How parents can help your child be successful in school and life.
Parents, YOU make the difference!!
How to Help Your Student Make the Grade
How to Help Your Student Make the Grade (cont.)
Let’s compare some lifetime earnings:
Eighth grade graduate $770,960.00
High school graduate $1,063,680.00
College or technical degree $1,674,880.00*
*Based on 40-year work life, Bureau of the Census; Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1998
Now let’s figure the difference between a high school graduate and an eighth grade graduate:
High school earnings = ______________________________
Eighth grade earnings = ______________________________
Extra earnings = ______________________________
Take the extra earnings and divide it by the number of years you attend high school:
_______________________ ÷ 4 = ______________________________
This is what you earn each high school year by getting a high school diploma.
Now let’s look at how this breaks down per school day:
_______________________ ÷ 180 = _______________________________
earnings each high school year earnings each school day
This is what you earn each day while attending high school.
Now, divide the money earned each day by the number of hours you spend in school each day.
_____________________ ÷ ___________ ________________________
earnings each school day hours in school earnings each hour in class
each day
This is what you earn each hour in class during your high school career.
Where can you get a job like that?
A Homework Guide for the Middle School Parent / Guardian
* Do a lot of studying during the week and free up your weekends to have fun with your family!
How to Help Your Student Make the Grade
- Your attitude towards school is very significant in your child’s mind. Always be positive about school and the value of getting an education.
- Education Counts
- Knowledge is power! It provides choices for people.
- A young person with a college degree will earn four times as much money as a young man or woman without it.
- When students stay in school, work hard and graduate, they open up for themselves a broader world to live in.
- Don’t Let Your Child Miss School
- Do whatever it takes to keep your child in school. This may even mean taking a day or so off from work to sit with your child in the classroom if he or she has been ‘ditching’ school.
- Be sure your child gets to school on time. Students who are continually late arriving to school get so far behind in schoolwork they give up trying.
- Be sure to buy an alarm clock and allow plenty of time for your student to get up, eat a healthy breakfast and arrive to school on time.
- Great Expectations
- A study conducted by the University of Florida indicates that one of the most important things parents can do for children is to expect them to achieve in school.
- When parental expectations are combined with teacher expectations, students DO ACHIEVE.
- Encourage and support through positive communication and action. Negative comments may help you vent frustrations, but they don’t help your student grow and learn.
- Be sincere and truly expect the very best from your children. They won’t let you down.
- Focus on Strengths
- Find activities that your student can excel in and enjoy, and then support their continued success in these areas. “The key is to help your student develop his or her own identity in terms of the things he or she does well.”
- Limit Television, Phone Calls, Video and Computer Games
- Studies indicate that the average child watches more than six hours of television A DAY! That’s more time than they spend at school in the classroom.
- Studies also show that the kids who do best in school watch the least amount of television. Instead, they read a book, do their homework or go for a walk.
- Set a positive example by reading books, newspapers and magazines instead of watching TV yourself.
How to Help Your Student Make the Grade (cont.)
- Balance Work and Play
- Personal satisfaction and happiness are important qualities in the successful learner. “Never underestimate the value of play for creating energy and renewal for less enjoyable, but necessary tasks.
- Values are Vital
- Students no longer support traditional sources of authority. Students instead turn to their peer group to decide what is right and wrong.
- Students still look to their parents as role models, but what they see today is “winning is everything”, a “me-first attitude” and a “get ahead at any cost” way of living.
- Teachers spend nearly 40 percent of their day dealing with discipline problems. Little teaching can go on in such classrooms; students suffer academically while teachers burn out.
- Know the Teacher
- Joining together with the teacher, you can make the most important difference in your child’s education.
- If a problem comes up, talk to the teacher first. Teachers appreciate you coming to them directly. Bring your child along for the meeting. Sometimes the message that goes home is not exactly what happened at school.
- Teachers need a treat
- Sometime during the school year, surprise your student’s teacher by sending a treat.
- Teachers want the best for your child and showing them you are pleased that they share this concern goes a long way.
- Together, teachers and parents can make the grade.
Let’s compare some lifetime earnings:
Eighth grade graduate $770,960.00
High school graduate $1,063,680.00
College or technical degree $1,674,880.00*
*Based on 40-year work life, Bureau of the Census; Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1998
Now let’s figure the difference between a high school graduate and an eighth grade graduate:
High school earnings = ______________________________
Eighth grade earnings = ______________________________
Extra earnings = ______________________________
Take the extra earnings and divide it by the number of years you attend high school:
_______________________ ÷ 4 = ______________________________
This is what you earn each high school year by getting a high school diploma.
Now let’s look at how this breaks down per school day:
_______________________ ÷ 180 = _______________________________
earnings each high school year earnings each school day
This is what you earn each day while attending high school.
Now, divide the money earned each day by the number of hours you spend in school each day.
_____________________ ÷ ___________ ________________________
earnings each school day hours in school earnings each hour in class
each day
This is what you earn each hour in class during your high school career.
Where can you get a job like that?
A Homework Guide for the Middle School Parent / Guardian
- Students will usually have 45 to 90 minutes of homework each night. This could reach upwards of two hours (1/2 hour each: History, English, Math, Science, Band, Foreign Language or other elective).
- Set aside at least one hour each night for studying. Often students will say that they don’t have any homework, or that they did it in Alpha. If so, have them read, write, or organize their notebook during this study time. This is an important habit to get into. (Read a book, magazine, write a letter, etc.) Note: Rarely is a student able to complete all of their homework in Alpha.
- Encourage Homework Club. Homework Club is held on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the Willis Jepson library from 2:40-3:30 p.m. There are teachers who will answer questions and help students during this time. They also have access to the library resources for projects.
- Check your student’s Assignment Notebook. Make sure your student has at least one “Study Buddy” in each academic class.
- Be aware of any large projects that have been assigned. Students receive plenty of time to complete large projects, but they may need help organizing and budgeting time.
- Keep a separate homework file (manila file folder). Often students do their homework but fail (forget?) to turn it in!! It’s lost, misfiled or left at home, etc. Using a single, separate file labeled “Homework File” enables students to keep track of, and easily find their homework.
- Make a daily schedule.
- Determine when you are in class, practice, babysitting, or doing chores.
- Plan the best time each day for homework and write it on the planner!
- Allow at least 1½ to 2 hours per day for homework.
- Look at all the free time you still have.
* Do a lot of studying during the week and free up your weekends to have fun with your family!