Dear Teachers Q & A

Helping Children Become Responsible

Question: My parents never reminded me to do schoolwork. I somehow had a built-in desire to handle it myself. How can I get my children to have the same attitude? – Lacking Responsibility

Answer: It is not just schoolwork that your children need to be responsible for as they grow up. It is a lot of other things, from making their beds and cleaning their rooms to putting dirty dishes in the sink and dishwasher. So what you have to do is teach them to be responsible people from early childhood, and it will extend over to handling their schoolwork with some special help from you.

Taking responsibility is an action that brings pride to children as they do things by themselves and not have their parents do things for them. It starts when parents invite their children to help with indoor or outdoor chores. You begin by showing them how to handle a small task, such as matching pairs of socks, and then give them this responsibility.

One thing parents often forget to give children is the responsibility of monitoring their own work. By this, we mean looking at tests, homework and assignments and seeing what they have done right or wrong. When they have been successful, they need to think about why this happened so they can be repeated. Parents can foster this responsibility by giving their approval for a job well done.

On the other hand, when students do poorly, they need to evaluate why it happened. Did they work too fast? Did they fail to get needed help?

Finally, handling homework successfully depends a lot on having strategies to handle it effectively. This involves parental involvement in helping children learn which assignment they should handle first (easiest or most difficult) and what to do when they run into work that they can’t do. The answer is usually to study examples of similar work that they have done at school.

Keeping School Skills Sharp This Summer

Question:  How can I keep learning alive for two fairly good students in the summer?  I don’t want them to lose basic skills. – Building Skills

Answer:  Most parents realize the secret to continued academic success for their children is to keep them reading during the summer. If you are running short of ideas, go online to ReadWriteThink.org and search for summer reading. Here you’ll find activities to help children from ages 4 to 18 explore reading and writing all summer long.

And don’t forget to bolster your children’s math skills. Most lose more ground in math than reading. Try to play games with them that require math. If your children like to use the computer, have them search online for “summer math activities.” For lots of fun with math, have them work with “Learning Activities -Math” on our Dear Teacher website.

Beyond bolstering their basic skills, remember that summer is a wonderful time to help your children expand their horizons. They also could take art or music lessons. Many would probably enjoy throwing clay on a pottery wheel and then painting the unique creation. Start researching now for what safe opportunities are available in your community.

Parents should send questions and comments to dearteacher@dearteacher.com or to the Dear Teacher website.

©Compass Syndicate Corporation, 2020