Michael believed that if he tried hard and kept working at something, he’d succeed.  He could succeed at school. He was sure of it. He said that nobody had told him this—not his parents, not his grandparents. How did he know?  It was the message in his fortune cookie in a Chinese restaurant–so it must be true.

It’s a cute story but in Michael’s case, luckily only partly true. In fact he had wonderful support from his parents and his grandparents. They cheered him on every day as he struggled with severe language issues.

Although Michael could speak when he was five, nobody could understand him. His family was concerned with school and worried about his future. By the time I met Michael, he had been through three years of neurologists, audiologists, pediatricians, and speech therapists.

I started working with Michael when he entered kindergarten and continued meeting with him through high school. Between the school and hour-long weekly tutoring sessions, Michael succeeded. Sure there were rough times. At times, Michael became so frustrated that he would pound his fist on the table because he couldn’t retrieve the words he needed to express himself. But, through everything, Michael’s family never walked away.

They accepted his strengths and weaknesses, supported him daily and respected his needs. He’s in college now, wants to be an engineer. He’s an amazing math student! And he now talks up a storm!

Michael’s story shows that even with odds stacked against him from the get-go, with the proper support, success in school and beyond is attainable. However, it takes a great deal of effort on three main fronts: the child, his parents and his teacher.  But it starts at home with you.

All parents, like Michael’s, want their kids to do well in school. How well children do in school and beyond is determined by their own special genes (nature) and experiences (nurture). Sometimes their genes contain special “gifts” from the past. For example, they may have inherited their Great-Grandpa Joe’s dyslexia or Grandma Sue’s love of reading.

Some children are extroverts like their dad and get A’s in class participation, while others are introverts like their Aunt Sally, and are very happy just to listen and take it all in. Many parents have a fantasy of a child they want their child to be, but it may not be the child they have.

To ensure school success and beyond, you need to

1. Accept your child for who he is.
2. Support your child in any way you can.
3. Respect your child so that she can reach her full potential.

These are three of the most important factors in school success. Since you—Mom and Dad—are the most important significant others in your child’s life, your acceptance, support and respect are essential to her emotional, social and intellectual growth.

In fact, these three factors are the building blocks of positive self-esteem, which is of the highest importance to ensure school success.

My guest Alison Stowell, a registered dietitian, had some great tips for all of us.

You can listen to the recording and still pick up the handouts if you missed Session One of Mom’s Spa.  

Now for the BIG news: I have the opportunity to offer the Strong Interest Inventory to you. It’s all part of Mom’s Sap, Part Two, where we’re talking about “Attending to Your Life-long Needs.” 

Of course, you’ll also get an Action Guide jam packed with information.

Sign Up Today for Session Two
Attending to Your Life-long Needs
and get the Strong Interest Inventory

I’m looking forward to having you at the TeleWebcast Sunday night. And be sure to take your Strong Interest Inventory first. You’ll get all the details when you sign up.

So with Moms in mind, I’ve designed an entire TeleWebcast series called “Mom’s Spa.” It all starts on Sunday evening, May 17, 2009, and I’m pretty excited about it. You can get all the details at  http://bit.ly/139W28 I know you’ll want to come and pamper yourself. You deserve it.

May 17, 2009:Mom’s Spa TeleWebcast, Pt. One: Personal Needs.
5 pm Pacific/7 pm Central/8 pm Eastern

We’ll be looking at what it takes for you be healthy physically and mentally
 
May 24, 2009:Mom’s Spa TeleWebcast, Pt. Two: Life-long Needs 
5 pm Pacific/7 pm Central/8 pm Eastern

Gain insight into who you are: your interests, your career choice,  your lifestyle, and how you interact with others. You’ll get a questionnaire that’s all about you. There are no right or wrong answers, to help you get started on your life long needs and goals.

You’ll also get help moving forward with your goals.

Of course you can ask questions. And if you can’t make the date, both sessions will be recorded. You can listen to the audio on the web or download it any time you choose.

Sign up at http://bit.ly/139W28

P.S. Dads can come too. They also need to take care of themselves, and they need to remind Moms how important self care is.

Mom, feeling special helps you succeed.  Not only that, when you feel special your kids feel special.  Feeling special will  help them succeed in school!

So time for you to start feeling special yourself.

Sit in the most comfortable chair in your house. Be sure everything is quiet. Close your eyes. Take a deep breadth.

