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What can I do if I am not happy with my child’s academic performance in school?

If you are feeling that your child is falling behind academically, there are ways to help. Read more here on how parents can encourage their children to aim for success!

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It can be difficult to determine what the best course of action is when your child’s performance in school isn’t up to your expectations. Should you push harder? Provide more opportunity? Take away privileges? There are many factors that could contribute to a poor academic performance, so it is important that you take time and think about how you would like to approach this challenge with your child. Here are some examples of what you could do if you aren’t happy with your child’s performance:

  1. Help your child create a schedule to balance academics and other activities.
  2. Communicate with teachers about poor grades and/or behavior problems, and determine how both can be improved together.
  3. Meet with the teacher regularly to go over progress reports or discuss test scores that came home during parent conferences or report card time.
  4. Encourage your child through praise when they do well in school instead of punishing them if their grades aren’t where you would like them to be at the end of each marking period.
  5. Work on building better study habits by helping find resources such as tutors for weaker subjects, asking older children who may have experienced poor academic performance themselves what worked best for them, etc.

1. Help your child create a schedule to balance academics and other activities

Getting together and making a calendar to plan out all their activities for the week, month, or semester can assist your youngster in developing a timetable that balances studies with other passions. Then, you can work together to rearrange them so there is enough time devoted to each activity. Keep in mind that there may be certain activities your child can’t do without, such as certain sporting events, so finding a balance is the most important thing.

If they have poor grades or behavior problems at school, it’s likely because their schedule isn’t working for them anymore. You can also look at your family’s schedule and see if there are any ways you can adjust things so that everyone can get enough sleep, exercise regularly and find time for homework and studying without too much stress.

2. Communicate with teachers about poor grades and/or behavior problems, and determine how both can be improved together

You should encourage regular communication with teachers about poor grades and/or behavior problems by trying to meet before report cards come home or while school is still in session (before final exams). When meeting with teachers it is important to express your concerns in a respectful manner and to ask them for their help. Talk with teachers about poor grades, behavior problems they’ve noticed or how you can work together to ensure that your child is understanding the material in class. Keep in mind that not all poor grades are as a result of failing to understand coursework, as there may be other factors like lack of motivation or poor time management skills at play here.

Working on improving poor academic performance is usually best done when parents collaborate with the teacher because everyone has different perspectives on how the child is doing. A teacher may be able to pinpoint some areas where poor grades are coming from, while you as a parent can provide additional insight on how their behavior is affecting their learning and what kind of outside help they may need if it’s a serious problem. Meet regularly with your child’s teachers so you can have a better idea of what progress is being made and whether poor grades or behavior problems are improving (more on this next).

3. Meet with your teacher regularly to go over progress reports or discuss test scores that came home during parent conferences or report card time

You should meet with the teacher regularly to go over progress reports and/or discuss test scores from either a conference you had at school, through regular email updates, etc., so teachers know how your child is doing throughout the year rather than only when grades come out once a semester. Try not to take poor academic performance personally as it may take months or years for them to understand what is expected of them and how they can be successful.

During this time, poor grades are likely just a sign that there is something else at play here rather than your child being unintelligent or unmotivated. That’s why it’s important to meet with teachers regularly to take a look poor grades together and determine how they can be improved. For example, if your child is struggling in math, find out what kinds of resources are available for extra help outside of class. Take advantage of tutoring or other academic support services offered by the school or elsewhere. If poor academic performance continues, consider getting him/her tested for any learning disabilities they could have that may be contributing to their struggles. Getting your child tested will help you get a better idea of what is causing the problem.

4. Encourage your child through praise when they do well in school instead of punishing them if their grades aren’t where you would like them to be at the end of each marking period.

You should encourage children by using praise rather than punishment for poor academic performance at the end of every marking period, after report cards are received or during parent conferences. Try focusing on what your child did that was good and help them build upon it! For example, “I’m really proud that you got a B on that math test! I know you can do better if we work together on these problems” rather than “How could you get a C? What were you thinking?” If poor grades are the result of poor time management skills, encourage them to keep track of their homework and help remind them when it’s due. This will show kids that poor grades don’t define who they are as a person but simply indicate areas which improvement is needed.

5. Work on building better study habits

You can help your child build better study habits by looking at their weak points and finding ways to improve upon these areas so they are able to perform well in school overall. For example, if your child struggles with math then you could look into finding a tutor or after-school enrichment class that is specifically designed to teach kids how to do math more easily.

You should also look into what may be causing poor academic performance and try helping your child find ways around these difficulties so they can still get their work done without too much effort. If poor grades are because of other problems such as lack of sleep then you should make sure children get enough rest by having early bedtimes, setting a good example yourself about how important this is (for instance, not staying on the computer/watching TV for hours at night!) will also help a lot!

These were strategies to try if you are not happy about child’s poor grades. Remember that poor academic performance doesn’t define who they are as a person – it just indicated areas which improvement is needed! Work on building better study habits by helping find resources such as tutors for weaker subjects, asking older children who may have experienced poor academic performance themselves what worked best for them, etc. You should encourage children through praise when they do well in school and try focusing on what your child did that was good so they build upon it!

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