What can I do to help my son?

<strong>What can I do to help my son?</strong>

<strong> </strong>At the beginning of a new school year, it is natural for boys to think about their positive intentions for the weeks ahead. Teachers hear so much about the desire to ‘turn over a new leaf’, but just as with our own New Year’s resolutions in January, fulfilling these good intentions relies much on the support of others to ensure that we don’t get distracted from our goal. I am sure that many parents are therefore asking in these early weeks of Autumn Term ‘What can I do to help my son?’

This is a complex question and the answer depends both on your son’s stage of education and on his temperament. I am therefore going to begin with a caveat. In terms of parental interventions with our children, we have broadly two types of choice: carrot or stick. As both parents and teachers, we have to judge and to constantly re-evaluate how to balance these alternatives. Regrettably, whether we are parents or teachers, we can’t guarantee to get things right all of the time. I cannot therefore be prescriptive; ultimate success depends on knowing your son and how he is likely to react positively. Here, however, are some pointers that are likely to fit most LGS boys.

Something from which boys of all ages can benefit is help in creating a constructive atmosphere for homework. I have often heard from parents that they can’t understand why their son is getting low grades for effort, when he ‘spends hours every evening locked away in his bedroom’. Of course, this is not the same thing as being engaged in constructive work. Many boys are, unfortunately, experts in finding ways of distracting themselves. Their workspace at home must therefore be properly configured, with all necessary stationery to hand, and with distractions removed. It may be that working in a public room, rather than a bedroom is preferable. The argument of ‘I need my phone/computer to do my homework’ should be taken with a pinch of salt. A textbook is much better than Wikipedia in providing any subject context your son may be lacking. I am sorry if our mobile devices ban has left your son even more closely attached to his phone than before, but it is best left in a different room.

Care should also be taken over music. As I have noted previously, there is little, if any evidence to back up teenagers’ belief that their music helps them to concentrate. During the first week of term, I attended a lecture given by Dr Susan Hallam of the Institute of Education in London on ‘The Power of Music’ as part of our Music Enhancement Programme. I took the chance to ask her about this topic? Her nuanced summary of the research available was that ‘slow, calming music’ can have a positive effect on concentration, but that anything with lyrics should be avoided. Orchestral music by Handel and Mozart can be positive. However, I doubt that this is the choice of most Loughburians. The sort of music I hear boys listening to is rather more upbeat, containing the sort of fast-moving lyrics likely to cause cognitive dissonance with the academic work at hand. Dr Hallam explained that the brain can’t help but listen out for singers’ words, causing confusion with what one is reading or writing at the same time.

Naturally, we want our sons to take responsibility for their learning as they progress inexorably towards university and total independence. The first stage is getting them to recognize that they are capable of time-wasting. If you can work together to minimize distractions and ensure effective study, they will learn ultimately to make the right decisions for themselves.

I would like to focus specifically on the monitoring of homework for our new boys, particularly those in Year 7. Although they may well have had homework tasks at primary school, the routine of three subjects per evening is a notable step up. Most Year 7 parents are worried in the early weeks about how much time their sons are taking on homework: “why is the school setting so much?” This isn’t really the issue. My colleagues are well aware of the need to avoid overload for our youngest pupils. The problem is that Year 7 boys tend to over-complicate out of a sincere desire to please teachers and achieve good grades.

To combat this and to set your son onto the right path at this early stage of his LGS career, you may need to spend some considerable time supporting him. Get him to show you on Firefly (our Virtual Learning Environment on which all homework is posted) exactly what he was asked to do. Although a teacher can sometimes underestimate the amount of time a task will take, it is more likely that your son is over-complicating, for example, needlessly copying out chunks of textbook. His brain may also be full of what has happened in his life since the lesson that morning – he has had 5 other subjects, a lunchtime club and an after-school sports practice. The simple question ‘What did you do in the lesson today?’ can help to focus him. Importantly, try to encourage him to make a prompt start, once he has got home so that he can have some downtime before bed. It is vital that our youngest boys can clear their minds before getting into bed at a decent time – especially with the early start that most boys have each morning.

Finally, I hope you won’t find it patronizing if I give some advice on helping your son to deal with the inevitable annoyances that will come his way, particularly as his tiredness increases towards the end of term. When boys are tired, they are more likely to complain – aren’t we all? What your son doesn’t need is for you to jump in and to seek to solve even the smallest issue. Instead, I would ask that you listen and help him to filter. Of course, the school needs to hear about serious issues such as bullying, discrimination or systematic unfairness. However, often he needs to hear your sympathy and understand that, in the grand scheme of things, this is a minor blip that can be quickly forgotten.

In conclusion, I would add that it is all too easy as a parent to be hypercritical of oneself when our attempts to help our sons are rebuffed, or when we feel that our intervention has done more harm than good. There is no Haynes manual for parenting, so we must not beat ourselves up when the outcome does not match our intention!