Personal Cost Decisions
Researchers at the University of Connecticut noted that some students conduct a sort of cost/benefit analysis when it comes to completing school work. These students find school work to be interesting, useful, and rewarding enough and feel a sense of accomplishment when they do well. The problem is that the positive feelings they get from school are not as powerful as the positive feelings they get from playing with friends, socializing, web surfing, video gaming, skateboarding, surfing, or sports. The positive feelings from academic learning simply pale in comparison to other enjoyable things they do.
As Parents
You must step in and set guidelines and limits. There is no need to remove the opportunity for doing things they enjoy, but it may be necessary to restrict the amount of time devoted to these activities.
Be prepared to enforce limits on activities that consume too much of your child’s time and attention, even if that means that your child will be very upset and angry with you for a while.
Make sure you do not devalue education by saying it is important for getting a good job and then complain about how awful your job is—your child may calculate, based on the evidence, that she does not want to work hard if it just means being miserable at work.
Avoid completely eliminating stress releasing activities, especially if they involve getting physical exercise.
Investigate Further
As Parents
You must step in and set guidelines and limits. There is no need to remove the opportunity for doing things they enjoy, but it may be necessary to restrict the amount of time devoted to these activities.
Be prepared to enforce limits on activities that consume too much of your child’s time and attention, even if that means that your child will be very upset and angry with you for a while.
Make sure you do not devalue education by saying it is important for getting a good job and then complain about how awful your job is—your child may calculate, based on the evidence, that she does not want to work hard if it just means being miserable at work.
Avoid completely eliminating stress releasing activities, especially if they involve getting physical exercise.
Investigate Further
Some students become very resistant and may even tantrum when a parent decides to set limits. If your child overreacts to your attempt to
establish balance in their activities explore this topic further by opening the link above.
establish balance in their activities explore this topic further by opening the link above.
The link above takes you to website that provides a number of tools that you can use at home, including one for time management. The time management tool can help your child see how much time is spent on different activities. This can be the starting point for planning how to redistribute time alloted to different activities in order to be more successful.
References
Siegle, D., McCoach, D.B., Greene, M, & Reis, S. (2000). Making a difference: strategies to increase student motivation and academic achievement. Retrieved from: http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/Siegle/NRCGTUnderachievementStudy.htm
Study Guides and Strategies. Time and project management series. Retrieved from the Study Guides and Strategies Online Web site: http://www.studygs.net/
Study Guides and Strategies. Time and project management series. Retrieved from the Study Guides and Strategies Online Web site: http://www.studygs.net/