21 Tips for Parents to Help their Kids Succeed in School

The one thing that parents want for their children is to succeed not just in school but in life. However, sometimes the best intentions by the parents are misguided. Attempts to provide children with a wonderful life can, in fact, increase the stress of the entire family.

A very common mistake that many parents make is to want to make everything easy for their children. It’s painful for parents to see their children struggle. However here is the thing. If children never do anything difficult, how will they learn that they can successfully meet a challenge in life? Kids need to struggle and fail at times. That is the only way they will learn and master skills, and self confidence. Here are 21 tips for parents to use to help their kids succeed in school, which they will carry on for life.

1. Make school attendance a family priority. Try to schedule doctors’ appointments and family vacations when school is not in session. Have your child arrive at school in time to organize for the day.
2. Show your child that you consider school to be important. Attend parent meetings and conferences. Talk with your child about school. Don’t overemphasize grades.
3. Read to and with your child. Let your child also see you reading alone.
4. Never over-schedule your child. Be sure at least three hours between school and bedtime are free of extracurricular activities.
5. Encourage healthy sleep patterns. Because of the changes their bodies are undergoing, adolescents actually require more sleep than younger children, perhaps nine hours per night.
6. Provide your child with nutritious foods (limited in sugar, fats, caffeine, and additives). Be sure your child starts the day with breakfast.
7. Make dinner a family activity, complete with conversation on a wide range of topics.
8. Provide a place, with minimal distractions, for your child to study. Be sure the study area is well lit, well ventilated, and equipped with all the supplies your child is likely to need: pencils and pens, dictionary, ruler, stapler, etc.
9. Establish a definite time each day for homework, reading, or other academic activities.
10. Don’t allow TV or video games in the morning before school. Limit total time for these activities to 10 hours per week.
11. Don’t give your child everything he or she wants. Doing so will teach the child that desires can be satisfied without work.
12. Be sure your child has household chores to complete without reminders.
13. Help your child develop the habit of writing all assignments in an assignment notebook. It works best if assignments are written on the date they are due.
14. Help your child learn to organize time and materials. Begin to wean your child from this help as soon as he or she is able to assume partial responsibility.
15. On nights before a test, have your child review material just before bedtime and then go to sleep without reading or listening to music. This will aid retention of material studied.
16. Make homework your child’s responsibility. This lets your child know that you recognize him or her as a capable person.
17. Be sure your child gathers together each evening all the materials that he or she will take to school the next morning.
18. Allow your child to experience the natural consequences of his or her actions. For example, don’t retrieve things the child forgot.
19. Have realistic expectations for your child. If his or her abilities are slightly above average, do not expect the child to be at the top of the class.
20. Recognize that your child’s teachers are striving for the academic, social, and emotional development of many children besides yours. Seating your child next to a best friend, for example, may not be in the best interest of the class or even of your own child.
21. Recognize that there will be times when your child will be frustrated by a difficult task. Resist the temptation to solve the problem yourself. Your child will learn and grow from this experience and will emerge with confidence to face the next challenge.

A successful school year depends on the cooperative efforts of parents and teachers as well as the students themselves. Each member of the team must fulfill his or her own responsibilities, and allow the other members to fulfill theirs.