Parents, ready for school?
Those lazy, hazy, crazy days are over for this year, and households with children are running into as many different attitudes about the return to school as there are kids.
While the littlest ones, having been prepped for weeks about the first day of school, are bounding out the door, eager to help name the classroom goldfish, some of the older kids are looking anxious and acting cranky.
The challenge for parents is to keep cool while trying -- as always -- to do the right thing. Experts in mental health, sleep and child and adolescent health offer some tips in easing the transition back to school.
How can I help keep alive the joy of learning that my children had in the first years of school?
Kids look forward to different parts of the school day. Find out what that is for your child, and build on it, says Ernest Katz, pediatric psychologist and director of behavioral sciences at USC's Childrens Hospital Los Angeles. "Some kids are looking forward to the academics or to seeing their friends or to being on a sports team.
Try to link the peer group and the education together." That could mean encouraging participation in the French club, the school newspaper or an interactive environmental club that combines learning and social life.
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How do I help my child through the bad times, such as disappointing grades or a bout of unpopularity?
"I have a simple answer to that," says Dr. T. Berry Brazelton, pediatrician and author of "Touchpoints: Birth to Three" and "Touchpoints: Three to Six." "Sit down with them and say, 'It must feel like hell to fail. It would to me, and it must to you.' " After hearing that the parent gets it and isn't either minimizing the problem or getting angry about it, the child is more likely to listen.
Development isn't a straight upward line, and all children will feel that they don't measure up at some point. "There are ups and downs," Brazelton says. "The downs are for gathering steam for success in the ups."
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My child used to love school and now doesn't want to go to middle school. How can I help?
Younger children learn to get over their fear of separation from the family, but resistance to school can kick in again in preteens, says Dr. Kyle Hinman, child and adolescent psychiatrist at Lucille Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford. "They were the king of the old school, and now they're the youngest again," he says. "They're wondering who their friends will be, whether their friends will think they're weird, or even if they'll get bullied."
