Reading Time: 3 minutes How To Help Your Children Progress At School
This is a contributed post from Ellie Jo on education.
As a parent, you obviously want the very best for your children when it comes to their schooling and education. However, wanting them to achieve as much as possible and actually helping them in productive ways are two things that can be quite far apart from one another. There are some things you can do to help your child progress at school if you’re unsure.
Use Motivation And Reward Rather Than Punishment
First of all, you should try to make sure you’re motivating your child to do well. That might mean rewarding them when they do well or get positive feedback from their teacher. Motivation is always much better than simply using punishment when they do something wrong or fall short of expectations. That latter strategy usually does more harm than good. Reinforce positive behaviors, and those positive behaviors are more likely to be repated.
Let Them Know Perfection Isn’t Required
You don’t want to raise your child to feel as if they need to achieve perfection because that can lead to chasing unachievable expectations. Instead let them know that doing their best is what matters most and that being perfect isn’t expected or required of them. The journey to perfect (and understanding what is good enough) is much more meaningful than perfection.
Provide Them with Resources for Various Methods of Learning
There are lots of great resources out there that can help your child to learn and progress, regardless of what their particular method of learning is. Remember, all kids and all people learn in different ways. What’s best for your child might not be the predominant method of learning that’s used in the classroom. Some benefit from audio over reading and writing-based learning for example. If so, you can help them by finding the best audiobooks for kids.
Look for Ways to Make Academic Subjects Relevant to Them
One of the things you can do at home is help to make the things they’re learning at school seem more relevant. They might wonder why they need to learn mathematics, for example. If you can find real world examples that have relevance to them of why and when mathematics are important, it’ll all start to carry more meaning and make more sense to them.
Give Them the Room to Pursue What Interests them
Every child has different interests and things they want to pursue. And that means there’ll be some things at school that they’re more interested in than others. That’s the case with all children and it’s not necessarily a problem. Sure, you probably want them to succeed in every area at school, but you also need to give them room to pursue what they’re most interested in too.
Helping your children progress at school and fulfill their potential is understandably one of your top priorities as a parent. Be sure to make the most of the tips and advice outlined above. And try not to put too much pressure on your child as this can be counterproductive in the end.
See also 5 Tips For All Students Going To College
Erin is the mother of identical twin girls and their slightly older brother. She is a domestic engineer, and previously had a career leading customer service teams for a major HVAC company. Cleaning without harsh chemicals, and cooking easy and usually healthy meals are part of Erin's daily life. She volunteers with youth leaders, and genuinely wants to help others win. Erin has a degree in Communications, with a focus on Broadcast Journalism.