Visualize being at a fashionable spa surrounded by gardens. Listen to the splashing water from the fountains of mineral water. Experience the whirlpool, exercise in the exercise rooms, and calmly sit on the wooden benches in the sauna.Every minute of your day you’re being pampered and cared for. What a feeling! You feel special. You feel proud to be you. You feel appreciated. Take another deep breadth. Now open your eyes.

EEK! Back to reality!  Now, just in case you can’t go out today, I’ve designed Mom’s Spa so that Moms anywhere and anytime can have that wonderful feeling as if they’re in a spa.

What is Mom’s Spa?Mom’s Spa is a frame of mind that makes you always feel Special, Proud and Appreciated. And,  if you feel special, proud and appreciated, your child will have a greater chance to feel special, proud and appreciated.

How does this work?

As a Mom, you are your  child’s number one significant other. As one of his most important significant others, you, more than anyone else, help to establish how your child feels about himself. There’s just no getting around this fact. School personnel, family, and peers have some influence on your child, but yours is the most important.
 
As a Mom, you are your child’s number one role model. Children have a better chance of developing high self-esteem when those closest to them, primarily their parents, demonstrate high self-esteem. After all, children learn from modeled behavior. 

What you do influences your child’s character far more than what you say. If you have high self-esteem and exude confidence, you pass those traits on to your children —so your child can grow from your example and learn how to deal with life’s curveballs.   High self-esteem and confidence translate into school success for your child.
 
What  do you need to do to feel special, proud and appreciated?

First, begin by taking care of your personal needs so you can be healthy physically and mentally: eat well, get plenty of sleep, exercise, and be sure to leave some time for fun. Go to the gym, take up biking or join the book club. You could even take a course at the local college. 

Secondly, think about your life long needs. Who you want to be, where you want to be in a year, in five years, in ten years? Make an appointment with a college counselor or a private career counselor. Research your interests online.

If you know what you want, do it, don’t just talk about it. If finances are a problem, look into your options. If your children are too young for you to go back to work or to school, research your options. Maybe you can take an afternoon or evening course, while your spouse, mom or friend watches your children.

Life is full of obstacles. Every successful and happy person had to overcome obstacles to get to where they are. So, you too will have to overcome obstacles to become happy and successful. Once you do though, you will spend your days feeling as if you’re always in a spa, Mom’s spa.

A few of them, the more daring, went back to work and hired babysitters at home or in the sitter’s home. The lucky ones who had grandparents around left their little ones with grandma and grandpa. The first day care centers were just emerging and the concept of au pairs was on the horizon. Both were quite radical ideas at that time.

I decided to be a work at home mom. I would tutor children from my own home and write children’s books in my spare time while my little ones napped or sat quietly next to me and played. Their napping and playing would be the secret to my success. Was I delirious? 

The secret to my success were “mother’s helpers!” I can’t stress how wonderful these preteeners, around 11, 12, and  13 years old, can be, if you want to work from home. They’re the perfect solution for the work-at-home mom because they’re committed yet to lots of after school activities, they aren’t working in part time jobs yet, and they’re dating yet. And, oh yes, they haven’t started driving either.

Also, since you’re at  home, you don’t have to pay a professional babysitter’s rates since you’re responsible for your child’s welfare. These kids just that, mother’s helpers. They can play with your children, help put away the groceries, fold the laundry, clean up the toddler’s toys, help you with whatever you need that’s safe for them and your children.

So where do you find mother’s helpers? Just ask around. Might be your friend’s child, a child in the neighborhood, your niece or nephew, or someone you know from your religious organization. You’d be surprised how many preteens would love to play Candyland with your four year old while you make those important business calls.

The secret to their success is 1. How organized you are. 2. How creative they are. 3 How responsible they are. 4. If your children like them and look forward to them coming over. Remember though, that they’re only preteens, so don’t leave them alone while you run out to the post office or the supermarket.

Always remember how old they are. And if you find that you have to spend your time watching them watch your children, you may need to look for a different mother’s helper or a more mature babysitter.

Let us know how you’ve used mother’s helpers. Have any advice for our readers.  We love to hear from you so please leave a comment below.

Kids (and adults) who don’t get enough sleep can’t function properly. Sleep restores energy to the body, particularly to the brain and nervous system.
When your child doesn’t get enough sleep, she has trouble concentrating on her schoolwork and remembering what she’s learned, even controlling her temper. The amount of sleep people need varies. Most kids and teens need at least eight or more hours of sleep. Monitor your child to be sure she’s getting enough sleep, especially if she’s a teenager. Many teens suffer in school because they’re sleep-deprived. They stay up late and then get up early to be in class by 7:30.

