all, everyone loses control of their emotions, and it is unrealistic to always require parents to be perfect. So later I added a line of small words next to it: "You don't have to be a perfect parent, it's good enough if you are willing to change." When I went on a lecture tour last time, I saw a father taking photos of this line of text for a long time. He said that he had just scolded his child the day before and was feeling guilty. After reading it, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Speaking of which, the most outrageous slogan I have ever seen was a line of pink words painted on the gate of a public kindergarten: “Did you smile at the teacher today? ”Think about it, a child who has just started primary school is hugging his parents’ legs and crying heartbrokenly. When he looks up, he sees this line. Doesn’t this mean that he is saying “it’s wrong for you to cry” in a different way? Totally counterproductive.

Slogans in public areas do not need to be too directional, just mild and neutral. Last month, I went to the psychology department of the Children's Hospital. There was a quote on the wall in the waiting area that read, "Every emotion deserves to be seen." Sitting next to me was a little girl whose face was full of tears because she just had blood drawn. She pointed at the words and said to her mother, "Mom, look, it's okay for me to cry just now, right?" ”Her mother's eyes were red and she held her for a long time without speaking. You see, a good slogan really doesn’t need to be fancy, it just needs to be able to capture people’s emotions.

After all, there is no standard answer. The criteria for judging whether a slogan is good or not is very simple: Squat down and read the sentence at eye level with the child. If you feel comfortable and not awkward after reading it, then it is good. After all, these words written on the wall were not originally meant to be read by the inspection team, but to quietly support those children who were embarrassed to say they were uncomfortable and parents who were putting too much pressure on themselves.