We wish all of the parents and children preparing to return to school this week lots of success!

Browse Rob Stringer’s Classroom Matters column archive for lots of helpful advice throughout the term.

Is your child struggling in school, or perhaps in one or two specific subjects or areas? While there can be many reasons for this, one reason many children fail to achieve good grades in school is the existence of an undiagnosed learning disability.

WHAT IS A LD?

Learning disabilities come in many forms and levels of severity, but typically affect a child’s ability to take in, process, store, organize, or use information. Learning disabilities are usually seen as a life-long condition—they do not go away—but many children (and adults) successfully compensate for them by using various strategies and/or technologies. It is important to note that people with learning disabilities often possess average or above average intelligence, however their academic performance is impaired resulting in lower than expected grades.

WHAT ARE SOME POSSIBLE SIGNS?

Signs of a learning disability can vary depending on the age of the child. While most children show some signs at various points of their schooling, those with learning disabilities often demonstrate a far greater number. Sign can include:

Difficulty working with words: learning the alphabet, numbers, or colours; blending sounds, or breaking words into syllables; rhyming words or recognizing spelling patterns; trouble comprehending information read.

Difficulty with shapes & space: trouble with puzzles and patterning activities, copying and letter formation, handwriting or note taking.

Difficulty with memory and attention: trouble remembering things (short term and/or long term), slow or poor recall of facts

Difficulty with organization: thoughts, materials, belongings, time, etc; has trouble maintaining friendships with peers; difficulty self-monitoring and editing

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

If you or your child’s teacher suspects your child may have a specific learning disability, consider speaking to your family doctor. Learning disabilities should only be diagnosed by a member of The College of Psychologists of Ontario or The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario after a thorough assessment.

Once diagnosed, there are many things you can do to help support your child:

Advocate for your child. Be open with family, friends, coaches, and the school with your findings, and look for ways to help build on your child’s strengths.

Provide support. Your child may need extra help at home with school work, but more importantly, he/she may need emotional support to help deal with the frustration faced at school. Be sure to praise their efforts and help them to better understand their learning disability. Often knowing there are many other kids just like them helps.

Get support. Find friends, fellow parents, professionals, and/or organizations to act as your support network. One excellent resource is the Learning Disability Association of Ontario (www.LDAO.ca).

As well, various levels of support are also available at the school level. These might include support from a resource teacher, accommodations or modifications made by your child’s homeroom teacher, and possibly the creation of and Individual Education Plan (IEP)—a legal document to ensure your child receives the programming he/she requires to ensure his/her success.

BE OPTIMISTIC

With proper support, people with learning disabilities go on to have successful lives. Need proof? Here are just a few: Leonardo da Vinci, Tom Cruise, Magic Johnson, and Thomas Edison just to name a few.

About the author:
As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21. To receive Rob’s free newsletters or for information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.

©Rob Stringer 2009

Our children learn new things every day at school, and we often do the same at home or work. But have you ever stopped to consider exactly how we learn a new skill? While it may not be something to which you’ve ever given much thought, understanding the four stages of learning can provide valuable insight into some of the reasons students have difficulty succeeding in school.

Unconscious Incompetence

The first stage is known as unconscious incompetence. Simply put, this means that not only do you not know how to do something, but you’re also not even aware you don’t know.

For example, take learning how to multiply numbers together. Having not yet attended school, young children do not have any understanding of what multiplication is, or what it is like to do it.

Conscious Incompetence

Once you start to learn a new skill, you enter the second stage, conscious incompetence.

At this point practising the skill takes all your concentration and is usually accompanied by many mistakes. While you become quickly aware of your limitations, this is the stage when you learn the most.

In our example, when first learning how to multiply numbers together, students learn what multiplication is, and then various ways to figure out the correct answer. The key at this stage is to assure the learner that mistakes are not to be feared but expected and embraced – they are a natural part of the learning process. (Note: If you child did not do well this year on Math tests, it may be a sign he/she is still at this stage, and requires some tutoring this summer.)

Conscious Competence

After lots of practice and guidance, you reach the third stage, conscious competence, where you can successfully demonstrate the skill although it still requires a great deal of thought. Interestingly enough, this stage is often thought of the final stage by many students and parents.

In our example, students can correctly multiply numbers together but it is still a relatively slow process. While test results may be good, there is one more critical stage to go – especially in school subjects like Math.

