How Do I Help My Child With Their Schoolwork?

Something that parents struggle with, and a question that we often hear is, how involved should I be in my child’s education? This is a complex question, and one that is largely dependent on the particular student. 

In a study that has received much attention recently, two Sociology professors looked through thirty years of data, and came to some interesting conclusions. Many of their findings are in their new book, The Broken Compass: Parental Involvement With Children’s Education. In a nutshell, what they found was that parental involvement in things like homework or choosing classes does not yield positive results, and sometimes actually hurts performance.  While some of the conclusions of this study are worthy of debate, it does raise some interesting questions. 

In our experience at Evolve Tutoring, here are some things to avoid:

1.) Don’t do their homework for them. This may seem obvious, but it’s something we have seen numerous times. There is a fine line between helping with an assignment, and crossing the threshold where the work isn’t theirs anymore. It’s alright for them to sometimes not know how to do something, and in fact it’s one of the things homework is for. 

2.)  Don’t micromanage things with teachers. While it can sometimes be helpful to communicate with teachers, don’t do it too often. They are very busy, and tend to tune out the parents who they view as overbearing. This can also cause the teacher to treat the student unfairly, and no one wants that.

3.)  Try not be the homework police all the time. This can be especially difficult, because parents fear that if they don’t fulfill this role, then the work won’t get done. The problem with this line of thinking is that it sets up an adversarial dynamic, the student often tunes the parent out, and it also takes the responsibility away from where it belongs. While the “tough love” approach has its limits, sometimes kids do have to feel the sting of not getting work done before they will understand the importance of it.

We’re always interested to hear your thoughts. Are there some things you have learned to avoid as you support your child with their schoolwork? 

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