EQ for Families workshops available to improve family communication, health, and positive decision-making.

San Mateo, California: Emotional intelligence skills are essential for today’s families. As parents and children learn to recognize and manage emotions, their communication improves and they make better, healthier, decisions. A new curriculum supports schools, nonprofits, and counselors to effectively teach these skills (http://www.6seconds.org/family/).

Emotional intelligence — the ability to understand and effectively use emotions — has been shown to reduce problem behaviors, increase academic achievement, improve communication, and enhance life success. The curriculum focuses on four primary prevention skills that help children and care-givers to be healthly, safe, and strong.

The four EQ For Families workshops are published by the world-leading emotional intelligence advocacy organization, Six Seconds EQ Network (http://www.6seconds.org). Six Seconds is known for transformational training rich in wisdom, caring, and self-discovery. Using a teaching methodology proven in research and over 35 years of practice, the EQ for Families workshops are interactive, fun, and meaningful. Each workshop focuses on one key aspect of emotional intelligence.

The first module, “The Power of Feelings,” teaches the basics of emotional literacy. It aims to increase self-awareness and enhance families’ understanding of emotions — a key step to becoming more intelligent about feelings. This workshop is available for free download from the EQ For Families web page: http://www.6seconds.org/family/

Other modules include:

• Accountability: “Raising Strong, Caring Kids”
• Optimism and Resilience: “Bouncing Ahead.”
• Empathy and Acceptance: “From the Heart.”

Each module includes presentation materials, instructions, handouts, and even an announcement letter so teachers, counselors, and other parent-educators can use the materials quickly and easily. Publication was made possible, in part, by a generous grant from the East Bay Children & Youth Funding Circle, Women Donors Network.

Six Seconds, the publishers of the curriculum, is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization established in 1997 to spread emotional intelligence around the world. Six Seconds delivers highly effective training, publishes practical curriculum, and supports the world’s most extensive network of emotional intelligence practitioners (see http://www.6seconds.org). Named because the chemical compounds of emotion only last in our bodies for about six seconds, the organization brings the cutting edge science of emotional intelligence into easy and practical tools for businesses, schools, individuals, and families. Donations are welcome and may be tax deductible.