Research has shown that this early school schedule isn’t in step with the biological clock of teenagers. They need early morning sleep and aren’t getting it.

 Symptoms of Sleep Deprivation:

• Your child is constantly sleepy.
• Your child is cranky or sad.
• Your child has trouble concentrating.
• Your child gets hostile or weepy over small things.
• Your child reacts irrationally over the smallest decision, problem or assignment.
 
 Three Strategies to Combat Sleep Deprivation:

1. Review the daily schedule. Work with your child to adjust her schedule so she doesn’t always end up doing homework late at night. Since children need to play at some point during the day and many teens are busy with after-school activities, this isn’t always easy. If your child continues to do homework late in the evening, go over her schedule and see what activities she can drop or move to a different time so she can get her homework done earlier.

Many parents encourage their children to get homework done as soon as they walk in the door, but many kids need to do something physical after school to unwind, and others need to relax and have some free time. Still others have trouble doing homework when their siblings or friends are out playing. It’s important to gauge what your child needs. Determine together the optimal time for doing homework every day. Help her stay on this schedule.

2. Make up for lost sleep. Allow your child to sleep in on weekends to make up for lost time during the week.

3. Work to have school open later. It’s a long shot, but talk to your school board members to see if it’s possible to shift the school day a little bit later. High school students in particular need a later school start. Starting school later has met with great success in some school districts. It sounds naive, but if enough parents and kids support this shift, it’s possible.

Get teachers behind the move. Be prepared. Do a search for the latest information. Since school principals and other administrators will want to see the research, bring several copies with you. Better yet, have copies of the research distributed ahead of time to everyone on the school board.

Remember that sleep deprivation not only gets in the way of school success, but can also cause health issues. When kids don’t get enough sleep, their immune systems are weakened. They get more colds and are more vulnerable to the flu and other illnesses. Then they miss school on top of it.

How do you get your kid to go to bed early enough? Please let us know. Our readers love to read your comments.

 Naturally we all want our kids to do well in school. We want them to succeed. However, some kids are driven. They become fixated on getting nothing lower than an A.

 In itself, getting all A’s isn’t a problem as long as it doesn’t create emotional problems. However, if you see signs that your child’s natural ambition for excellence is becoming problematic, you need to step in.

Staying up night after night until 2 AM studying simply isn’t okay. Teens need their sleep.

 If your child is doing very well in school, it’s unlikely that she’s compensating for an overlooked learning disability. However, you will want to rule out a such a disability.

 Symptoms of Being Driven:

• His highly competitive nature causes him to revel in the failures of others.
• Constructive criticism from you, teachers or friends causes her to be hostile and stomp away angry or in tears.
• He begins cheating in order to maintain his grades.
• She can’t accept making mistakes, so she makes up excuses in order to cover up.
• He stays up all hours of the night studying.
• She has meltdowns when she gets below an A.

 Three Recommendations to Help Your Child Succeed without being Driven:

1. Focus on learning. Talk to your child about school, what he’s learning, and what he enjoys. Ask questions and show an interest in his whole school experience. Take the focus off grades and tests.

2. Explain failure. Tell your child that failure, or in Leslie’s case less than perfection, is part of learning. Failure is okay. Getting a B is perfectly acceptable. It happens to the best of us at one time or another. Share a time that you failed, in or out of school, and what you may have learned from the experience.

 3. Look at Your influence. Ask yourself honestly if you might be putting pressure—spoken or unspoken—on your teen  to get straight A’s, to get into an Ivy League college. Be aware that an overdriven teen may be the result of an overdriven parent. Keep your child’s emotional and
 physical health in focus. Accept your child for who he is.

 A lot of pressure is put on teenagers right now—from school and from friends, even from the media. As parents,  it’s our job to help them weather the storms.

Does you child have a meltdown when they get a B? What do you tell them about success. Share your ideas with your readers. Use the comment box below.

It’s not just ADHD kids who are disorganized? Kids who don’t have ADHD sometimes can’t remember to bring homework home either. Can’t remember to take the homework back to school when they did bring it home. It’s not intentional. He really means to get his homework done. He just forgets.

