Easy Ways to Boost Your Middle School Student’s Grades
by Evie McDonald on Aug 20, 2008 with 0 Comments
These suggestions should help your middle school student do the best he or she can at this critical time in life.
- Get to know your child’s teachers before he or she gets in trouble. Teachers schedule conferences druing reporting periods for under-achieving students, but why wait. Make sure that your child’s teachers know that you want to work with them. Then, make sure that your child, in turn, knows that the teachers have your respect and cooperation.
- Be your child’s mentor, friend, and confidant, but make sure he or she knows that you are not his peer, and neither are teachers, administrators, and coaches. Now’s the time to teach your son or daughter to know how to shake hands and make eye contact, give compliments, and receive them in return. Also, make sure your child understands that teachers know the difference between a genuine compliment and “buttering up the teacher”.
- Take time for dinner with the family every night you can. Include your child in adult discussions on politics and family finances. Teach him or her that valid reasons win an argument and that name-calling only makes an opponent angry. I can still remember my dad saying from this period in time, “Not every one thinks like you do.”
- By this time, an adolescent should have an allowance tied in to certain tasks around the house, such as mowing the yard, weeding the garden, and cleaning his or her room. The young teen should be beginning to discover just how much items like school supplies, clothes, and shoes cost and how they fit into the family’s budget. Teach him or her the concepts of interest and percent by using your family’s finances; for instance, talk about putting a down payment on a new car. If he or she doesn’t have a savings account already, open one for him or her.
- Make sure your child spends time with grandparents and older aunts and uncles. A sense of family history can develop into an appreciation for history in general along with the knowledge that things weren’t always as they are now. Consider joining Ancestry.com or another online genealogical web site.
- Take weekend trips to historical and cultural points of interest: Remember the Alamo, stop at the historical markers along the way, visit local geological and historical digs, tour historic homes.
- If a teacher takes the trouble to call to tell you that your child hasn’t turned in an assignment, require your child to turn it in as soon as he or she possibly can. Most parents take away privileges until the young teen hands in the paper.
- Review your son or daughter’s papers each week in every class. Compliment him or her on doing well, but make sure to note the mistakes and make sure he or she knows how to correct them.
- Insist that your child use proper spelling and grammar. Teach your child to proofread his or her papers, double-checking for accuracy by reading aloud or reading backwards (the last parts of the paper first). A good way to learn misspelled words or grammar mistake is to write out the rule or word spelled correctly at least six times. Middle-school students still have spelling tests, so quiz your child on the words on Monday night and make sure he or she knows how to spell all the words on the list by the end of the week. If your child claims that only the content is important, suggest that spelling errors and grammatical errors will very much influence how others view his or her work.
- Take your child to church (or if you aren’t religious to meetings where there are public speakers). He or she should become accustomed to the lecture format and the restraints it imposes on the listener: No talking; no leaving the auditorium while the speaker is talking; most lectures have an introduction and conclusion and approximately three main points–just like a five-paragraph essay.
- Read aloud to your child and have your child read aloud to you. Pick a book that the family can enjoy together. Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” is an excellent choice because it teaches detailed sentence structure, but popular books like J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series are also an option. If your son or daughter enjoys sports, consider giving him “how to” books on different sports at Christmas. Your main goal is to encourage sustained reading.
- Does your child exercise for at least 30 continuous minutes four days a week? Encourage exercise by taking walks together, enrolling your son or daughter in team sports or modern dance or jazz. Exercise literally stimulates the mind.
- Encourage your child to learn a musical instrument either through the school band or orchestra or enrolling him or her in private lessons. Enroll him or her in a youth choir. After all, the same part of the brain used in mathematics also functions when playing music. Playing a musical instrument also helps adolescents understand that “practice does make perfect” and that talents don’t automatically appear at will.
- Take your child to live local theater and musical productions. A lifetime appreciation of jazz, the blues, folk, and classical music starts in adolescence.
- Give your child a small dog or cat to care for, giving him or her complete responsibility for its feeding, walks, and house training.
- Monitor your child’s friends and acquaintances, supervising time on the Internet, in front of the television, talking on the cell phone, and going out with friends. Take the time to discuss with him or her current events and make sure that what he or she is viewing is age appropriate.
- Remember that time-outs in your child’s room aren’t really much of a punishment if a television, line telephone or cell phone, or computer is readily available. Place the entire family on a television and Internet diet, restricting hours on weeknights and types of shows watched.
- Your child’s self-image has a major impact on how he or she does in school. Accordingly, you need to monitor your child’s sugar in take as much as possible. Have an ample supply of lemonade or iced-tea on hand instead of purchasing sodas. Substitute apples and bananas for candy; keep low-calorie (un-buttered) popcorn and nuts, sunflower seeds, and yogurt on hand when your young teen has the munchies.
- Once your child learns an assignment, give him or her a chance to tutor others, thus reinforcing his or her earlier knowledge
- Give your child a hug and a kiss every day before school and make sure to ask about his or her day in the evening!
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