The SPIRIT Framework is built around ten transversal skills that we believe can help today’s children prepare for tomorrow’s world. Rather than exploring them all at once, this series takes a moment to reflect on each one individually. Together, these ten skills form the heart of the framework: emotional awareness, regulation and communication; creativity; problem-solving; critical thinking; resilience; flexibility; curiosity, sense of wonder and openness; empathy; valuing people and nature; and connectedness. This time, we turn our attention to empathy—the skill that helps children understand that the world does not look or feel the same through every pair of eyes.

Empathy begins in small moments. A child notices that a classmate is quiet today. Another pauses before laughing because they realise a joke may hurt someone’s feelings. Someone offers help, not because they were asked, but because they sensed it was needed. The SPIRIT Framework describes empathy as the ability to understand and share the emotions and viewpoints of others, both emotionally and cognitively. In other words, empathy is not only about feeling with someone; it is also about trying to understand their perspective. This matters deeply in childhood, because children are still learning that other people can experience the same situation in completely different ways.

Between the ages of six and ten, empathy develops gradually. Younger children may respond to clear signs of distress, such as tears or sadness, especially when adults model caring behaviour. As they grow, they begin to notice more subtle emotional cues, such as tone of voice, facial expression or body language. By around age ten, many children become more capable of anticipating how their words or actions may affect others, offering comfort, adjusting their behaviour and thinking more carefully about the emotional world of those around them. In this way, empathy becomes closely connected to communication, cooperation, emotional intelligence, conflict resolution and inclusion.

Perhaps one of the most meaningful things empathy teaches children is that kindness is not only a feeling; it is a practice. It grows through stories, conversations, role-play, group work, listening and the daily example set by adults. When children learn to pause and consider another person’s experience, they begin to build relationships rooted in respect rather than assumption. Empathy does not ask children to forget themselves. It helps them make room for others too—and in doing so, it gently reminds them that a more caring world begins in the way we notice one another.