Help Your Kids with Time Management
Tuesday, August 17th, 2010As we are gearing up for back-to-school, sports, and activities, do you find that your child is having trouble getting all their interests, and homework, fit into the day? Is it becoming a source of stress rather than a source of joy, relaxation, or accomplishment?
What can you do about it as a concerned parent?
We’ve heard this comment, time after time - some variation of “Little Johnny/Susie really enjoys his/her soccer/violin/dance lessons; but the days (s)he has practice, it’s just a madhouse! We are eating dinner on the go (or through the drive-thru), and (s)he’s up until all hours of the night getting homework completed…”
The good news is, with a little help, you can get your child’s calendar, and the resulting stress, under control. There are several solutions:
1) Limit your child’s involvement in after-school activities. I’ve heard many parents say that they limit their child to 1 sport and 1 other activity, such as scouts; or they are limited to 1 activity if that requires significant lessons/practice. The child is allowed to pick what the activity is; but they know that they are allowed to pick only one during the school year.
If this is your choice, consider enrolling the child in something different over the summer months, so they can experience something that they may be interested in, to find out if there is a passion there…
2) Identify projects, assignments, etc. that can be worked on ahead of time - and then help your child to block out time to work on the project in advance. I’ve found this to be particularly helpful for my procrastinating child… (s)he tends to wait until the night before for most assignments. To combat this (and the inevitable 3 am bedtime unless (s)he wants to get a failing grade), I’ve asked their teachers to let me know which websites, papers, or assignments I should be aware of. Then, if I know that the teacher hands out long-term assignments on Mondays, I can proactively query what that week’s assignment is, and have a relaxed discussion about what we can do each day to chip away at that assignment. Our weekly schedule may look like this:
- Monday - think about what we want to research and write down some ideas
- Tuesday - research our idea and start to capture sources. Cut/paste info into a document.
- Wednesday - do an outline of how the info should be organized, start writing a first draft.
- Thursday - write final draft including all spelling, punctuation, and source citing.
- Friday - hand in completed assignment
You can lay it out on the family calendar, a whiteboard, etc. - wherever it makes sense for your family. The important thing is to help them do what they want to do, without stress, or missing deadlines.
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