After the summer holidays, my inner superhero wants some downtime rather than another episode of conquering the world.
The same for my kids. They might be role-playing superheroes, but their batteries aren’t fully recharged for another semester of school.
The school year is around the corner. Whether your child is going back to a public school, private school or nontraditional school setting, it’s almost time to jump back in.
Try these 7 simple strategies to recharge your kid and their enthusiasm for learning. Real change happens in a series of small changes practiced daily.
But probably the most valuable hat you can wear to help your child engage in learning is that of a coach.
What coaching looks like:
Sound like a lot? Like a huge change? It doesn’t have to be. It can be as simple as being on your kid’s team and cheering them on, minus the worry, tension or pressure.
Adopting this mindset is like a positive reset. It helps empower your kid to engage in learning rather than be disinterested or discouraged.
But like all lasting changes, it happens gradually, one day at a time.
Same with soccer, we don’t just cheer our kids on when they make a goal, we cheer them on when they get the ball, make a good kick, or out run their opponent…
You can cheer your kid's small wins in school learning too.
We often see success as short-term and fixed: good test scores, good grades, a good game. While those things are great, they are not necessarily markers of success.
Real success is when kids are engaged in their lives, excited about learning, and take an active role in the process.
Shifting our focus to a long-term perspective helps us become better coaches for our kids. It helps us put into perspective the minor bumps in the road and instead keep our sights on the big picture.
Kids might not get perfect grades every time. They might need to work on more problems to master a certain math concept or reread something to understand it better. It’s like drilling a certain technique in soccer practice.
When coaching, we see practice and stumbles as a natural part of playing the game and don’t get weighed down by an off day. We encourage our kids to keep going.
We can talk with our kids about setbacks in school too. We can help them rise to a challenge instead of worrying about a stumble.
Help your kid see that school challenges are not so different from challenges on the field or court or even in a video game. Doing more math problems or reading is like leveling up their soccer or dance or gaming skills. It’s the long game that matters.
Help your kid see the big picture. It helps them reset their own thinking rather than feeling weighed down by the moment.
You’re gulping down coffee, putting on your boots to walk the dog for 5 minutes even though he really needs a half-hour walk, rushing to find your phone, keys, the dog’s leash.
You still need to pack your child’s lunch, make sure they have their homework. It’s cold with slushy snow outside and you remember you couldn’t find one of their gloves last evening.
Your phone pings, the dog knocks over your work papers, you spot the lost glove, sopping wet by the door, under one of your boots…
We lead busy lives and try to squeeze every moment to the max.
Except multi-tasking is a joke. Impossible.
We all know this, but we do it anyway.
Our kids’ lives often look similar—they might be learning 4-6 subjects even in elementary school, have extra tutoring, sports or after-school activities like music or dance or drama club, plus social activities.
Just like your crazy morning routine, it’s a lot to juggle.
Add to that the fact that it’s hard to sit for hours a day and learn new things, with lots of distractions. Most adults find it hard to sit still and focus for hours a day at work.
But we expect our kids to excel at it.
There’s a sense of urgency to make sure our child isn’t falling behind.
But juggling too many activities, especially if they aren’t ones your kid wants to do, starts looking like failed multitasking—an impossible cycle. It makes the morning scene with your coffee, breakfast, the dog, the phone, and the wet glove, look like a walk in the park.
When our kids are faced with constantly jumping from activity to activity, they can experience burnout. They might end up doing more things but doing none of them well and doing all of them at a low level of interest and engagement.
More is less.
More, is like being on constant overdrive. More can make our kids want to hibernate and retreat rather than engage.
We all need a work/life balance. Kids need this too. They need downtime in their day to recharge, play, and even be bored and unplugged from devices and demands. Boredom gives our brains time to dream and think creatively. Ironically, a brain without pressure has the space to dream, think new thoughts, question, imagine, create.
Fewer activities and more space can positively affect your kid.
Take a breath. Let your kid take a breath.
Less is more.
Especially when it allows our kids to grow and develop as people.
Kids are learning from everything they do. They need time and space to learn all those intangible life skills too.
Your kid’s challenges are just as epic for them.
And by coaching them, you can help your kid meet those challenges with resilience and a positive mindset.
Superheros are popular for a reason—they instill in our kids the feeling that they too can meet the challenge. They are the ultimate positive mindset story.
By modeling a positive mindset, instead of a self-limiting mindset, we can encourage our kids to meet challenges with a ‘Can Do’ attitude.
As parents we can help our kids believe in themselves—and figure out the small practical steps to fight their battles and ‘save the town’ so to speak.
It is a daily practice. It’s the small things, like having a morning routine, planning things in advance, helping kids practice their math skills or reading skills—like they’re Aang.
Model this mindset for your kids and empower them to have it and they can achieve huge wins—like Aang.
It doesn’t happen overnight. Like all new habits, it takes practice. This means we as parents need to cut ourselves some slack and recognize it's not an all-or-nothing game, it’s a game of incremental changes and gradual improvement.
Once we learn to reflect on our interactions with our kids, the messages we are sending them and how we can improve on our ‘coaching’ methods, we will also become better coaches.
We don’t need to get it right a hundred percent of the time. We need to keep trying.
Like the message we are instilling in our kids to keep doing their personal best, we need to coach ourselves in this mindset. We become better parent-coaches to our kids the more we put in the practice time, reflect on our improvements, and adjust as needed.
It requires listening, observation, and encouragement, but we can teach ourselves to be strong coaches for our kids.
There is no academic achievement that holds any value if it is at the expense of a child losing their ‘wholeness’ and feeling of self-worth.
Conversely, when kids feel whole and supported, they become more interested in learning and engaged. They invest themselves in the process and retain their innate curiosity.
They push themselves to do their personal best and discover their strengths.
This is a far more meaningful goal than whether your child aces the next math test.
Your kid might not score the net soccer goal, might miss their steps in their ballet performance or piano recital, they may get a few problems wrong on their next math or social studies test.
Better for them to have the experience of not being perfect, but knowing they can keep working on their skills and improve, and not be defeated by a hiccup.
Life is full of hiccups. We want our kids to learn they can handle those too. When we prioritize this mindset, we are sending a clear message to our kids that they are people first and that we want them to grow in all aspects—mental, physical, emotional.
Each of these strategies is something we as parents can consciously put into action on a daily basis to help our kids.
No one strategy is a big earth-shattering change in our behavior, they are incremental and can be practiced daily.
We are learning together with and alongside our children. We are learning to coach ourselves as we learn to coach them.
No matter when your kids go to school or what type of school environment it is, each of these strategies is something we can do to help our kids stay engaged in learning and develop confidence in learning.
One step at a time, we can power up, and be the coaches our kids need so they can be superheroes—in their own story.
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