Maybe her school materials are poorly organized. Maybe he has poor time-management skills. With all the distractions bombarding kids today, it’s not surprising that they forget so much and are so unorganized.

Without some basic organizational strategies, kids do poorly in school and their grades plummet. Some kids end up cheating or lying–whatever it takes to survive school with a minimum of criticism and punishment. Disorganization and forgetfulness get in the way of success at school.

You can teach your child how to be more organized. Maybe you’ll even find some of these tips useful around your home.

Seven Tips to Help Your Disorganized Kid

1. Color code: Help your child organize his school books and notebooks by color-coding them. Use colored book covers, stickers, labels, stars, or markers with one color for each subject. You can also color code the books by adding colored stickers.

2. Clear book covers: Consider using clear book covers to cover books so that your child can always see the covers.

3. Locker organization: Help your child organize his locker. Brainstorm with him to come up with the best solution. Often locker organizers or locker shelves help a lot. Put morning  books on one shelf  and afternoon books on another, or math and science on one shelf, language arts and social studies on another, for example. Label the shelves.

4. Extra set of books: Keep an extra set of textbooks at home. Before you buy them, ask if the school can provide them. Check the web too for companies who rent textbooks.

5. Organizer: Help your child develop daily schedules. Some schools provide daily planners. If your child’s school doesn’t give out planners, you’ll need to buy one or a PDA (personal digital assistant) from an office-supply store. While you’re there, you and your child can look around at other products that help with organizing.

6. Structure: Offer to help your child organize her homework time. As soon as she gets home, go over the list of assignments due the next day as well as any long-term assignments. If you wait until later, it may be too late to get an assignment from a friend or a book from school. Help her decide which assignment she’s going to do first. Then help her figure enough time for each assignment.

7. Home organization: You and your disorganized kid need to decide on one place to put finished homework. One place to put everything that needs to go back to school including his lunch. One hook for his jacket. And keeping his room uncluttered helps also. Have him set a weekly schedule for cleaning and organizing his room. For some kids, they’ll need to do this every day for awhile until organization becomes a habit. Just as you did for his locker, find shelves and cubes to put things in. Color coding helps here also. You may need to help them at first.

Kids will do best at this new organization routine if it’s simple, and they’ve had a say in deciding what will work and what won’t. Disorganized kids can go overboard with color coding, labels, and stickers which only leads to more disorganization because it’s too complicated. They may need help in making it easy.

Being organized gives kids a sense of power and control over school and their lives. As they begin to feel good about themselves, they’ll start doing better in school.

How do you help your kids stay organized? Other parents will appreciate you comments.

Children rarely succeed on their own. They get most of their direction from you, their parent. Sure, teens, in particular, are influenced by other teens. And teachers and other family members play a big role too. But you’re number one!

They learn how to become responsible, how to follow rules, even how to make decisions from you. Follow these seven strategies, and you’re on your way to helping your children be successful at school and in all areas of their lives.

1. Use your P’s correctly. Parent and praise, not police and patrol. Be sure that your child’s emotional as well as physical needs are met. Too much policing and patrolling encourages children to lie and cheat in order to avoid punishment and criticism.

2. Get involved, but not over-involved, in your child’s education. By being involved, you are telling your child that you care about him, that she is important to you. When to help and when not to help is a fine line. Before you jump in, pause and ask yourself if your child really needs help right now?  Accept your child’s best rather than how much better it might have been if you had helped. Teachers appreciate your involvement. They do not appreciate your over-involvement. Don’t be a helicopter parent hovering over your child’s every move.

3. Establish general rules that are realistic and fair to you and your children. Rules need to have logical reasons behind them, even when children don’t understand them.  Children want boundaries. They want to know what they can and can’t do and what the consequences will be if they break a rule. Rules and boundaries help them feel safe and loved. Rules for the sake of rules, however, don’t help.

4. Teach trust. Children need to learn to trust their parents. If you want your child to trust you, it has to be clear to her, from her earliest school experiences, that you and her teachers are on her team. That you will not lie to her and that you will follow through on promises.

5. Provide opportunities for your child to make decisions. Learning to identify and evaluate options allows children to make effective, wise decisions. Learning how to make good decisions gives children control over their lives. This includes allowing your child to make minor decisions you don’t agree with as long as they don’t put him in dangerous or illegal situations.

