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Social Anxiety Always Needs Help and Grade Skipping Very Effective for Some Gifted Students
Social Anxiety Always Needs Help and Grade Skipping Very Effective for Some Gifted Students
Q: How do you know when social anxiety requires more attention (e.g. therapy or medication)?
A: A parent is often the first person who can help a socially …Read more.
Helping Over-Empowered High-School Students Is Not Easy
Q: My question is related to my role as a high-school teacher. I have my master's in special education with a concentration on students with emotional disabilities. I've taught for the last 15 years as either a special education or English teacher, …Read more.
When Should a Child be IQ Tested? and Death Is Frightening to Children
Q: At what point should IQ testing be conducted? We have an only child — a girl who is in kindergarten.
A: There's no specific time that all children should be given individual IQ tests by a psychologist. Schools often arrange for group IQ …Read more.
Grandson May be More Difficult During Grandma's Visit
Q: I'm concerned about my 2-year-old grandson who seems very needy and demanding. He cries for at least an hour after his mom leaves. Occasionally, distraction works but not often. He says, "It's mine" over and over about everything in his …Read more.
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Motivating Sixth-Grader Can WorkQ: My sixth-grader does fine in school, but I know she is capable of a lot more. How do I get her motivated to work harder and understand the importance of schoolwork and reading? A: Because you say your sixth-grader is doing well, I'm not sure there is truly reason to expect more, so let me just give you some general suggestions that may be helpful. 1. It's most important that we teach children balance in regard to schoolwork and social life. If your daughter's life is unbalanced and she's not putting enough time into her schoolwork and too much time into socializing and play, you can suggest that while you want her to have plenty of fun, she needs to put more effort into learning to get her balance more appropriate for her age. 2. You could use a reward system that's based on your daughter's improvement in grades. If she does better than she has in the past, you could give her a small gift. 3. Another idea is to extend what your daughter learns in school by enjoying some family excursions related to what she's learning. For example, if she's learning about Egypt, a visit to a museum that has an Egyptian exhibit can enhance her interest and permit her to bring relevant information into the classroom, which will help her feel more like a scholar. 4. Your grandparents may have taught you a rhyme that you could share with your daughter. It goes: "Good, better, best; Never let it rest; Until your good is better And your better best." We do want children to take pride in doing their best work, but not to feel pressured to be the best in the class or to always expect perfect work.
5. Sharing your daughter's interests related to school will also help motivate her. Doing a science experiment at home or showing her a magazine article on a topic she's studying will make you a role model for being interested in learning. 6. Emphasize to your daughter the importance of being a hard worker. Let her know you'll be happy with her accomplishments as long as she puts forth full effort, but that you don't like laziness or getting by without effort. 7. Praise each of your children when he or she works hard. Don't emphasize how easy their work is, or they'll assume that if they don't find the work easy, it must be because they're not smart enough. That will cause them to be afraid to put forth effort for fear that even with effort, they won't get A's, thus proving that they're not as smart as they're supposed to be. For free newsletters about "How to Parent So Children Will Learn" of "Why Bright Kids Get Poor Grades" (both by Great Potential Press, 2008), send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to the address below. Dr. Sylvia B. Rimm is the director of the Family Achievement Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio, a clinical professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, and the author of many books on parenting. More information on raising kids is available at www.sylviarimm.com. Please send questions to: Sylvia B. Rimm on Raising Kids, P.O. Box 32, Watertown, WI 53094 or srimm@sylviarimm.com. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS.COM
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