Seven Ways to Support Your Daughter’s Growth

As the mother of three grown daughters, Mrs. Jamieson has a personal as well as professional perspective on girls’ development, and she shared anecdotes and insights to illustrate the ways parents can support their girls. Below are excerpts from her talk:

1. Be observant. “Don’t just pay attention. When we’re attentive we are helpful and considerate. We are in response mode. When we are observant we come to understand our daughter better. We are reminded of her age level, which reminds us to have age appropriate expectations and advice. Try to see your daughter from a bit of a distance. Notice how she spends free time. What is the dynamic between her and friends? What draws her interest when she is not on a schedule? How much rest does she need?”

2. Don't fixate on early choices and successes. “Children can quickly assume a role that others assign to them by virtue of their enthusiasm. But at 10 or 14, it’s premature to define oneself as the athlete, the artist, etc. This is a time to explore talents and interests. As girls move away from home, they often are surprised to discover ‘new’ talents and interests beyond those they have grown up with as children. Truth is they were there all along.”

3. Make home a sanctuary. “The girls have a long work day. By the time they get home to you, they have had eight to ten (or is it 12?) hours of academic work, physical activity, performance, social interactions, dining hall meals. Just as we adults need gentleness and breathing room and sustenance, so do the girls. That doesn’t mean it has to be a Zen-like environment—lucky for me! A sanctuary can be where you have fun together—where humor is the go-to reaction to calamity. After a long work day, home should be a place of rest from the demands of the day.”

4. Model good relationships. “In a recent University of Pennsylvania research study, which NCS girls participated in, the authors provided data about what girls need to feel successful in school. The results were underwhelming to those of us who work and live with girls every day. You won’t be surprised to hear that relationships at school are of utmost importance to girls. While boys deem the relationship with the teacher as very important, girls attend also to the quality of the relationships with classmates—an added challenge to the day. We need to help our daughters understand that not every relationship is going to be of the same quality. Friendships come in all shapes and sizes. The girls are looking for love everywhere, and we can remind them that not all friendships reach that high bar. Part of growing up is realizing that relationships vary in their intensity and may come and go.

Two messages that have been powerful in our family are: nurture friendships with those who help you grow and seek those whom you admire and respect. I believe we adopted the last one when dating time came around! One of the ways we can model good relationships is to be clear about our expectations for relationships between siblings, with grandparents, with neighbors, with our adult friends. Your family should be her first experience of being on a successful team, regardless of the complexity of your family structure. Those examples become the model our children live with all their lives.”

5. Nurture muscle memory for good decisions. “If we only focused on the past month of college campus news and student behavior and crime, you would have a powerful parental agenda. You must provide opportunities for your daughter to make one decision after another. What responsibilities will she have at home? How do they get managed when she’s away? What’s the right way to communicate a concern for a friend? What social situation should she anticipate before heading out for the weekend? How will she spend her summer? Our Crisis Team would call these 'tabletop exercises.' One after another, she will gain experience and develop a framework for deciding. She will reason and consider consequences. This is much more productive than swooping in to direct all the decisions. Her practice will temper any emotional response that will come in the heat of a moment. You don’t want the dangerous situation to be the first time your daughter thinks about what to do in a dangerous situation.”

6. Build self-confidence by building competence. “The children least susceptible to peer pressure are those with self-confidence, and they don’t get it by being told they are great, talented, or beautiful. Just as the best writing and speaking come from those who know what they are writing and speaking about, the strongest children are those who feel competent and capable with practical things, as well as intellectual ideas. Teach the girls how to make things, fix things—change a tire, prepare a meal, do their laundry. Feel free to be more ambitious! In doing so, her list of ‘I can do this’ grows, just as she does.”

7. Prepare her for take-off. “This last point is a distillation of everything I’ve said this morning. When your daughter is beyond our watchful eyes, she has to be her own beacon, having internalized all the things we’ve tried to teach while she's growing up. All that we do as teachers and parents needs really to be with our eye on the girls’ readiness to independently manage the challenges of each age. Know her well enough to understand her. Give her time to develop talents and interests. Have home be a lovely refuge—a safe haven. Treat her with respect by giving her responsibilities within your home. Show her what healthy relationships look like. Finally, express your deep and abiding love.”