How to help your child make it to the end of the school year successfully

It is still March but already schools are in the final part of their year. After what can seem like a long, unrelenting winter teachers are tired and students are ready for a break from learning.

It can be difficult to motivate children to do their work and to continue learning as the delights of summer approach, but it may not be quite as difficult as you think.

First, children enjoy a challenge, but they are tired of the challenges that school presents, they want new challenges, ones that will keep them interested and inspire them on to better efforts.

So you need to challenge them in other ways, and the best ways to present a challenge is to get your child interested in something, or to get them moving, or both.

Forget pushing the schoolwork for a while. Your child has worked hard all year and may need a break. Look for something that is a change from schoolwork, it may be soccer, volunteering, walking the dog, even a part time job, that interests them and gives them a break for schooling.

And don’t think that your child will not be learning. During the time he or she spends doing other things two things will be happening. First, their brain will have space to assimilate all the learning they have been doing and secondly they will be getting new experiences and learning
new things as a result.

There are two approaches to getting motivated to do something. One is to force yourself to do the thing you do not want to do. Sometimes you have to take this approach, but hopefully not too often. The second is to do something completely different for a while and to let your brain work for you. Remember, a change can be as good as a rest, and you can find that your brain has been working all the time and that problems seem easier to solve, results seem easier to achieve and the motivation to finish the work returns.

So, stop pushing your unmotivated student, give him or her a break for a while and try something new. It might be just what your child needs to hang on till the end of the school year.