The present is not the age we would like our kids to be known only as book-smart or school-smart! Instead, each one of us wishes to see our child emerge as someone who is capable enough and aware enough to keep pace with the world ‘socially’ and ‘creatively.’ As such, this is indeed the best time to look into the significance of raising socially and creatively intelligent kids. After all, both the cited facets are fully laden with several advantages for children not merely at present but also for their future.
However, first, let’s comprehend the meaning of the terms ‘social intelligence’ and ‘creative intelligence,’ and we will then look into why each of these areas of development is equally imperative. We, at Delhi Public School Kangra, one of the top schools in Kangra, are certain that after reading the article, you will not only have good understanding of the significance of social and creative intelligence for your little ones but will also be equipped with the know-how to build the same. Read on.
What is Social Intelligence?
While IQ (Intelligence Quotient) is what we are born with, SI (Social Intelligence) is what we learn within social settings or what we gain from our experiences, successes, and failures in society. In this regard, the following elements of social intelligence are more elucidatory:
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Conversational talent
A person with plenty of SI can be easily spotted at a social gathering, a party, or amongst peers, for he knows how to engage the room. Such people are said to be having verbal fluency and social expressiveness proficiencies. A socially intelligent person can keep the conversations going with an array of people with absolute finesse and ease. He knows the tact of conversation. He is aware of what to be said and when to be said.
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Listeners
Socially intelligent people are stupendous listeners. As a consequence, people conversing with a socially intelligent being get the feeling as if they had an instant connection and an excellent bonding with them.
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Mind-readers
Persons high in social Intelligence are extensive people watchers. More explicitly, it can be said that they understand the minds of people. They possess the art of attuning themselves according to what people are saying. Moreover, they know how to read them by observing their behaviors, emotions, feelings, and thinking.
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Aware of social-gaits
Socially intelligent beings are well informed about the informal and unsaid rules or principles present in society. For they are comfortable with all types of crowds, they are pretty familiar with the norms prevailing in societal interactions. In other words, they know how to play the ‘social game.’ Consequently, they have been very aptly termed in several ways, such as persons who are socially wise, socially practical, socially sophisticated, and socially confident.
Apart from those mentioned above, a few other characteristics of socially intelligent individuals are:
- Excellent memory for names and faces
- Unparalleled sense of humor
- Quick judgments in jeopardized social situations
Why is Social Intelligence imperative?
At DPS Kangra, ranked among the top schools in Kangra, we have seen that when efforts are laid to instill social intelligence in children right from an early age, they go on to experience multiple benefits as mentioned below:
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Relationships
Social Intelligence plays a central role in several phases of a person’s life. It primarily assists in building relationships. It lets a person form coalitions and friendships. Also, it supports a person against being taken benefit of.
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In school
Social Intelligence facilitates connection with other beings, averts arguments, and allows learning through discourse. This adds considerably to one’s individual development. And being able to understand what activates people’s sentiments (either negative or positive) is a vital constituent in putting compassion into effect.
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At work
Social Intelligence is indispensable to unchain the ability of efficient communication, dialogue, and collaboration to generate the most favorable and fruitful work setting.
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Leadership
One of the essential character strengths that help establish the achievements of leaders is social intelligence. Through their communications with people, leaders prompt them to put their most exemplary efforts and bring their behavior parallel to the organizational ambition.
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Careers
Socially intelligent beings turn out to be excellent teachers, salespersons, therapists, politicians, counselors, facilitators, and motivational speakers.
Tips on how to instill social Intelligence in your children
- Ask them to give additional notice to the social rondure around them.
- Encourage them to form a fine rapport with masses or crowds by involving well with them and through relationship management.
- Help them work on becoming improved speakers and conversation starters.
- Make them join influential speaking groups or trainers that assist in building up basic communication proficiency.
- Provide them with the basic know-how of the prevailing rules or norms of the society or community where you are
- Encourage them to grow into active listeners
- Steer clear of being critical
- Examine your own conduct as well as society’s
- Be specific, explicit, and authentic in whatever you say to your kids
- Help your kids learn from your own social success and failures
What is Creative Intelligence?
Now that we have seen a detailed overview of what social intelligence is and why it should be built in children, let us shift our attention towards Creative Intelligence.
Creative Intelligence is a bit of intellect mixed with imagination. In psychology, it is the ability to solve problems by imagining new and unique solutions. In addition, it can successfully deal with new and unusual situations by bringing on existing awareness and aptitudes.
Creative Intelligence is firmly attributed to individuals who have a knack for storytelling, art, and developing new ideas. The very first people who come to our mind are artists and musicians. Also, creative intelligence would be involved when using one’s imagination to write a short story, paint an artwork, or create an advertisement. Thus, it can be said that someone with high creative intelligence would be impressively innovative and imaginative. Creative Intelligence involves reacting successfully to new situations and successfully producing new ideas.
