Hearing Families

School never came easily for Zach. He was only 4 when the teachers started calling Zach’s parents to discuss his difficulty staying tuned in to the activity at circle time. He started having problems with reading in first grade and since then schoolwork has always been challenging for him. Zach’s parents realized that school would probably never come easily to him. They worried that as school became more frustrating, Zach might start to feel less good about himself. They wanted to do things to prevent his difficulty in school from making him lose his positive self-esteem.

There are a few important things to keep in mind when dealing with this situation.

Positive self-esteem is so important for children. But it IS NOT all up to parents. Parents can help support their children’s self-esteem in several ways:

Search for other areas to experience cognitive success. For younger children, puzzles or chess can be fun ways to feel smart and competent. For older children, jobs – either after school work or informal responsibilities around the house and neighborhood can help children feel good about what they CAN do well.

Your child can feel good about doing other things well. Music lessons, drama clubs, dance troupes, and sports teams all offer the opportunity to feel accomplished and good about what you can do. They also offer a chance to have adult role models to look up to, learn from, and lean on when things get rough. It is also great to have the support and camaraderie of the team behind you. Especially if school peers think of you as the “dumb kid” – it can be so wonderful to have a completely different set of kids who think you are competent and talented.

Find different activities for those kids who need LESS time with the team. For some of us, we need to do “our own thing.” School can be so hard on those kids because often teachers expect everyone to stick with the same program. For these kids, activities like swimming, tennis, track and field or marital arts can be much more enjoyable and appropriate than team sports because the child can have a chance to do their own thing, their own way.

Try to keep your expectations realistic. Make sure the child enjoys and wants to do the activity. If not, you haven’t gained anything – no parents need extra things to disagree and argue with their kids about. Even if you loved this activity, it might not be your child’s interest or talent. Also, it might be great for your child, but 2 years from now when she is older, bigger, or just more ready to enjoy it.

Be aware of your messages to your child: separate love and acceptance from success or failure. For example, “we are so proud of you because you are wonderful, not because you accomplished this or that.” Also, “YOU must feel so proud of yourself for how nicely you read that page!” Your success or failures in specific situations are SPECIFIC wins or losses.

When you need to criticize or reprimand your child – be specific. Example #1: “you behaved really badly this afternoon at the friend’s house when it was time to clean up, I felt disappointed”, NOT “you behaved really badly today just like you always do, how can I take you to friends’ houses ever again?!” (even if you really FEEL the latter!) Example #2: “what a great helper you were, helping me set the table for dinner!” and NOT “what a good boy, always helping mommy!”

Introduce the idea that everyone is good at some things, and no one can be good at everything – use yourself as an example and talk about how you feel. Example: “I love to bake cookies, but I can’t bake bread – it always comes out badly for me, your Daddy is really good at baking bread.” It is the truth and kids sometimes think of their parents as being perfect and things just come easily to them.

These are things that make the rest of life –outside of school – easier or better for kids. It is still a good idea to work with your child’s teachers and the guidance counsellor to help your child be as successful as she can be. Nonetheless, you can often think of a few friends or people you know who had so much trouble in school all the way through and then became very successful in their business or in another aspect of their lives. Remember that we are not and cannot all be the same and that there are many different ways to be successful!

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Tags: children, cooperation between parents and teachers, encouraging talents and hobbies, extra-curricular activities, parenting, positive outlook, self-esteem