How to Emotionally Prepare your Child for School
By: Margie Frisco, MA, LPC-Associate
Most parents right now are trying to prepare their children for school, but are we emotionally preparing our children? As parents, it can be easy to get wrapped up in what a child needs physically for school, like pens, paper, notebooks, clothes, etc. Sometimes it can be even more difficult to prepare our children emotionally. What I mean by preparing them emotionally is to give them tools so that if they are struggling emotionally, they can better help themselves.
How to Emotionally Prepare your Child for School
Some tools can help set a child up for success. These tools can be used every day. A healthy sleep routine, celebrating their strengths, and setting goals can be helpful steps in setting your child up for success this next school year.
Emotionally Prepare Children with a Healthy Sleep Routine
A healthy sleep routine can be different for each child. I firmly believe that not every child must do the same thing to be successful. A healthy sleep routine is an example of that. Depending on your family and their needs, you might need to change some things to fit your household better.First, let’s define a healthy sleep routine. It begins with finding the best schedule for you and your child. Most children benefit from eight to twelve hours of sleep a night. Discover the best bedtime time and how many hours your child needs for rest. Always feel free to verify with your pediatrician to find a specific amount of time required for your child. Then we can prepare for bedtime by creating a routine that will eventually help your child’s body recognize that it is bedtime. For example, my child typically functions the best at school when they have had ten hours of sleep. So, since we get up at 7 am, it would be most beneficial to have them in bed by 9 pm. Before bed, keeping a specific routine of things that they like and things that help them move slower can be beneficial. For example, some healthy tasks that can help your child prepare for bed could be taking a bath, stretching, reading, lotion, or having some cuddle time. Some tasks to avoid are screen time, running, exercise, food, and drinks. The screen might seem like a good idea, but it gives a lot of mental stimulation, making it more challenging to fall asleep. Working with your child to find the best sleep routine can help them comply. They might take pride in the fact that they created the schedule/routine. Furthermore, it can develop independence and interest since they made it.
Emotionally Prepare Children by Celebrating Their Strengths
Helping your child prepare emotionally for school can be helpful when we recognize our strengths. Many times it can be easy to overlook when things are going well. Having your child identify what they did right can help them remember the good stuff. Think of their day as a google review. It can be easy to remember times when you felt like things were going wrong. Many times it can be challenging to remember when we did something right. If we keep a journal of daily things we did right, it can be helpful. And it is crucial to teach children to recognize when they did something right. This can be part of their sleep routine too. Celebrating their success can be simple, like a list, talking about the situations, or journaling about how the positive thing made them feel. Celebrating the wins will allow them to grow up recognizing when they were successful and to reward themselves for keeping up the good behavior. The nice thing about this task is that it can be adjusted to work with children of all ages.
Emotionally Prepare Children with Creating Goals
Another way to emotionally prepare your child for school is to create worthwhile goals. SMART goals can be beneficial to children. A SMART goal is an acronym to help make a goal that is specific, measurable, achievable or realistic, relevant or makes sense, and has a timeline. For example, say your child wants to get their grade up in class so they can attend a class party or play a team sport. The goal needs to be specific, meaning they need to know what they can do to raise their grade. Can they do extra credit or study to get a good grade on a test? Measurable grades can be easier because grades are a number that can be measured. Achievable means that we need to make the goal realistic. For instance, if a child needs to bring from an F to an A in a week…..can that be realistic? Relevant means the goal must make sense. Reading more can be helpful, but if the goal is to raise their math grade, practicing reading might not be the most relevant skill to work on. Lastly, there has to be a timeline. Again, the timeline can be easy with school as teachers usually have deadlines to turn in assignments.Working with your child to create goals and an action plan to achieve the goals can be helpful. It can create great work habits that can be beneficial in adulthood. Also, it teaches children how to problem-solve as well as self-reflection.
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