Seven Important Strategies To Surviving The School Year

Advice for parents on how to handle Back to School issues. Parenting tips are offered for behavior problems, discipline, and friendship issues. Parents of elementary school children will find helpful parenting advice in general.

(PRWEB) August 30, 2004 -- "I Put My Sweet Child On The School Bus And A Monster Came Home, What Happened?"

"I put a well-adjusted, happy 6 year-old on the bus to first grade," said Susan James of Newbury, MA. "I wasn't prepared for the boy that got off the bus after the first few days!"

Welcome to the school years. It's a time of adventure and, for some families, agitation as children are exposed to new ideas and behaviors, not all of them positive or consistent with what is taught at home. Both parent and child face challenges; the parent struggles with the new behaviors, the child struggles to understand why his new behaviors aren't acceptable at home.

"Children want to be accepted by their peers, that's nothing new," says child psychologist and family therapist Jan Nealer, Ph.D., LMFT. "What is new is the conflict created when a young child models his new friends' behavior and finds it unacceptable at home. Parents usually aren't prepared for their sweet child to act differently so quickly, they get upset; the child digs his heels in."

So how do parents reinforce acceptable behavior, discourage errant behavior and still encourage children to explore new friendships and activities at school? Dr. Nealer says three simple rules can provide the framework for a consistent relationship with a school age child.
#1: establish specific, non-negotiable rules of behavior
#2: apply them consistently
#3: add lots of love and attention.

Katie Basson, creator of The BITS Kit, Better Behavior Kit for Kids, a 3-week behavior improvement program for kids aged 4 to 9, agrees and adds that parents need to become Benevolent Dictators. "Setting limits for your kids makes the world more manageable for them. They feel safer knowing what the boundaries are and that parents will help them stay within them. Giving children lots of choices is like making them captain of a sailboat when they don't know how to sail."

Basson has four guidelines for surviving the early school years: consistency, knowledge, support and family time.

Consistency: Choose a small number of rules and make them non-negotiable with clear and immediate consequences. If limits are fluid, kids will spend most of their time testing those limits.

Know Your Child: Every child has a unique style that includes its own set of triggers. Know what they are and how other children may feed into them. New friends and acquaintances that set off the triggers should be discouraged.

Know the Families: Volunteer in the classroom or for field trips, get to know the other children. Volunteer with the PTA, get to know the other parents. This is the only way to intercept potentially bad alliances and friendships. Unfortunately, teachers aren't allowed to give insights into other children or their families.

Dinnertime + Bedtime = Family Time: Maintaining a consistent dinnertime and bedtime is reassuring to children and gives them something to count on. Dinner is a great place to discuss the day. Bedtime is a time for closeness, cuddling, reading and discussion of the day's problems.

"This simple formula can often stop trouble before it starts," said Basson. "Every child wants boundaries, love and attention. Not every day is perfect, but applied consistently these guidelines tell your child that they live in a family of mutual respect and love."

For more information, log onto www.bitskit.com. Additional information is available on "How to Stop Bad Behavior Before it Starts", "10 Steps to School Year Success" and "End Homework Battles". Other resources are available from the National Parent Teacher Association at www.pta.org.

Contact:   
Katie Basson
Behavior Improvement Today, Inc.
978-465-3110

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