Take a moment to reflect on what maybe the cause of academic problems. This is an essential reflection point not just as as a parent or educator but also as a student. Have your student sit down and discuss these things. Take the time to ponder what you think might be going on. Have your student also ponder on the causes. Then when you sit down to talk you can compare and contrast your lists and be able to come up with good action plan to solve some of the problems.
- Describe the last semester.
- What classes did they take?
- What went well?
- What didn’t go well?
Don’t just look at the grades. You also want to look at the dynamics of the classroom.
- What was inspiring?
- What was more difficult?
- What did the teacher do that you may have liked or not liked?
- Which teachers did you like or not like?
You also want to look at teaching methodologies. For instance, if you have a student who is very quiet, they’re probably not going to enjoy a classroom that had a lot of drama, role-playing, interaction or collaborative activities. They’re going to want more opportunities to reflect. This type of classroom dynamic might be something that’s impacting their academic success.
- Too many students?
- Are there too few students?
- Did your student get too much attention or not enough attention?
Also look at the student composite of the classroom.
- Is there a particular student that is annoying?
- Or annoying to someone else?
I want to give you an answer an example. I have a son who has Asperger’s. He had a student in a class that didn’t like him. My son went out of his way to get this young man to like him. Because of this additional effort, he wasn’t concentrating on what was going on in class. We had to discuss and realize that not everybody is going to like everyone else. You want to be able to help your students and your children to understand that sometimes these type of dynamics within the classroom are going to impact how they do academically.
- What kind of time involvement is going on?
- Is the student doing so much music or sports that there isn’t enough time to do any of the other things?
Look and see when is your student doing their homework. My daughter competes in low brass. She loves it. As parents, we love to hear her perform, but there are certain times in the school year when she needs to plan ahead. If she does not plan ahead she will be up at 2 a.m. still working on homework. That has happened occasionally. When that happens, we need to take the time to look and evaluate.
- Is our involvement too much?
- Do we need to pull out of one competition or another?
- Is the activity too much?
- What is going on?
- Does the student do homework in between practices?
- Are they sitting on the side of a football field struggling to get things done?
- Or are you witnessing that your child during the break times when they’re supposed to get a snack drink, some water or take a break, they are running it to get their school books? Striving to get a little extra studying time in?
- Are they having the opportunity to participate in a leadership position?
- Is it stretching them to a point that it adds something to their lies or is it just something that they cannot give it up?
- Do they work?
- What is the time commitment?
- What is the work schedule?
For instance, if they’re going to work 10 hours a week maybe they can handle 10 hours a week. But what if those hours are between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m.? That’s going to impact their studies.
- When does the student get the best studying time?
- If you could redo your life or maybe it was your last year or year beginning of high school the beginning of school, what would you do differently?
The great ideas you get from this question are going to give you some indicators as to maybe what needs to be changed.
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By Tracy Atkinson
Tracy Atkinson, mother of six, lives in the Midwest with her husband and spirited long-haired miniature dachshunds. She is a teacher, having taught elementary school to higher education, holding degrees in elementary education and a master’s in higher education. Her passion is researching, studying and investigating the attributes related to self-directed learners and learning styles. She speaks at conferences on learning styles and has published several titles, including MBTI Learning Styles: A Practical Approach, The Art of Learning Journals, Calais: The Annals of the Hidden, Lemosa: The Annals of the Hidden, Book Two, Rachel’s 8, The Personal Pursuit of Perfection and Securing Your Tent. She is currently working on a non-fiction text exploring the attributes of self-directed learners: The Five Characteristics of Self-directed Learners. Check out her online courses at: Udemy.
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