Motivating Your Child and Increasing Independence in Online School

This is the transcript for part 2 of our webinar Maximizing Your Child’s Independence in Online School. We highly recommend watching it in the video format. Click on the video to watch this section now.

This portion appears in the video from 13:12 to 25:27. Return to part 1 to learn about self care for you and your child. See part 3 and part 4 for more tools you can use to maximize independence.

Part 2:  Home Schooling while You’re Working

Robin Brannan LCMFT: Ok, so you're working yourself.  And you don't have superpowers.   You don't have X-ray vision to see into your child's room and see what they're doing.  (We do have cameras for that these days.  But that would be the mental multi-task that we don't necessarily want to do.)

So how do you manage everything that you have on your plate?  And how do you help your child manage everything that they have on their schedule for the day?   As a parent you do have a secret superpower.

You are much better than your child, because of brain development, at sequencing tasks.   At setting up a schedule.  At creating an order of things.

Even if you don't feel like that's your strength. You've done it at this point. Enough to put this Q & A on your schedule and show up in the middle of your Saturday.  Enough to get your kids to school and to doctor’s appointments (before COVID).

And you do it so automatically that you don't even really think about it.   That process of sequencing tasks can be such a helpful skill for you to use.  But also for you to share with your kids during this time. 

What should teens be able to do on their own?

Robin Brannan LCMFT: Every child or teen is a little bit different.   It is going to vary if they have learning differences.  If they have ADHD.   If they have executive function challenges.

That will impact the age at which they do various things on their own.  So we can certainly talk more specifically about that.   If you'd like us to, pop up in the chat as well.

But if your middle or high schooler can't yet set calendar reminders, this is a great opportunity to teach them to do that.   If they have a smartphone they can do it on their phone. 

Or if they have an Apple watch or something like that.  That can be really great for kids that need something that physically buzzes to remind them that it's time to go to the next class.   Or it's time to turn in an assignment.  

Anything that you need a reminder for, you can set it up in that way on a watch or on the smartphone.   If not on the smartphone… they're using some sort of electronic device to access school right now.  So use whatever that device is.  It might be a school provided Chromebook. It might be a device that you already had at home such as an iPad.

There's a calendar feature in there.   You can get those calendar reminders to pop up in the corner of the screen.  And on most devices you can set them by voice command like you would do with an Alexa or an echo dot or something.  But you can also set them by typing.

Use technology to support your child… without exhausting yourself

So if your child is in middle school or high school and doesn't know how to set up calendar reminders and sequence tasks in that way, this is the time to really show them how to make that happen.   Younger kids might also get a kick out of knowing how to make that happen.

Particularly on devices where they can do it by voice command. They might have a little fun setting up tasks for you or otherwise putting things in there.  This is also something that I really recommend to families around daily routines.   You can set Alexa up to tell your child it's time to brush their teeth.

It absolutely is not a substitute for you.  But it is a substitute for you having to say the same thing over and over and over again.  If you get that extra verbal reminder just coming automatically.   “Hey it's time for this!  It's time for that.  It's time for the bedtime routine. It's time for lunch.”

You can really use technology to automate some of those reminders.   So that you don't have to be popping in the doorway saying “hey it's time for your English class.”  Or “it's time for PE.” 

That can happen for you with devices.  With a little bit of advance planning.

But what if my child is unmotivated?

This is an issue that comes up a lot.   What if my child doesn't like school?   What if my child is feeling some anxiety about school?   If my child is just not interested.

You know you may have a child who's the “I'm never going to use math in the real world” kind of kid.   That happens sometimes. So what do you do if your child is unmotivated? The first thing that you need to do is identify something that they are motivated about.   

Is it depression?

Is it difficult to find something that they are motivated about?   That's something that maybe we should talk a little bit further about. If you're finding your child feeling unmotivated toward everything right now.  That can be a sign of some depression.   

And something that we should maybe talk through a little bit further.  We're happy to do that. We do free 15-minute consults.   So that would be a great topic for one of those conversations.

But the first thing you want to do is just identify those personal interests and goals. Maybe she wants to get really good at mastering a 3-point shot.   Or maybe he wants to earn enough money to save up for his own smartphone.   Or a particular pair of shoes.

It doesn't have to be financially linked.  It could even just be that your child is really frustrated with what you're serving for dinner.  And they're invested in choosing what's going to be on the dinner table the next night.

