2011 December - 2012 Jan - Westview Middle School

St. Vrain Valley School District RE-1JWestview Middle School Counseling DepartmentJodi SmithJudith ThomasResponding to Bad GradesBecause there is so much at stake - and because we often feel like our children's grades reflect on our parental abilities - it'stough to stay calm and collected when our youngsters earn bad ones. Another factor making this subject so emotion-laden is itscomplexity. I've come to believe that the art and science of motivating children to do well in school is one of the most complicatedand challenging known to humankind.Fortunately, there are a handful of relatively simple and very powerful truths regarding this topic:• When anger and frustration are present, motivation goes down.Experiment with saying, "I love you, and I bet these grades are really disappointing. Let me know how I can help."• When control battles erupt, learning stops.This is why it's so important to say, "I will love you regardless of how happy or sad you make your own life. You need to decidewhat type of life to make for yourself."• We can't make another person learn and achieve.All we can do is be good role models and provide help when they are interested.• Positive relationships are highly motivating.When kids feel loved, they are always more likely to do well in school.• Character serves as the foundation for success.Without good values and morals, kids will never reach their potential.Over the past thirty years, we've seen case after case of parents who've decided to stop fighting with their child over grades.With the energy left over they began to rebuild the relationship and focus on raising good kids with great character. We've neverhad a parent tell us that they were sorry that they made this choice.There's No Need to Battle Over HomeworkSome of you already know that I really struggled in school as a kid. Doing what they thought was best, my parentssat right next to me and employed a combination of begging, pleading, bribing, lecturing and threatening. Theharder they worked, the less I did!When I started the fifth grade, they began a new plan that radically changed my life and theirs. We’ve seen similarresults with family after family over the past thirty years.Just a small part of the plan included:• Setting aside a time and place for me to learn• Telling me that I could either do my work or learn by thinking about it• Saying that they would help me only as long as we didn’t start arguing• Telling me that they would help only as long as I worked harder than they didAllowing me to take total responsibility for my homeworkMost importantly, they transferred all of the energy they had wasted fighting with me on making sure that I wasrespectful, did my chores, and knew that I was loved regardless of the grades I earned. Although I did worse in theshort term, things really got better in the long term!