Things You Learn in Therapy
Things You Learn in Therapy
Ep 104: Setting Your Kids Up for School Success: Practical Tips and Strategies
What if a few simple changes at home could set your kids up for a successful school year? Join me, Dr. Beth Trammell, as I share actionable tips and strategies from years of clinical experience and personal parenting to ease your children into their academic routines. Whether it's resetting sleep schedules, mimicking school meal times, or gradually reducing nap times, I discuss how these small but effective adjustments at home can help your kids smoothly transition back to the classroom. Learn how to create a structured daily routine that mitigates the fatigue and irritability often associated with the back-to-school period.
Setting realistic goals for the school year is crucial, and I’ll guide you on how to make them both attainable and meaningful for your family. Avoid the common pitfalls of overly ambitious plans and focus on what truly matters to you and your loved ones. Tune in to find out how you can make this school year less stressful and more successful for everyone involved.
This podcast is meant to be a resource for the general public, as well as fellow therapists and psychologists. It is NOT meant to replace the meaningful work of individual or family therapy. Please seek professional help in your area if you are struggling. #breakthestigma #makewordsmatter #thingsyoulearnintherapy #thingsyoulearnintherapypodcast
Feel free to share your thoughts at www.makewordsmatterforgood.com or email me at Beth@makewordsmatterforgood.com
www.bethtrammell.com
Hello listener, welcome back. I'm your host, dr Beth Trammell, and this is Things you Learn in Therapy. This is our second to last episode for the summer where we're going to talk about getting ready for the new school year. So you know, it has been many summers where I have either been doing clinical work or even preparing my own kids or talking with other parents who are trying to prepare their kids for kind of the best school year, and so I want to share a few thoughts that I have around making it a good start to the year. You know it's interesting because by the time this airs, you know, the very beginning of August, I fear that some of you may have already started back to school. So if that's true, then maybe you'll look back at these tips and think, well, maybe I'll do those things next year.
Speaker 1:And if you are a parent whose child hasn't gone back to school but it's coming in the next few days or weeks, then maybe there are some things to think about here as I share a few ideas. So you know, every year I have parents who ask about getting back into the routine of school and how we as adults kind of crave that, how we see in our kids that they sort of need that, and that's really the power of what school does for many of our kids is that it creates that routine for us. And so if you've kind of been routineless this summer, you might need to think about getting them back into a regular sleep schedule, having them eat fewer snacks at home, sticking to sort of like you know, having lunch around when they have lunchtime, so maybe their bodies can start to get used to kind of the routine of school. If your child is taking a nap currently and they are going to go into a school year where they're not taking a nap, maybe try to aim that week before school starts or those few days before school starts, trying to get their bodies back into a routine. Now, the reality is it's going to be a kind of jolt to your child's system that first couple of days or that first week of school, and so while I'm suggesting to us to try to get them back into kind of a regular routine or getting their sleep back on track, even if you do that, it's going to be kind of a long first few days because it's just so much more work to be at school than what most of your kids have been doing all summer. Now if your kids have been, you know, if you have teenagers and they've been working all summer and actually going to school may be less stressful than that, then maybe it'll be a welcome difference for them and their schedule. But for anyone who has preschoolers or elementary age or middle schoolers, you can expect them to be kind of grumpy those first few days or weeks because of the fatigue level. So they are just going to be a little more irritable because of the increased demands of school but also the social demands of school, and so you know, the first idea here is to get them back into a routine, while also keeping in mind they are going to be more fatigued those first few days or weeks. The second idea here is to prepare with realistic goals.
Speaker 1:So I love goal setting. I do a lot of teaching of goal setting in my classes and in workshops therapy, whatever it might look like. We kind of always talk about goals and I think one of the real problems with goal setting is that we set unrealistic goals right. So we say I'm going to leave a note in my kid's lunchbox every day for the whole school year and then you're great at that for the first three days and then you're like I really suck at leaving notes in my kid's lunchbox. Or perhaps you know you are going to pack them. You know great healthy lunches every day. You have this grand goal that you are going to pack them, this great healthy lunch. That is a great goal if that's what you want to do and you really are going to focus on that as a primary thing that matters to you. If it isn't a primary thing that matters to you, you might find yourself feeling frustrated because you don't meet your goal by week three of school. So I encourage you to think about what kind of realistic goals do you have for this year?