Unconscious Competence

The final stage is unconscious competence, sometimes referred to as mastery. It is the stage when the process has been internalized and handed over to your unconscious. It is the stage, for example, when you are asked to multiply 5 x 8 and immediately know the answer is 40. The process has become automatic through lots of drill and practice, and frees your conscious mind up to solve more difficult challenges. (Note: Did your child run out of time on Math tests this year? It could be a sign he/she may be stuck at the previous stage and requires some additional practice this summer.)

Given that our conscious minds can only keep track of about seven things at once, it becomes especially important for students to get to the fourth stage of learning as soon as possible. After all, once we can get to the point of mastering the basics, we free our conscious minds to focus on bigger and better things.

As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21. To receive Rob’s free newsletters or for information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.

©Rob Stringer 2009

Final report cards are almost here, and with them comes an excellent opportunity to reflect upon and celebrate the growth and success your child has achieved at school this year. But what does success look like? Is it just about marks and favourable comments? Or are there other components, like having friends, high self-esteem, showing growth, or independence? While the answer to this can vary from family to family, this month I’d like to offer you some alternate factors (beyond marks) to consider as you reflect upon and define your child’s success this June.

Other faces of success …

In addition to looking at marks, parents at a workshop I recently ran in Ottawa shared these additional factors they use to define how successful the school year has been:

My child is …

• happy & enjoys school
• developing a love of learning
• motivated
• a good problem-solver
• organized
• well behaved
• good at making friends
• independent
• good at time management

Many of the above are usually addressed in the comments or the learning skills section of the report card. However, another method of evaluating your son or daughter’s current level of success is to use a variation of an exercise called “The Wheel of Life”. Here’s how it works …

The Wheel of Success …

Draw a large circle on a piece of paper. Then divide it into pie-shaped pieces, labeling each section to represent a different facet of “success” as you define it. (These may include some/all of those previously listed.) Add as many segments as you require.

Next rate your level of satisfaction with each segment from 1-10, with the center of the circle representing 0, and the outer rim 10. Draw a line across each segment at the appropriate level. (E.g. if something scored a 5/10, you would draw a line across the middle of the segment.) Finally join up and darken all of these new lines to create the new outer rim of your wheel.

How smooth and/or balanced is it? If most areas share close ratings (e.g. 7’s or 8’s), then you and your child likely experienced a relatively “smooth ride”. If, however, some areas are significantly lower (or higher) than others—forming an unbalanced wheel—then you may have noticed things have been a little “bumpy”. This is a great way to visually identify any areas you may need to work on or strengthen over the summer in preparation for next year.

So this month, in addition to celebrating what is on the report card (and not), be sure to take some time with your child and talk about your current school-related practices and determine what’s working really well, and what is not. After all, poor marks and results are really only “bad” if we ignore the opportunity they offer us to make changes.

As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21. To receive Rob’s free newsletters or for information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.

©Rob Stringer 2009

There can be many reasons why capable students lose marks or do poorly on written assignments. Some don’t read the question carefully. Others forget to include important details. Still others simply have difficulty organizing their thoughts into a reader-friendly format. While there is no miracle cure for these situations, teaching your children to use a simple formula to answer questions can prove very effective—providing some comfort and structure until they become more confident writers.

While there are many methods children can learn, here is an easy 3-step model based on the book, Better Answers, by Ardith Davis Cole, and is a strategy currently being adopted and taught by many teachers in Ontario.

(1) Restate the question.

Many students do a poor job of written responses for the simple reason that they do not answer the question actually asked of them. They get lost or side-tracked when trying to formulate the answer. One way to help avoid this is by having students begin their answers by restating part of the question. For example, the answer to the question, “How do people often celebrate birthdays?”, might begin, “People celebrate birthdays in many ways,” or “People often celebrate birthdays by …”.

(TIP: This can also be used in general conversation … buying you a little more time to think and formulate an answer. You often hear experts doing this during interviews.)

(2) Start with a general (or “gist”) answer.

Before going into the specifics of your answer, give a general answer by tacking a little information onto the re-statement of the question. For example, “People often celebrate birthdays with food or special activities.” The key here is to keep things general and to entice the reader to keep reading.

(3) Add details to support the general answer.

Now students can add ideas, personal references (or examples from books they’ve read if comparing stories, etc.) to help support or broaden the answer. In our example, this would now be the place to add sentences like, “People in my family always have a party with birthday cake and the favourite foods of the birthday boy or girl.”

