Contents
Notice achievements, emphasize strengths, not mistakes and do not blame. We are able to mitigate the school stress of your child, our experts are sure. Staying demanding.
Basic Ideas
- Build confidence: support despite mistakes. Help overcome difficulties. Don’t criticize.
- Encourage: notice any, not only educational, interest of the child. Focus on his talents: curiosity, humor, dexterity…
- Encourage: Treat school as part of your child’s daily life. He must know that efforts are expected of him and understand that he is only gaining knowledge so far.
Do not rush
“A child is constantly developing,” reminds child psychologist Tatyana Bednik. – This process can be very active, but at other times it seems to freeze, gaining strength for the next breakthrough. Therefore, adults should allow themselves to “reconcile” with what the child is now. Do not rush, do not insist, do not force everything to be corrected immediately, to become different. It is worth, on the contrary, to listen to the child, to observe, helping him to rely on his positive sides, and to support him when weaknesses appear.
Take advantage of mistakes
Not mistaken, as you know, the one who does nothing. The reverse is also true: whoever does something is wrong. At least sometimes. “Teach your child to analyze the causes of failure – this way you will teach him to clearly understand what exactly led to the mistake,” advises developmental psychologist Andrey Podolsky. – Clarify what remains incomprehensible, ask to redo the exercise at home, retell a poorly learned lesson. Be ready to re-explain the essence of the recently covered material yourself. But never do the task instead of him – do it with the child. “It’s good when joint creativity concerns complex and creative tasks,” psychologist Tamara Gordeeva clarifies, “a biology project, a review of a book, or an essay on a free topic. Discuss new ideas with him, look for literature, information on the Internet together. Such (“business”) experience of communicating with parents, new skills will help the child become more self-confident, try, make mistakes and look for new solutions on his own.”
Read more:
- Pass the exam: 5 preparation strategies and psychologist’s comments
“There is nothing more soothing and restorative than moments of joint activities with the family,” adds Tatyana Bednik. “Cooking, crafting, playing games together, watching and commenting on a show or a movie together – so many invisible but fundamental ways of learning!” Sharing opinions, comparing yourself to others, sometimes opposing each other – all this helps to develop a critical mind, which, in turn, will help you look at the situation from the side and keep stress at a distance.
Have a question?
- Center for Psychological and Pedagogical Rehabilitation and Correction “Strogino”, t. (495) 753 1353, http://centr-strogino.ru
- Psychological center IGRA, t. (495) 629 4629, www.igra-msk.ru
- Center for Adolescents “Crossroads”, t. (495) 609 1772, www.perekrestok.info
- Center for Psychological Counseling and Psychotherapy “Genesis”, tel. (495) 775 9712, www.ippli-genesis.ru
Commentary by Andrei Konchalovsky
“I think the main task of a parent is to create moderately favorable conditions for their child. Because a person degrades in absolutely favorable ones, just as in absolutely unfavorable ones. That is, it should not be too cold or hot. You can’t have everything. You can’t be able to go anywhere or eat whatever you want. It is impossible that everything is possible – there are things that are impossible! And there are things that are possible, but they have to be earned. And there are things that you need to do, although you don’t want to. A parent shouldn’t just be a friend. Life is made up of an infinite number of limitations because we always want what we don’t have. Instead of loving what we have, we want to have what we love. And there are a lot of unnecessary needs. And life does not coincide with what we want. We need to earn something, and to realize something as something that we will never have. And the task of the parent is to make sure that the child learns this idea. It is, of course, a struggle. But without this, a person will not become a person.
Plan Together
“What is the best time to do homework; take on the easiest or most difficult first; how to properly organize the workplace – it is the parents who should teach the child to plan their daily life, – says school psychologist Natalya Evsikova. “This will help him make decisions easier, become calmer – he will stop sitting at his desk at the last minute before going to bed.” Discuss his work with him, explain what is needed and why, why it should be organized that way. Over time, the child will learn to independently plan their time and organize space. But first, parents must show how it is done, and do it together with him.
Create motivation
The child is interested if he understands well why he is studying. “Talk to him about everything that fascinates him,” advises Tamara Gordeeva. “Remind me: success comes if we love what we do, enjoy it, see the meaning in it.” This will help the child understand their desires, better understand their interests. Do not demand much if you yourself are not very interested in studying, reading, learning new things. Conversely, actively demonstrate your curiosity about new things if you are a lifelong learner. “You can draw his attention to the knowledge and skills that he will need to fulfill his childhood dream,” Andrey Podolsky clarifies. Do you want to be a film director or a doctor? The directing department studies the history of fine arts and literature. And a doctor needs to know biology and chemistry… When there is a prospect, a child has a strong desire to get to his dream as soon as possible. Fear disappears and learning becomes more interesting.”
Educate without suppression
Not getting irritated by failures and avoiding overprotectiveness could be formulated as a double rule of pedagogy. Natalya Evsikova offers a metaphor: “A child learns to ride a bicycle. When it falls, do we get angry? Of course not. We comfort and encourage him. And then we run side by side, supporting the bike, and so on until it rides itself. The same should be done with regard to the school affairs of our children: to explain what is incomprehensible, to talk about what is interesting. Do something fun or difficult for them with them. And, having felt the counter activity of the child, gradually weaken our own – in this way we will free up space for him to develop independently.
Marina, 16 years old: “They only care about my success”
“My parents are only interested in my grades, victories at the Olympiads. They were straight A students at school and the thought does not admit that I can study worse. They consider a B in physics to be mediocre! Mom is sure: in order to live with dignity, you need to stand out. Mediocrity is her obsessive fear.
From the sixth grade I have been studying with a tutor in mathematics, from the seventh grade – in chemistry and English, in biology – with my father. The mother strictly controls all school grades. At the beginning of each term, she communicates with each of the teachers for an hour, asks thousands of questions and writes everything down in a notebook. The Russian teacher once tried to stop her: “Don’t worry, everything will be all right!” How ashamed I was! But now I think I’m starting to look more like my parents: at the end of the year I got a B in chemistry and felt terrible all summer. I constantly think about how I might not live up to their expectations.”
Alice, 40: “His grades haven’t gotten worse!”
“From the first grade, it happened like this: Fedor did his homework after school, and I checked them in the evening. He corrected mistakes, retelling oral tasks to me. It took no more than an hour, and I thought I had found the best way to help my son. However, by the fourth grade, he began to slip more and more, did his homework somehow, and every evening we ended in a quarrel. I decided to discuss this with the school psychologist and was shocked when he explained to me what was really going on. It turns out that every day my son was waiting for my assessment and could relax only after I finished checking the lessons. Not wanting this, I kept him in suspense until the evening! The psychologist advised me to change my course of action within a week. I explained to my son that I trust him and I know that he can already cope on his own. From that moment on, returning from work, I only asked Fedor if there were any difficulties with the lessons and if help was needed. And within a few days, everything changed – with a light heart, he took up the lessons, knowing that he would not have to redo them again and again. His grades have not improved.