I wrote this children’s book based upon the socio-emotional challenges that children, specifically 4-5 year olds, face doing daily activities. It might be getting anxious about school, feeling socially inadequate, not wanting to speak to classmates, getting upset about sports, or learning to make relational connections and appreciate others for what they do.
The Concept of “Defuse”
The book is titled, Dad Helps Me Defuse, and I wrote it through the eyes of a child. To begin, defuse can be defined simply as reducing certain feelings such as anger, sadness, or tension within a tense situation (Merriam-Webster 2021). The book tells four individual short stories that all center around the same concept of the transitional stage of early childhood. It is meant to show children how pivotal a father can be in this stage of evolution and growth. And how unwarranted feelings, situations, or new understandings are all a prominent part of growing up. I also found it important to be a culturally diverse book because I find it influential and crucial for not only children but for parents to see themselves and their children represented in a book that can be impactful to the younger generation.
Personal Inspiration for the Book
On a personal note, I took inspiration from my own family, as I was adopted as a Puerto Rican into a Caucasian family and never once throughout my childhood have I seen myself or “my family” represented within a book.
Social Development and Socio-Emotional Growth
In Arya Ansari’s study on social development and academic achievement of kindergarten children, she expressed the importance of boosting a child’s learning outcomes by addressing and nurturing their socio-emotional development, as it plays an extensive role in both short-term and long-term success (Ansari 2017). When a child is around the age of three to five, they are busy learning language, pushing the boundaries in an attempt to prove their independence, understanding the world and everything in it, and forming connections on a bit of a deeper level.
Connecting Characters to Emotions
In my book, I connected the concept of emotion through the lens of the characters Claire, Jacob, Judah, and Izzie and displayed their perceptions of anxiousness, fear, sadness, and love.
Children’s Emotional and Cognitive Growth
At the age of five and six, children not only grow in a physical manner but they begin to acquire the ability to see more of the world around them and understand that there is so much more that goes into life, such as time, location, peers, language, and certain concepts. Socio-emotionally, they can somewhat control how they feel and from then on learn to regulate their mental state. Specifically, we learned that conversations between a parent and child about internal states facilitate self-knowledge. Additionally, by watching their parents manage their emotions, children can learn strategies that can, in turn, increase a child’s capacity to handle things on a higher emotional level (Mendoza, n.d.).
Emotional Issues in the Storybook
In terms of translating this over to my storybook, I focused on capturing the emotional issues of the child while showing the father’s approach to parenting to alleviate their children’s stress, anger, or anxiousness. For example, on pages three and four of the book, the character Claire is nervous about attending school, but her dad offers her two things: 1) Positive affirmation by complimenting her and 2) Validating and normalizing her disposition.
Father and Child Relationships
Throughout the entirety of the book, the relationship between father and juvenile is illustrated by the child’s need for their guardian. Without her father, Claire might have thrown a tantrum stemming from her nerves, but her father advised her of a different approach to understanding her negative perception. Similarly, Jacob’s ability to interact socially would’ve suffered if his father had not stepped in and encouraged him to give it a go. Judah, angry and upset with his ability to play golf, might have gone undetected and unmanaged, resulting in social issues down the line. Yet, thanks to his dad acknowledging his state and conversing with his son, Judah gained the tools to be able to manage how he feels.
A Different Meaning of “Defuse”
In a contrasting manner from the others, five-year-old Izzie learns to “defuse” in a different sense, as her father diffuses her hair. I added this in because, socio-emotionally, she doesn’t understand time and doing her hair, yet her father does and can aid her until she is old enough one day to do it on her own.
References
- Ansari, A. (2017). Multigrade kindergarten classrooms and children’s academic achievement, executive function, and socioemotional development. Infant & Child Development, 26(6), n/a-N.PAG. https://doi-org.scclib.sccollege.edu/10.1002/icd.2036
- Defuse. (n.d). In Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online. Retrieved from https://www.merriam-webster.com/Defuse.
- Mendoza, C. Self Concept, Emotional Regulation, and Gender Socialization [Online Lecture]. Retrieved from Lecture Notes Online. Website: https://rsccd.instructure.com/courses/ 65127/pages/self-concept-emotional-regulation-and-gender-socialization? module_item_id=4797366