Homework can be difficult for most kids during the school year, but it can become a major challenge when you have a child with ADHD. But here’s some good news for exhausted parents: if you take the right steps now, at the beginning of the school year, homework hassles can be kept to a minimum. The key is to be organized and plan ahead to minimize the frustration your child is bound to experience around multiple homework assignments. Begin by tackling the two most important places: school and home.
I’ve worked with many parents and children caught up in power struggles in the home—they argued over bedtime, homework, curfew, video game time—you name it, they fought over it. And the more these parents fought with their children, the better at arguing and manipulating situations their children seemed to get. Mothers and fathers came to me exhausted, frustrated and desperate to stop the constant tug-of-war going on in their homes.
"No one is immune to the disease of addiction," warns Katherine Ketcham, the coauthor of thirteen books, including Teens Under the Influence: The Truth About Kids, Alcohol, and Other Drugs – How to Recognize the Problem and What to Do About It and the bestselling classic Under the Influence: A Guide to the Myths and Realities of Alcoholism. For the last eight years she has worked with addicted youth and families at the Juvenile Justice Center in Walla Walla, Washington.
As a parent, there are moments when warning bells go off—times when you notice that your child might be having trouble grasping certain skills that their peers seem to have mastered.
Nearly every morning before school, Josh, 9, will scream, cry and do anything possible to stay home. “He’ll whine on and on, ‘I don’t feel well. I hate my teacher. School is boring,” say his parents, Suzanne and Rob, who report that they have hit the wall with his behavior. “He used to like school,” said Suzanne. “I’m not sure what happened, but in the last few years it’s become a battle just to get him out the door.”
Almost every kid will eventually have a teacher they don’t like, but that’s not an excuse for them to refuse to follow the rules of the classroom. When you side with your children in this scenario, believe it or not, you are actually undermining your own authority in the process. The bottom line is that it’s a mistake to denigrate authority figures with your children, even if you agree with them. Read on to see how James Lehman advises you to handle the situation.
One of the unaddressed elements of children’s behavior is the pain that families go through, knowing that others are judging them. Because the fact is, they are being judged. When parents have to go to school constantly because of their kid’s outbursts, when they get in conflicts with the neighbors because of the kid’s behavior, when they’re at the supermarket and the kid throws a temper tantrum, or they’re at the mall with their adolescent child and he raises his voice or gives his parents backtalk, it’s completely humiliating.
Being the target of bullies is a form of torture. I know this firsthand—I was bullied for two years in elementary school. Now I’m a mom, and the thought of the same thing happening to my child terrifies me. Recently, we caught up with Peggy Moss, a nationally known expert on bullying and a tireless advocate for the prevention of hate violence. Peggy is also the author of Say Something, an award-winning children’s book that helps parents and educators start conversations with kids about actions children can take when they are being bullied, or are a witness to other kids being tormented at school.
A consequence is something that follows naturally from a person’s action, inaction or poor decision. It differs from a punishment in that a punishment is retribution. Punishment is “getting back” at someone, to hurt them back for a hurt they did. When you get a speeding ticket, it’s not a retribution for something you did wrong. It’s a consequence of your poor choices and decisions.
When you’re giving a child a consequence, it’s important to make it flow naturally from the child’s choice or action. For example, if your son sleeps late and doesn’t get up for school, the natural consequence is to go to bed earlier that night to get more sleep. The natural consequence isn’t to take his phone for a week. Tell him he has to go to bed early for the next three nights, and then if he can show you he can get up for school, you’ll go back to the later bedtime.
You graduated from school years ago. But you’re still dealing with homework every night for hours on end, and it’s no fun. If your child refuses to bring work home, won’t do it at night or gives you endless grief when you try to help, Empowering Parents has some answers for you. Here, James Lehman explains how to get your child to do his homework so that you can stop the nightly tug of war and stop doing the work for him.
Homework is often a barometer of what’s going on in the child’s life, and it’s easy for parents to misinterpret the issue. Sometimes the child can’t do the work because of a learning disability. Very often, the issue really isn’t the homework. The homework is what we call the “incident.” The issue is an unwillingness to do the work.
Last month, we invited readers to email us with their “Number One Concern” for their child in the upcoming school year. Our Parental Support Line staff responded to each inquiry with suggestions based on the Total Transformation and Total Focus Programs. Read on to see what you can do to help you and your child get through the school year with flying colors.
Nearly a quarter of all 12 to 17 year olds in the latest National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported current marijuana usage. Unfortunately, kids with ADHD typically have the highest rate of drug use among their peers. According to Stephen Andrew LCSW, a substance abuse counselor and director of the Health Education Training Institute of Maine, the latest statistics say that 80 percent of all kids with ADHD are using illegal drugs.
What I typically suggest to parents is that they don’t allow violent video games in their home. If and when the issue comes up, that is actually a good opportunity to talk about their values, how to resolve conflicts and disputes in a non-violent way, which are useful conversations to have with kids. In any case it’s useful to convey your values to your children that violent solutions are not appropriate. Non-violent solutions can almost always be found.”
All parents want to see their child as the smartest, most capable boy or girl on the block. So why would they want to have a label attached to them that often coveys just the opposite--such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder? What a difference one word can make. Suppose we changed the last D in ADHD from “disorder” to “difference.”
Unfortunately, a diagnosis and medication aren’t always a solution. Medications that target behavior problems are at best a shot in the dark and at worst can have many undesirable side effects and alter the child’s personality. There is a fork in the road that many parents face daily: "We have a behavior problem. Should I medicate my child?"
The public perception of bullying is that bullies are acting out to cover their own fears. They may indeed be afraid, but accepting this as a reason makes bullies sound like victims of their fears -- like we're supposed to feel sorry for them and not hold them responsible for their abusive actions.
