In a world that places increasing emphasis on individual achievement and competitive performance, the qualities of kindness and empathy can sometimes feel undervalued in education. Yet they are among the most important characteristics a child can develop, not only for the wellbeing of those around them but for their own psychological health, social success and long-term fulfilment.
What Empathy Really Means
Empathy is often described simply as the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. In practice, it is more layered than that. Cognitive empathy involves understanding what another person is thinking or feeling. Affective empathy involves actually feeling something in response to another’s emotional state. Both are important, and both develop over time through experience, conversation and modelling.
Young children are naturally egocentric, not from selfishness but from a genuine inability to fully separate their own perspective from others. The development of empathy is gradual and requires patient encouragement over many years.
Practical Ways to Encourage Empathy
Reading together is one of the most consistently effective tools for building empathy in children. Stories place readers inside the perspectives of characters whose lives may be very different from their own. Asking questions such as “how do you think that character was feeling?” or “why do you think they made that choice?” helps children practise perspective-taking in a low-stakes, imaginative context.
Acknowledging emotions openly in the family, including difficult ones like anger, disappointment and fear, normalises the full range of human experience and makes it easier for children to identify and name what others might be going through. Families that talk about feelings create children who are more emotionally literate and more able to respond thoughtfully to others.
Kindness as a Habit, Not Just a Feeling
Kind behaviour does not always follow naturally from kind feelings, particularly under pressure. Teaching children specific, concrete ways to show kindness, including checking in on a friend who seems quiet, offering to help without being asked, sharing resources generously, turns kindness from an aspiration into a practised habit.
Schools with a strong community ethos, such as Bishops Gate School, build kindness and empathy into the culture of school life, not just the curriculum. Visit https://www.bishopsgateschool.com/ to find out more about their approach to developing the whole child.
Author bio: This post was written in association with Bishops Gate School. Visit https://www.bishopsgateschool.com/ for more information.