Allow children to make decisions that are wrong. If your child decides to wear something to school that you both know is against school rules, allow him to make this decision and to suffer the consequences. Children learn from mistakes. After it’s all over, “I told you so” is not an appropriate response from you. Saying something like “Maybe it would be a good idea just to wear that t-shirt on the weekends. What do you think?” is a better comment.

6. Help your child set goals. Goals are like rudders. Realistic short and long term goals are the rudders that give children a sense of purpose. Help your child set goals that they can achieve and within a reasonable time frame.  Children, without help in goal setting, often set very unrealistic goals and then fail.  As a parent, help your child become a strong navigator.

7. Promote a sense of responsibility by helping your child learn to accept responsibility. By being responsible, she will gain self-confidence and self-worth. This requires that you avoid setting standards she can’t reach. Remind yourself that your child needs lots of support, not punishment, to become responsible. Many children appear irresponsible when, in fact, physical, emotional or social barriers may prevent them from succeeding at home and in school.

So it’s time now to praise your kids, get involved, and set some rules. Good parenting requires it.

What’s your parenting style? Let us know. We always love to get your comments.

A concerned Mom was telling me the other day about her daughter whose IQ is very high but whose grades are lousy. I told her that lots of other kids have the same problem and that we do have strategies that work.

Who are the underachievers?

Underachievers are kids who have a lot of potential but don’t live up to that potential in school. Underachievers span all social, economic, and ability levels. Many underachievers have very high IQ’s. Teachers and parents often accuse underachievers of being lazy, of having attitude problems, or of not caring about themselves. Sometimes these kids get into trouble at school and at home. Nobody realizes that underachievement is the issue.

How do I know if my child is an underachiever?

Sometimes it’s easy to tell. Lots of smart middle-school boys underachieve because it isn’t “cool” to get good grades. If they did well in elementary school and are now getting bad grades, “forgetting” to turn in homework, and not completing in-class work, underachieving could be the culprit. You’ll want to rule out health issues, lack of sleep, and poor nutrition. Teachers can usually spot these “trying-to-be-cool” boys right away.

Often an IQ test answers your question. If a child has a high IQ and is doing poorly, underachievement could be the reason.

But the problems can also be so subtle that they escape detection through the usual tests. Huge numbers of children end up “falling through the cracks” in our schools every year simply because they aren’t doing school work that they’re quite capable of doing. 

Many factors can cause underachievement including ADHD, boredom, disruptive family situation, lack of sleep, health issues, even something as simple as a child needing glasses.

And, of course, underachievement can come from low self-esteem. If your child has been told that she’s stupid, she may do poorly in school because she thinks that’s what is expected of her and that’s all she can do.

Research has shown that many children will perform in school according to what the teacher thinks about them. When teachers were told that certain children (chosen at random) had extremely high IQ’s and other children (also chosen at random) had low IQ’s, the children’s grades reflected the teachers’ perceptions.

Fortunately, the cycle of underachievement can be broken if the problem is diagnosed and the child is given the attention he needs. You, your child, and your child’s teachers will have to work together. If you know that your child can do better work, you need to make sure your child’s teacher knows this also.

How can parents help underachievers?

1. Learn why your child is underachieving. Talk to your child’s teachers, school psychologist or school counselor. Or go to a learning specialist or psychologist for an outside evaluation.  You can ask your child’s pediatrician for referrals. In many cases, a child counselor or psychologist with a strong background in education can do wonders to improve a child’s achievement in school and her self-esteem.

2. Accept, support, and respect your child. Are you someone your child battles against, or someone who can be relied upon for support and encouragement? As the most important significant others, parents, more than anyone else, help establish how kids feel about themselves. So accept who your child is. Let your child know you are proud of him. Just simple phrases like “good job,” “great idea,” and “I knew you’d come through” help a lot.  Show your children respect. If you expect them to say “please” and “thank you,” are you also saying “please” and “thank you” to them?

3. Be a good role model. Children have a better chance of developing high self-esteem when their parents demonstrate high self-esteem. Children learn by your example. Are you an achiever at your job? Or an underachiever?  Do you talk about doing the least possible amount of work on your job just to get by? Or do you tell the family about a challenging project you just completed successfully and that you’re pleased with what a good job you did?

For many children supporting them in positive ways by accepting and respecting them goes a long way in helping them become achievers. And because children learn from parents, modeling achievement yourself is essential. You can help your child be successful at school.

Do you have kids who don’t work up to their potential? How have you been able to help them? We’d love to hear from you. Please leave a comment.