Anecdotes, observations, and insight from a leading
educator and innovator with the University of California's Lawrence
Hall of Science. Jacquey's Column is a growing Parent Portal feature;
we hope you'll check back for additional topics.
Jacquey Barber is Associate Director of LHS and the parent of three
children, ages 13, 9, and 5. She is the author (with Nicole Parizeau
and Lincoln Bergman) of the book Spark
Your Child's Success in Math and Science, which contains useful,
accessible information on all of the topics featured in this column
and elsewhere on this site.
A Parent's Role in Supporting Homework
Challenging Gender Expectations
Doing One's Best
A Parent's Role in Supporting Homework
There's lots to be said about homeworkìabout whether it
makes a difference in a child's future, its effect on family life, how
much is too much, and what kinds of assignments make for quality homework.
In our quest for the best for our children, it's easy to get caught
up in equating more homework with more rigor and better preparation
for life.
That's not what the research shows. There are no studies
that prove that extra homework leads to extra success in school or in
life. And there's increasing concern about the lack of time children
have to develop other parts of themselves and their lives. Families
need time to be together without the stress of external responsibilities.
Children need to learn how to deal with unstructured "free"
time.
There's hardly a back-to-school night that I've attended
when some parent hasn't raised his or her hand to express the desire
that more homework be assigned. I always raise my hand and express
the opposite. Whatever your position, remember that teachers and schools
often develop homework policies based in part on parental expectation.
Speak up if you think the amount and/or kind of homework your child
gets is inappropriate.
That said, and whatever we adults may think about the
amount or kind of homework our children are assigned, homework is a
reality that every school-aged child must learn to deal with. There
are certain things we can do as parents that can make a big difference
in our children's success and positive experiences with homework.
Show interest. The messages you convey about homework and school
register deep inside your child and can influence her whole attitude
toward education. Take an interest. Ask questions, care, and be curious.
It'll help your child become engaged and take her responsibility seriously.
Be a consultant, not a tutor. It's really the parallel of teaching
a person to fish rather than putting a trout on her plate. For all that
your active interest in your child's homework and the value you place
on it are immensely important, there's a potential trap. If, in your
enthusiasm, you end up doing much of the work FOR your child, she won't
take much away from the experience. Even worse, she'll be learning to
surrender responsibility to others. Lack of hands-on participation is
a fast track to giving up.
Make homework the responsibility of your child. Your child needs
to assume responsibility for her homework. This sounds obvious in theory,
but in practice it's hard not to assume the role of "project manager"
for certain thingsìlike planning every minute between 3 P.M. and bedtime
so there's time for homework and everything else, or breaking a large
project into individual steps and then planning a schedule to accomplish
those steps. These aren't skills we're born knowing; they need to be
learned. Homework provides a good context for helping your child learn
these important lifelong skills.
Be willing to occasionally let your child "fail." By
living with the consequences of "falling down on the job"
on an assignment or two, your child will learn that being motivated
and responsible is what it takes to be on time and to get hard things
done. Protecting a child from these real consequences will deprive him
of the opportunity to learn. And as I've discovered, some children need
more firsthand experience than others in order to learn. Elementary
and middle school are the times we'd like our children to be learning
these lessons, rather than high school, college, or in the work world.
Create the environment. There's lots of research that shows that
it's important to create a regular time and an appropriate environment
for doing homework. In my family, that's become the kitchen counter
in the calamity of meal preparation. Sounds bad, and for many years
I felt some inadequacy on this front. But I now realize that in our
busy family, with three children and usually only one parent around
at any one time, this might be the ideal environment. The kitchen locale
and meal-preparation time provide a steady and comfortable routine,
allows access to a parent for questions, and keeps the parent at some
appropriate distance. Find what works for your life and your children.
Be positive about homework. It's hard to convey enthusiasm for
your child's homework if you think it's too much, too little, too hard,
or too frequent, but remember: it is what it is. As the person who expects
the best from your child, and who knows both his potential and his limitations,
your proactive response to homework can motivate him to perceive it
with curiosity rather than dread. Focus on helping your child do things
effectively and efficiently as the way to "beat the homework drudge."
It's amazing how much time we save by skipping procrastination and complaint
and moving directly to a specific task! Not all children can heed this
advice (at least not immediately), but demonstrating that you understand
that homework isn't always fun but that it needs to get done will make
a fundamental difference to your child.
Turn the situation into a lesson about success in Life. Talk
to your child about the value of figuring out what's needed in a situation.
Ask her what makes a particular teacher satisfied. Is it different from
teacher to teacher? Knowing how to judge a situation and meet its requirements
is an important life skill. It's okay to talk about doubts you may have
about homework in the context of the lifelong success principle. Each
situation has requirements that need to be met.