Identify these personal interests and goals first.  And then once you've done that you can connect the school related goals to the interests.   

So if you really want your child to get to the zoom meetings on their own... maybe they do that now 50% of the time.  Or maybe they don't do that now at all.   You want to be really careful to make that next step manageable.

So if they do it 50% of the time maybe reaching for 100% of the time or 80% of the time is reasonable.  If it's something that they're never ever doing right now, if that's a skill they really have not mastered, aim for getting to one or two Zoom meetings today on time.

That's the goal.  And then you connect it to what they’re invested in.  So “when you're able to do that two days in a row we're going to have pizza for dinner.”   Or “you're going to get to choose what kind of family game we play in the evening.”   Or “I'll take you to the park and you can have some extra time practicing with your basketball.”

So you tie the interest back to the thing that you really want them to invest in.  And then they become intrinsically motivated.  Sometimes parents talk about this as bribery.  It's not so much bribery.  It's making the things that matter to you matter to them.

Because what matters to them at this stage in their life is about “time horizon.”   They can only think about what they're doing today or what they're doing tomorrow.  As an adult with a fully developed brain you can think about how what they're doing today will affect what happens next month.   Or next year, or 5 years from now.

But they really don't have that capacity.   So they're not inherently motivated today to pay attention in school because someday they would like to go to college.  That's too far off.

So you really need those smaller motivators throughout.  To help your child be invested in the process.  And then once you hit those reachable targets you reward that performance immediately.

It has to be something that can happen that day.  If they're saving up money toward a smartphone you might do it one tiny little piece at a time.  It might be quarters that you're giving them.  Or maybe that little chunk of time on the basketball court.   

So as soon as that performance target is hit, you want to make sure that the reward is right there.  That basketball time is right there.  The coins are right there to drop in the piggy bank.

Because that immediate reward is what makes the task inherently rewarding for that child.

Will this help for kids with ADHD?

This is especially important if your child has ADHD.  If your child is on the autism spectrum. Those kids really do best when they've got a clear immediate reward in front of them.

It helps drive motivation.  And motivation helps drive executive function.   So they just function better when they know that they have something positive that they can expect in the situation. 

Strengthen Your Child’s or Teen’s Self Sufficiency

This graphic is our path to parent help for teens and pre-teens.  We have some parents today who have kids up in that 15 to 18 range.   They may need your help sometimes.  But especially for them it's going to be really important that you get the help of the experts first.

The materials they’re working on in school, or even the way that they're doing math in school. The way that they're talking about their writing and other concepts.  It's different than what you were taught.

You need to get the help from those teachers first.  Use the experts for what they are there for! That's really important.

So this is a flowchart that you can actually use with your teen.  To just remind them what you need to do when you feel like asking your parents for help.

The first step is to flag it for follow up.  Ask your question in class first before you do any of this.  But then if it's still confusing you need a way to get back to it, right?   Write down the problem you got stuck on.  Circle it on that piece of paper that you're working on. 

Or if you're using this for younger child. Or a child that's really uncomfortable or stressed out by writing.   You can also just provide a highlighter.   Or you can provide a magnet and put the schedule on the magnet board so they can just flag it with a sticker or a magnet or highlighter.  

It just reminds them “oh, I wanted to go back to something in English class.”  Or ”I needed some help with something in science class.”  And then you can go back and review the material and  get an idea of what it was.   

Their second step is “ask a teacher.”   Don't ask you, ask the teacher.   Schedule office hours. Send an email.

If you've got a student that has an IEP.  And they have a resource teacher or an IEP case manager.  That person is their secondary helper besides the classroom teacher. That person is the person they ask if they're getting really confused in a particular class.

So they can circle back to that resource teacher or case manager and get that help before they have to come to you.   And then ultimately when they need to come to you, you need a little bit of a system for doing that.  Your day might include meetings that can’t be interrupted.   But your day might also include moments where they can access you to ask.   

That first step under “wait”  is “now move on to your next class or assignment.”   That’s really important. You don't want your child sitting there in the chair.  Waiting for you to be available to help them.  And not moving forward with anything else.

So, (it says) move on with what you have to do.  And then if you have a scheduled time to check in with your parent... (I would really advise that)  Then you're going to get that help at that time.  And if not then maybe there's a schedule you can look at.   Or something else that you can reference to tell you when and how to get a parent’s help.

For help creating a visual schedule for you and your child, continue to part 3 of this video.