Why is instilling creative intelligence in your kids vital?
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Self-awareness
Creative Intelligence permits a person to create such outlooks that might not have been mulled over before. Thus, when you try and instill your kids with creative intelligence, you basically reinforce and enhance their capability to reframe their viewpoints and harness a developmental frame of mind. As the child will discover fresh points of view, they will get to uncover something about their own stances, hypotheses, or preconceptions that they might have not observed before. Testing their typical approach would thereby help them boost their self-worth and cater to constructing their emotional aptitude.
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Interpersonal connections
We, at DPS Kangra, have seen that individuals with creative intelligence are generally better at verbalizing their thoughts with more clarity, which results in improved discussions and associations with their acquaintances, folks, and colleagues. Such individuals are good at working on fresh thoughts with their connections, which not just help in fortifying ties but also aid in uniting ideas to come up with innovative concepts and solutions.
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Problem-solving capabilities
It has been seen that developing your creative intelligence can assist you in cracking a large array of troubles in a quicker and easier way. As your brain becomes more familiar with using diverse thinking methods, you become adept at devising out-of-the-box solutions that you might have not thought of earlier.
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Productivity
It may seem like creative intelligence is a time-wobbling interruption in your efforts, but that’s really far from the fact. When we get trapped in a variety of thinking patterns, it’s obvious to get upset when something fails to function in the preferred manner. That disappointment might even force your output to sink. However, taking a moment and carefully employing a creative intelligence approach can revamp your inspiration, revive your earnestness, and aid you to find novel explanations when you’re jammed.
How to help expand the creative intelligence in children?
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Let the child embrace challenges
When it comes to strengthening the creative expertise of your kids, it is important you let them take challenges. Yes, you read that right! At times, it is indeed necessary to let your kids take some healthy challenges as it is these challenges that thereby help them take their capabilities ahead. For instance, allow your child to work on a new task all on his own. Though there is a risk of failure, it will still help enhance his creative aptitude and instill in the child some critical skills that will contribute to his growth thoroughly in the future.
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Help them enhance their observation skills
Creative intelligence is less of just a eureka moment and more about conferring vigilant attention to things that lend a hand to map our route to reach the desired output. All it takes is to be more curious and more observant.
We, at DPS Kangra, positioned among the top schools in Kangra, would like to advise you to make your kids indulge in simple things like – asking a lot of questions, carrying a notepad, penning down what they observe and believe, seeking out fresh experiences, reading extensively about even the areas outside their interests, and most importantly, keeping a mental log or record of thoughts. Their critical observations today will help them build their own path to success tomorrow.
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Encourage them to fight the fear of failure
The fear that you might make a mistake or fail in your efforts often ends up paralyzing progress. Whenever you find your kids harboring such feelings, remind them that mistakes are simply part of the process. Let them know that while they may occasionally stumble on their path to creativity, they will eventually reach their goals.
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Make them learn the art of connecting the dots
Ask your kids to get into the habit of evaluating their observations daily because they might then have approaches that fertilize over time into a novel thought. After all, only when their investigation leads deeper into the unidentified horizons will it help strengthen their ability to envision and craft something new, something unique.
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Let them collaborate with their peers and friends
Most of us innovate better jointly than when we do on our own. In fact, collaboration is broadly accepted today as a critical driving force of creativity and development in each turf. Collaboration serves superlatively when you build parity without evenness, diversity without disagreement, and teamwork without compromise. When you jointly monitor, make associations, and share your thoughts, you basically get to benefit from a kaleidoscope of viewpoints to see clear past the giant clouds of ambiguity.
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Encourage them to scrutinize numerous solutions
The next time you address an issue, ask your little one to strive to look for a mixture of outcomes. Instead of quickly choosing the very first impression they come up with about the problem at hand, ask them to take some amount of time to guess other probable means to address the dilemma. This simple activity is an incredible strategy to construct both their problem-solving and creative intelligence skills.
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Let them gaze towards motivation
Never anticipate creativity just to transpire. Instead, it is necessary that kids are made to look for novel seeds of motivation that lend them fresh ideas and encourage them to produce unique solutions to the problems. Encourage them to tour a museum, browse a book, engage in a robust discussion with a pal, or listen to their loved music – The message here is to let them employ whatever method or skill that works satisfactorily for them.
We, at Delhi Public School, Kangra, one of the top schools in Kangra, proudly expanding the celebrated legacy of the DPS brand and saga, have devised our teaching pedagogy in such a way that children are not just goaded into books but are instead encouraged to think socially as well as creatively. We would hence also like to urge our esteemed parent fraternity to provide a similar atmosphere to the children at their abodes. After all, it is only when you, as their loved ones, and we, as their mentors, come together and lay equal efforts towards raising our young buds into socially and creatively intelligent individuals, will we be actually preparing them for the need and necessity of the 21st-century world in the true sense of the term!