Challenging Gender Expectations
It's hard not to fall prey to social and cultural gender
expectations. And when we do, it limits the development of our children.
A friend of mine followed her first daughter's lead: team sports, no
way! Ballet's what she was interested in (not surprisingly, since that's
what her friends were doing.) By the time her second girl came along,
after a boy in between, my friend had learned from her son's experience
that team sports and the opportunity to develop gross motor skills,
coordination, teamwork and cooperation, game strategy, and all the lessons
of winning and losing gracefully were too important to miss. So her
second daughter got signed up for soccerìand benefited from the many
life lessons it had to offer.
As for me, I bought my first son a doll. Well, many dolls,
because he wasn't particularly interested the first time. Whenever I
saw a glimmer of interest, I'd try again. Why? Because in the same way
that my friend's daughters might not encounter as many opportunities
to develop typical "boy" skills, I knew that my son was unlikely
to have the same opportunity to develop, practice, and be rewarded for
the typical "girl" skills of nurturing, empathy, and emotional
expression. I persevered. What's fascinating is that over the period
of the first four years of his life, my son flop-flopped between engaging
with and ignoring those dolls. Had I stopped offering the opportunities
because I'd concluded he wasn't interested, I'd have missed the periods
when he was thrilled to have them!
When the peer pressure and teasing inevitably set in (it
happens so early!), my son, on his own, shifted from dolls to stuffed
animals. Even as a twelve-year-old boy, he loved his stuffed animals.
His love of stuffies established a positive and gender-neutral culture
in our family as his two younger brothers, in the most natural way,
have adopted and cared for a wide range of animal babies. I'm sure it's
no coincidence that my two older boys are confident and comfortable
as they care for their littlest brother.
The lesson? Your child's apparent lack of interest in an area shouldn't
deter or limit her abilities. Our society understands this when it comes
to things like reading; a reluctant reader wouldn't be allowed to choose
not to learn how to read! In the same way, we should ensure that girls
and boys have the chance to develop important skills that relate to
life success, irrespective of gender trends. How many times have you
heard a parent say that his daughter is simply not interested in construction
toys like Lego or blocks, or that his son isn't interested in art? All
the more reason to afford them the opportunities!
The best educational opportunities aren't always born
of choice and comfort level. Make sure your child's school doesn't allow
"free choice" time to mean that girls never venture into the
construction and strategy game centers, or that boys stay away from
small-motor and verbal-expression activities. You wouldn't let a reluctant
reader....
Doing One's Best
When my child's teacher asked what my goal was for my
son's 3rd-grade year, I said the same thing I'd said to his 2nd-grade
teacher and that I would say to his 4th-, 5th-, and 6th-grade teachers
in the years to come. "I want him to try his hardest." At
a parent-teacher conference, my son's 6th-grade teacher confided that
this is the number-one goal of most parents. When I asked her when kids
begin to internalize a high standard for their work, she looked at me
and said, "Some kids never do. Look at the adults you know."
I was speechless for a moment. Not because I didn't know that, but because
it never occurred to me that my son wouldn't necessarily become like
me.
I've come to realize that a child's value system, while certainly influenced
by parents, is ultimately something that's outside a parent's control,
complicated by many factors. Children grow to become their own people.
The only thing we can do as parents is to try our best to provide
the guidance, the feedback, and the modeling for the things we think
are important, and instill the values we believe in.
So what's the best a parent can do to communicate the
value of doing one's best?
Be conscious of how you react to success or failure. When parents
communicate to children that their academic successes (both small and
large) are due to hard work and diligence, and that their academic difficulties
are due to not working hard enough, it leads students to conclude that
theyìnot their teachers, their genes, or the luck of the drawìcontrol
their scholastic fate.
Help your child know what "best effort" looks and feels
like. Point out the occasions when your child really made her best
effortìincluding, but not just related to, school. Ask questions that
help your child internalize high standards for her own work, so she
can ask herself the same kinds of questions.
Show acceptance. Those of us who are achievers sometimes unwittingly
send the message that we accept our children only as long as they perform
to our standards. Because all children have a fundamental need to belong,
to feel accepted and wantedìespecially by their parentsìany suspicion
that a parent's acceptance is conditional undermines a child's sense
of security, self-esteem, and courage. Let your children know through
your words and actions that you love and value them for themselvesìjust
because they are your children. Our acceptance must be free and unconditional.
Sure we want to encourage their success, and we don't accept certain
behavior as okay, but we always accept our children as unique and special
human beings who are gifts in our lives.
Model "best effort" yourself. Perhaps the strongest
influence you can have as a parent is to model the things you value.
How you approach life for yourself sets the best example your child
will ever learn from
Adapted from Spark
Your Child's Success in Math and Science (GEMS, 2002) |