Speaker 1:In school, I kind of find myself always wishing at the end of the year that I would extend more gratitude to my kids' teachers, and so I think, oh, I'm going to send them a note, I'm going to email them, I'm going to do all these things and I think a realistic goal for me would be, once a month, to put it on my calendar, to drop a gift card or send an email or some sort of expression of gratitude, so that I don't come to the end of the year and I'm like darn expression of gratitude so that I don't come to the end of the year and I'm like darn, I wish I would have expressed more gratitude for that person who basically raised my kid this year with me. I don't know what your goal for the school year might be, but think about preparing that goal for the school year to be realistic for what your life is going to be this year. Obviously, preparing for school looks like learning the logistics right. So when is pick up and drop off? What is the routine of that? How does that go? Maybe that involves bringing your child to meet the teacher night. Maybe it means walking their classes. If you have a middle schooler or high schooler, maybe it's practicing with their locker, learning the teacher's name, talking with your child about your teacher's name.
Speaker 1:One of the guests who came on to the podcast recently or in the last year or so her name is Beth. She is dayswithgray on Instagram. She's so good. Shout out to Beth I love you, thank you for being here. And one of the things that she talks about on Instagram she has all these great tips for young kids especially is that she, over dinner or in the car or whatever she will like drop the name of her child's teacher has a dog or like, while they're out walking the dog. Or I wonder what Mrs Smith likes to eat. I wonder if she likes mac and cheese. So kind of dropping the name of the teacher so it becomes part of conversation and kind of a continual point within your child's mind to prepare them for the school year might also be really helpful, especially if you have a child who's nervous or you know a kindergarten first or second grader who might forget their teacher's name. That might be a good strategy and shout out to Beth for sharing that.
Speaker 1:The fourth idea here is to talk to your own kids about their worries, their curiosities and their excitement for the upcoming year, and it'd be fair to present to them that it's likely that they're going to have all of those feelings. They might be feeling worried about some things, they might be feeling curious about some things and they might be feeling excited. And so in prompting them, you know, as the school year is getting started, to think about both the positive, the negative and the curious part of them, you can then kind of lead with these same questions week after week, perhaps as a way to open the door for communication with your child about their school day, about how things are going at school and that sort of thing. So ask your child what are you worried about this year for school? What are you worried about for fourth grade? What are you curious about for fourth grade and what are you excited about? And if they say nothing, you might have to prod them a little bit right. If they're not really looking back or they're not looking forward to going back to school, you might kind of prod them a little bit to think about things like oh, but you remember last year you liked this, or maybe your friend so-and-so is going to be in your class. Remind them of some of the positive things, especially as they are starting school with perhaps a little bit of dread or anxiety or worry.
Speaker 1:And the last thing I'll share here obviously there's lots of other ideas and you can search up tips for starting a great school year, but the last thing I'll say here is there is something fun about having kind of an end of summer or start of the school year celebration, and so whatever that looks like for you, I think it's good for us as grownups, but also for our kids, to recognize the sort of end of one season and the start of another. And so if you are digging like, hey, no, I want to call it the end of summer bash, or maybe you're like, hey, we're going to start the school year off, right, we're going to call it a celebration, and this doesn't have to be big or grand y'all. I mean, it can be just pizza on the couch and watching a movie, and this is what we're calling a celebration at the end of summer. But there's something that says, hey, we're ending this season of life and we're starting a new season, right. I mean, that's basically how life goes. There's doors that open and doors that close, there are seasons that end and there are seasons that begin, and so this would be an opportunity to get to celebrate that with your kids as they are stepping into the school year. So I hope everybody has a great start to school. I know that I am both looking forward to it and approaching it with a little bit of bittersweet sadness, because I do love the rhythm of summer and I also do love the structure of the school year, especially for my kind of workload in particular. But thanks for listening.
Speaker 1:As always, we're going to have one more episode next week on rest and there's going to be an ironic twist to that episode on rest. So tune in next week to learn more about that. And then I have a whole lineup. I'm so excited. I have episodes all ready for you all the way until the end of 2024, with the most amazing guests I am not even kidding Gosh the people that came to share again. They're going to rock your world, so I am so excited to share those with you. I really want to just post them all right now, but all the podcast experts say you just have to kind of pace it, pace it out. But you know me, I like to get really excited and I don't want to save anything for later. But it's going to be my Christmas gift to myself and to all of you to pace all of the episodes so you can really enjoy and savor each one. So have a great start to the school year and one more episode on rest next week.