(TIP: Students are also encouraged to examine ways they can link their thoughts, avoiding sentences that begin with, “And then … “)

(4) Construct a conclusion.

Finally, once some good detail sentences have been added to the answer, it is time to add a concluding sentence or two to help to finish the piece of writing. This could include summary statements like, “Although people often celebrate birthdays in many ways, my favourite way is always with family and friends.”

(TIP: Re-stating or referring back to the opening or original question like I do in the final sentences of this article is often a good idea. To help students remember, teachers often use the image of a hamburger—with bun on the top and bottom.)

So remember, if your children struggle when trying to answer written questions, be sure to share and practice this strategy with them. It can help to produce better answers that look good AND sound smart.

About the author
As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21. To receive Rob’s free newsletters or for information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.

©Rob Stringer 2009

Do your kids take forever to do simple homework? Keep putting off studying for tests, or working on long-term projects? Is getting them to clean their rooms is a huge struggle? If this sounds familiar, you may have a procrastinator in your midst. Before you chalk this behaviour up to laziness, you may want to consider some of the rarely talked about reasons why people procrastinate … AND get easy strategies to help break the cycle.

Why Do We Do It?

There are many reasons why kids (and adults) procrastinate. These can include:

Feeling overwhelmed by the task. Some kids freeze when faced with a task that seems overwhelming or too complex. In this case, the secret is showing them how to “chunk it”—how to break a task down into smaller parts and then choose only one on which to focus. Recently I interviewed Rita Emmett, author of the book The Procrastinating Child, who offered this short poem to share with your kids:

When you have so much to do,
You think you can’t get through it;
Break it into little chunks,
Then pick one out and do it.

Being afraid of making mistakes. Your kids need to hear over and over that making mistakes is OK, and is a natural part of learning. Self-monitoring your reaction when mistakes occur is also key, as your disappointment can unknowingly seem to contradict this message.

Lacking good organizational or time management skills. Kids need to be explicitly taught all the tricks we likely take for granted. Be sure to show them how to make lists, post reminders, use an agenda, organize their papers, etc.

Feeling unmotivated. Doing things we don’t like is part of life, but knowing how to get through them is not always clear. Ways to help your child feel motivated could include helping them get started, looking for a way to turn the activity into a game or contest (e.g. seeing how much they can do in 15 minutes, beating personal bests, etc.)

Knowing someone else will do it. Sometimes it’s just seems easier to do a task ourselves, or to step in and rescue our child when jobs or assignments are taking forever. However, what message does that send? Some children quickly learn that if they wait long enough, someone else will do the job for them. When appropriate, facing the logical consequences for inaction teaches life lessons, AND can motivate future change.

Wanting control or attention. Although not as common, some kids may put off doing tasks simply as a way of getting you to react and/or give them attention—even if it is negative.

Breaking the Habit

Regardless of the reason, procrastination is ultimately just a habit. Given the negative effects prolonged procrastination can have on children’s self-esteem (e.g. “I’m no good”, “I can’t ever do things as well as everyone else”), it is important that we help our kids understand the reasons why they do it, and support them as they break the habit as soon as possible.

As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21. To receive Rob’s free newsletters or for information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.

©Rob Stringer 2009

Do any of your children suffer from learned helplessness? Do they seem to give up or quit as soon as a task gets difficult? Do they ever refuse to try activities, or get labeled as lazy or unmotivated? Are mistakes or failures usually blamed on other people or conditions? Well, the good news is that all learned behaviour can be unlearned. Here are three keys you can use to help your friends or family members overcome learned helplessness:

(1) Understand the nature of the condition

Learned helplessness is a form of conditioned response—when someone comes to expect an outcome regardless of the conditions. For example, if your son constantly studies and fails tests, then he may eventually come to believe that no amount of effort or study would ever help him pass. In this simplified example, your son’s constant frustration could lead him to automatically believe that the factors for success are external and out of his control. Therefore, there is no point in even trying.

