When it comes to educating a child, most school systems primarily, if not entirely, focus only on academic subjects such as math, English, and science. They leave out some of the most important lessons that a young person should learn and hold close throughout their life, such as kindness, empathy, humility, etc. While the devastating consequences of this oversight become evident in the kind of news we hear every day, Denmark — a nation that has been consistently voted one of the happiest places in the world, according to the UN's World Happiness Report — recognized and filled this gap in education years ago.
The book The Danish Way of Parenting, by Danish psychotherapist and educator, Iben Sandahl, and Jessica Alexander — an American author and psychologist — states that the fact that children in Denmark are taught about empathy from a young age both inside and outside of school, might have something to do with the overall wellbeing of the country's population. "Children in the Danish school system participate in a mandatory national program called Step by Step as early as preschool. The children are shown pictures of kids who are each exhibiting a different emotion: sadness, fear, anger, frustration, happiness, and so on," Alexander said in an excerpt of the book published in The Atlantic.
She explained that the program entails students talking about the cards and describing what the child on it is sensing. This activity teaches them to conceptualize their own and others' feelings, as well as, empathy, problem-solving, self-control, and how to read facial expressions. "An essential part of the program is that the facilitators and children aren’t judgmental of the emotions they see; instead, they simply recognize and respect those sentiments," wrote Alexander. She also cited another popular program called CAT-kit which is aimed at improving emotional awareness and empathy.
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