You can certainly hold the line that your child needs to do what the teacher has asked. But your mission is to set those expectations with a sense of humour, and act as your child’s support person as they get the work done, rather than stepping in to judge and test.
Sidestep power struggles by using empathic limits. If your child is resistant, empathise: “I hear you. You wish you didn’t have to do what your teacher has assigned. You don’t think it’s as much fun as playing video games. I bet when you grow up, you’ll be a video game inventor, you like them so much!”
Then set the limit: “Even so, your teacher said we need to do XYZ, so you do need to do these assignments for your teacher.”
Finally, tell your child how they can get their needs met: “As you know, once you complete three cards (with three assignments), we get to go outside and play soccer. Which card do you want to tackle first? How can I help you get started, so you can complete it sooner?”
Prioritise Connection
No matter how calm you are able to stay, you won’t get cooperation until you’ve connected with your child and helped them with any anxiety they’re feeling about learning.
The best antidote to anxiety is to start every morning with at least ten minutes of roughhousing to get your child laughing, before you begin schoolwork. Laughter and physical activity actually reduce the stress hormones circulating in the body, so your child is more able to handle frustration and other emotions that come up as they manage themselves through the learning process.
Equally important, laughing together helps your child feel connected with you so they’re more open to your influence. In fact, if your child tends to be anxious or resistant, you’ll probably need to do roughhousing after every single assignment, to take the edge off and get both of you laughing.
You can see that your child needs to feel positively connected to you or they can’t learn from you. That means they need to feel heard and encouraged by you, so you’ll need to take their problems seriously and help them find solutions. They need to feel safe to show you all of their emotions, including the “negative” ones, so you’ll need to accept their unhappy emotions with grace and patience. And since connection needs to be renewed daily, you’ll need to build connection rituals into your daily routine.
Does this seem like too much to handle, especially if you’re also holding down a job or caring for a baby? It is!
It’s unreasonable that parents are expected to be their children’s teachers! It’s an impossible job, and there’s no way to do it perfectly.
But that’s also true for parenting in general, and you do that every day. The good news is that as your child develops a growth mindset, they’ll find it easier to manage their big feelings while they’re learning, even when they struggle. You’re giving them a gift that will help them learn more easily, not just during remote learning, or even when they’re back in school, but for the rest of their lives.
And the mind isn’t the only thing that grows when we stretch it. Every day that you’re able to model grace under the pressure of remote schooling, you’re stretching your heart, and your capacity to love. Once your child is back at school in person, you might even look back at these days with gratitude.
Find the original article here.
Dr. Laura Markham is the founder of AhaParenting.com and author of Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids, Peaceful Parent, Happy Siblings and her latest book, the Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids Workbook.
