My twins started high school last school year. Each twin will admit that it was, 'er, an adjustment period. Their grades were far from stellar, and balancing academic expectations with extracurricular activities and social pursuits was tricky.
They agreed that the semester was a bust, and so I sat down with one of them to set some goals for the following semester. Here's what we did:
- Listen to all the excuses. I allowed my son to tell me all the reasons why he couldn't get work done. I made a list of those reasons and we evaluated each one.
- Help your teen to evaluate their time. One of my son's main excuses was "I don't have time". I helped my son to think about his available time after school, and we made a list of daily after-school activities, and I was able to help him see that there was excess time to do the things he needs to do.
- Make an action plan. Once the excuses were out of the way, I was able to help my son come up with some goals for the spring semester and the action steps to achieve those goals. An example: If the goal is to make a hard-earned B in Spanish, an action step might be that he commits 20 minutes three times per week to go over notes.
- Write down the plan. There's something special about committing a plan to paper. This amps up the level of commitment and accountability.
- Create accountability checkpoints. Decide when you'll be checking on his status. Weekly? Bi-weekly? Establish your timetable up front.
- Schedule rewards at specific milestones. Set up rewards that are reasonable, with which you both agree. You can have fun with this step!
