EmpoweringParents.com

I got a call from my son’s teacher last week. Apparently, he used an inappropriate word and perhaps a hand gesture to accompany it to another child. That child’s parent had called the principal. The principal asked my son Builder’s teacher to handle it. She did. Builder denied it ever happened.

I know better.

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As a parent of two children who have gone through a bullying episode, I can tell you that the emotional, mental and physical stress can be overwhelming for both children and parents. After all, as a parent your natural instincts tell you loud and clear to protect your children against the forces that cause them pain — whether it’s mental, emotional or physical.

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The school year is in full swing now, and we are back to three hours of homework every night, various physical and mental antics done in order to avoid homework, and the kids calling each other names.  That encompasses the majority of what “back to school” means for this mom.

What?  That’s not normal?  What is “normal”, anyway?  The only “normal” that I know of is a setting on a dryer.  That’s about as much familiarity as I have with “normal”.  And when it comes to kids and homework, I feel like I’m the clothes tumbling in a dryer.

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Do you homeschool your kids? Recently, a reader wrote in with this question about her 13-year-old daughter, who thinks being homeschooled means she can do work whenever she wants to:

“I know James has written about how to get kids to do their homework, but we have a unique situation. We homeschool our two children, and while my son does his work just fine, my 13 year old daughter refuses to do any work at all! She won’t even get up in the morning. She says that because she is home-schooled, she can work whenever and wherever she wants! I’ve tried to give her the freedom to structure her day, but she still doesn’t get her work done. She’s falling behind, and when I try to get her interested in something, she just blows up at me. I can’t just let her fail, but I am working so much harder than she is. My house is a battle zone all day long, and I’m afraid my son will start to pick up her habits. What can I do?”

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We knew our son needed some help in school, but I was nervous about how to tell him about it.

To prepare, I talked with a friend about the problems he was having in school. She recommended that I check into the ARD program at our school.  In our state, an ARD program is a resource to help parents of students who may be eligible for special education supports and services, and it helps parents and teachers work together to take a more active part in planning the student’s educational program.

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The great homework battle comes and goes in our house. Sometimes, my daughter sits down and dutifully pulls out the workbooks and sharpens her pencil and gets it done. Sometimes, she wants me sitting at her elbow and will do silly things to keep me engaged in her homework routine. For example, she’ll tell me that she has to read out loud the last chapter of reading, even though this has not been the requirement since first grade. Sometimes, I think homework is a time for her to make me pay attention to her.

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Our family comes from a long line of big sleepers. When our son was smaller, other parents would enviously ask, “Wow, how do you get him to sleep until 10 a.m.?” We’d just shrug and say, “It’s in the genes.”

But when Alex started school last year, those genes became a real problem. You see, waking our son is a bit more challenging than raising a zombie from the dead.  In my desperation, I rather short-sightedly purchased a “howler monkey alarm clock” for his bedroom. (You can read about that episode here.) The clock disappeared suddenly last fall. No one is fessing up, but I believe my husband might have been the culprit. (And I have to say, I understand. The howler monkey scream was making him twitchy in the mornings.) Still, it wasn’t a big issue because Alex attended afternoon kindergarten; sleeping in was a perk.

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School is here.   I know many parents out there are dreading that the year ahead will bring nightly battles over homework and morning struggles over getting your child out of bed.

Parents can unintentionally take shortcuts when trying to change the behavior.  I don’t think that could be any truer than when it comes to school-related issues.  By the way, when I say “shortcuts” it has nothing to do with a good decision versus a bad decision as a parent; it’s more linked to this question: “Is the approach you’re using getting you any closer to the goal—is it really effective?”

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