It was nearing the end of the school year. Ramon’s kindergarten teacher requested a meeting with my wife and I.
Earlier in the Spring, we met with his teacher who expressed concern about Nathaniel’s unsatisfactory progress with his reading skills. She went on to say Nathaniel would need significant improvement for her to recommend his promotion to the first grade.
In response, as caring and concerned parents we got Nathaniel a wonderful, skilled tutor to help him with his phonics and reading. My wife and I increased the time we spent reading with Nathaniel.
When we were requested to schedule a meeting with his teacher I was filled with anxiety about what his teacher would have to say. Our meeting with his teacher came.
She informed us Nathaniel was still struggling with his reading and she would be recommending he not be promoted to first grade.
It’s Not About You
After hearing her recommendation, I was crushed by the news. His teacher went on to say being born in late October made Nathaniel the youngest student in her class.
His maturity or lack thereof was not where it should be for a new first grader. An unseen accusatory finger was pointing at my wife and I indicting our abilities as a parents—somehow we failed our son.
I felt like I would have to repeat kindergarten. While the majority of parent’s want their child to be successful in school it is important to define what academic success means for your child.
While we may want our child to be a permanent resident of the Honor Roll, graduate Valedictorian and be the hottest senior in demand by the best colleges and universities, it is important to define the unique definition of success for your child. The reality is when it comes to academic performance we all fall on the Bell curve.
Some of our children will fall at the left side of the curve. The majority will be clustered in the middle of the curve. Others will reside on the right side of the curve. The reality is our children are blessed with a unique set of gifts and abilities.
Discover what your child’s gifts and abilities are. Nurture these gifts and abilities. All we can really ask of our children is they give everything they attempt their best effort.
An Environment for Success
As much as I wanted Nathaniel to master reading and be promoted to the first grade with his classmates, it was something he had to do on his own. My wife and I could not do it for him. As parents, our role is to create an environment that will allow our children to be successful. The elements of the environment are physical and emotional.
- Physical
- Create a clean, organized, neat work space for studying, and make sure the rest of the family knows to keep it that way.
- Lighting should cover all of the study materials, it should be even and consistent—no shadows and no glare. Shielded, full-spectrum, fluorescent lamps are said to help a person be calmer, steadier and less easily distracted.
- Set the temperature of the room to a comfortable, constant level.
- Monitor the amount of time your student studies. Allow for periodic breaks where they can relax and unwind.
- Emotional
- Show your child love and affection.
- Frequently compliment your child.
- Make your compliments believable—no ego inflating.
- Criticize your child’s behavior, not the person.
- Express your pride of your child.
- Love your child unconditionally and let them know it.
- Let your child’s teacher’s know your child’s strengths and areas they excel in.
Character
Would you rather raise a straight A student who is of questionable character—untrustworthy, unreliable and lacking self-control, or raise a C student who is a person of integrity, honest and someone who do the right thing regardless of the cost? This is not to pooh-pooh the importance of getting good grades. However, if given a choice, I would rather be the proud parent of a C student who is considered by his teachers and peers a person of character.
- Discipline
- Take the opportunity to explain why your child’s behavior is wrong when you correct them. Identify the value you want to teach your child based on the particular behavior.
- Give a consequence that is appropriate to teach that value. For example, one consequence we can use is to ‘make amends’. If your child steals something making amends would be apologizing and return of the stolen item.
- Modeling
- By exhibiting the qualities of good character you transmit your values by modeling the choices and actions essential to being a person of good character.
- Do your children see you modeling honesty, trustworthiness, fair, compassion and respect in your everyday actions and choices?
- Story Telling
- Use stories to teach moral lessons.
- Listening and responding to your child’s stories about school and their friends with the goal of helping them identify the right thing to do.
- Children’s literature is filled with great books that illustrate important values.
- Discussion
- Having conversations about the stories you see on TV to share and reinforce your values.
As parents our goal is to raise our children to be mature, happy, successful, productive and well-adjusted adults. These are our responsibilities. We are responsible for setting our children up for success. While getting good grades is great what is more important is that our children represent strong character and values. Strong character and values will earn high marks in the school of life.
—Photo Credit: Flickr/Michael Newton
This was such a great article! I really like that you mentioned the importance of a physical study space and how to create one. Having a great study space was really important to me during school and it made the difference in my grades. Looking forward to reading your next article!