Homework Hassles

Each child is different when it comes to conquering homework hassles, said Marriage and Family Therapist Annie Drake.

With homework, Drake said there are generally two kinds of kids. “There are those that do everything early and are super organized – they cannot stand the anxiety of not being well prepared. The
other – they are a bit like the rebels. They like a little more excitement and a little more adrenaline.” She said the problem with the adrenaline kids is that “sometimes their timing is off.”

Drake said parents should tell their children, “Your number one job is school. You are responsible for your work. If you don’t bring homework home, we will assign you reading.” And, “it is not an option for you to not turn it in.” If homework is not turned in, “I will assign a chore card for you.”

She said, “What you want to do, parents, is hold back; reign back. They learn from experience, not from lecture. It’s good in middle school to let them fail. If you save them, they are not going to learn to save themselves.”

For example, she said children having to stay up really late by themselves to write a paper and then having to get up early for school the next morning can be an excellent lesson. “Letting them get tired is the best experience for them. They get mad at themselves if you leave them alone. It’s far healthier for them to get frustrated, angry” at themselves than for parents to step in and fix the problem for them.

“We want our kids to experiment enough autonomously so that by the time they get to high school, they really own their grades. It is really panic mode if they hit high school and aren’t really prepared – every year those grades are a ticket to what kind of college they will get in to. Middle school is a better time to play with this.”

For kids who consistently have a problem missing deadlines, Drake suggested having them make a calendar for the semester that they fill in with schoolwork deadlines, family events and extracurricular events.

Within reason, parents should let children follow their own clocks for doing homework, said Drake, author of “Help me âÂ?¦ I Have a Teenager.”

“What time is your kid in prime time to do homework? You’ve got to look at your kiddo, and you may even have to look back to birth – was this kid keeping you up at night, or was this an earlybird? Everybody is really different in terms of those clocks.”

Drake is a proponent of homework schedules. “Where is your kid
doing homework? They need to come to the kitchen table. Feed them their favorite foods, and I mean junk food. If you give them their favorite food only when they are doing homework, they show up. They’re more motivated. What you want to do is entice them in.”

She said everyone also is different in how they study. “Some kids do well with the phone on their ear. Some kids do well with headphones on or watching TV. Some kids do two things at once really well. If you have that kind of child, let them do it.” Also, some kids do best working in groups, while others work best alone.

“You really want to get to know your kid,” Drake said. Once you “negotiate a homework plan with you kid, and your kid cranks A’s or an A effort, leave them alone. Sometimes parents get really caught up in the grades, but I get caught up in the effort. When they get a really good grade for them, the best thing you can do for them is give
them your praise.”

She said, “Certainly we want kids to master school so they can really hit the ground running by ninth grade,” but “you want to keep them fresh. Some kids are so burnt out from all the pressure from middle school.”

A tip from Drake if your child does not like to read: “When kids don’t read, I have parents read to them a really interesting story. You read until your kid sparks on to reading. If your kid slugs on a reading assignment, especially in middle school, pick up the book and read it to them.”