(2) Adjust the belief failure is inevitable

Once you understand the nature of the condition the next step is to help your children become aware of negative self-talk running through their heads, and try to re-write the scripts. Like the story of The Little Engine That Could, they need to immediately replace negative thoughts with positive, self-affirming ones like, “I can do this.” However, they may need your help by sitting down and talking about:

• Past successes and how they were achieved,
• The factors within their control (getting extra help, studying, strategies to compensate for learning disabilities, etc.)
• New support structures or things they could try
• All the other strengths and areas of competence they have (keeping the failure in perspective)
• How mistakes are good, expected, and are opportunities from which to learn—not things to be avoided.

(3) Watch how you talk and respond

The words and phrases parents and teachers use can inadvertently help to strengthen feeling of learned helplessness. The next time you feel yourself about to say, “That’s too hard for you”, or “Let me do it for you”, or “I’ll talk with your teacher for you”, or “Our family isn’t good at Math,” you may want to consider something like:

• ”I know you can do it”
• ”I’ll start it for you, then you can finish it”
• ”What strategies have you already tried?”
• ”Let’s find a way you can do this yourself”
• ”How could you get more help with this?”

We all have things we’re not good at, however as adults we can often avoid these tasks or hire someone to do them for us. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for struggling students who, each day, are forced to confront their weaknesses in math, reading, and writing. While the result may be chronic frustration, it can also lead to an instilled sense of learned helplessness. What is important is that we take steps to overcome this condition before it worsens and our children over-generalize and view failure in one area to mean they are “dumb” or “stupid”.

As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21.

To receive Rob’s free newsletters or for information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.

Each month countless opportunities for celebration occur in each of our children’s lives, yet as parents sometimes we do not recognize them for what they are—with January being no exception. Last month your child likely received his/her first term report card which may have contained average or even below average results. Did this represent an opportunity for celebration? You may be surprised …

Why should you celebrate?

Although often taken for granted, the act of celebration affords our children many important opportunities.

• Celebration provides time for reflection. It allows you and your child a chance to stop and look back at his/her accomplishments—the goals achieved, as well as the steps taken (or in progress) to get there.
 
• Celebration provides the opportunity for others to participate. How wonderful it is to have family and friends share in the celebrations and acknowledge your child for his/her hard work or efforts—regardless of the final marks achieved.
 
• Celebration provides the opportunity to acknowledge others. Just as rewarding as being recognized, is the opportunity for your child to give thanks back—acknowledging family and friends for their support and encouragement along the way.
 
• Celebration allows everyone to relax and unwind in the midst of a busy life. It provides a chance for everyone to step outside their normal routines to do something pleasurable and unwind. It can also provide a positive sense of anticipation.

What do you celebrate?

It can be tempting to celebrate only the larger achievements or high marks. However, there are many other events which may also warrant celebration—be they large or small. Here are just a few for your consideration:

• When your child works at something new or difficult
• When he/she takes risks
• Making hard choices
• Letting go of habits that no longer serve him/her
• Completing a smaller step in the attainment of a larger goal, like working to close the gap between them and the provincial standards.

If you or a family member tries and fails, is there still reason to celebrate? Absolutely! Failure can be one of life’s greatest teachers, if you only help your child to be open and recognize the lessons it can provide. For example:

• Failure gives everyone a chance to look at what they are doing and change their actions—to try a new direction.
• Failure can teach people about perseverance, and give an opportunity to keep going.
• Failure can teach you there is no shame in failing—only in being so afraid of it that you do not get back up and try again.

For you see, it isn’t a matter of whether you will fail at things throughout your life, it’s more a question of how you will fail—and the attitude or perspective you will bring to the situation.

So let me ask again, should you celebrate below average report cards? While ultimately the choice is up to you, hopefully you see the importance celebration can play in both your child’s and family’s lives. It not only represents a chance to acknowledge the efforts/gains made, and to identify ongoing strategies for success, but can also replace threats and punishments as potential motivators with your children in the months and years to come.

As an award-winning educator and Parenting & Youth Coach, Rob Stringer BA, BEd, CPC has spent almost two decades helping kids, teens, and adults meet with success, and live lives they LOVE!. Although based outside of Toronto Ontario, Rob’s coaching practice is global, with clients across Canada, the United States, Australia, and Asia.  In addition to Parenting with Intention, he most recently launched, Youth Coach Canada – a non-profit organization dedicated to making affordable professional life coaching services available to youth aged 11-21.

Interested in having Rob speak at your child’s school, church, or organization? For more information on speaking engagements, programs, and upcoming workshops for parents and youth, visit www.YouthCoachCanada.com  or call 905.515.9822.