Focus on the Family Parenting Podcast

Guest (Female): If you're a pastor wanting to save and strengthen marriages in your congregation, we've got a great tool for you. Marriage 911 by Focus on the Family trains laypeople to mentor couples who may be on the verge of divorce or who want to strengthen what they already have.

The kit includes two leader guides, four workbooks, and all the training necessary to meet with and mentor men and women who need help. Visit marriage911.com. That's marriage, the numbers 9-1-1, dot com.

John Fuller: Well, you know that getting your kids to do their homework is a chore. It's not about just passing the grade; it's about setting them up for success in life. We're going to talk about that today. I'm John Fuller, joined by Dr. Danny Huerta, who heads up our parenting team, as we continue our education theme this month. Danny, what are the numbers about kids and homework?

Danny Huerta: It's a good theme, by the way. This whole education thing is so important. We've got to dive into this. Over 80 percent of parents say that their kids struggle with their homework in one way or another, so it's eight out of ten. Two in three students said that they have struggles in their homework.

What was fascinating to me, just thinking about the statistics and looking into it, is that 33 percent of parents say they don't understand their kids' homework, and they have kids kindergarten to eighth grade. They just think it's too complex or they're not understanding where they're coming from, probably the junior high kids or the middle school kids.

25 percent of parents say they're too busy to help their kids with homework. Then 41 percent of parents said that their kids just don't want help with homework, yet they want to help their kids. There are a lot of different types of struggles that parents face around this homework thing. They have different temperaments. Some kids just want to do it on their own, and kids that probably want help at every second, and then you don't have that capacity to give them help on everything.

You don't need to go through the fifth grade again. It gets tricky on how much you help your child with it, how much you let them just struggle through it and power through it even if they have a meltdown, because they need to learn how to handle working through all that. Then how much do you press that child that thinks they know everything and need to learn how to be okay with some help? Those are three big things to be considered.

John Fuller: They are. I'm just thinking back. It's been a while, but one of my kids was in, I think, sixth grade—fifth or sixth grade. I said, "You're not really trying. No, you really need to do your homework." "No, I don't." At that point, I thought he's kind of right. He doesn't have to do his homework. There are kids who don't have to because they can glide through and hit the mark on other elements of classroom performance.

Boy, if you've got a child who's kind of slacking or maybe stubborn about it, listen in. Aaron McPherson and Ellen Schuknecht joined Focus president Jim Daly to talk about what you might be able to do.

Jim Daly: Let's say that you have a sixth, seventh, eighth grader that isn't doing well with homework for whatever reason, struggles with that. I can think of some cases where it's robbing me of my time. It's not that they want to be disrespectful, but they're just calculating, "You know what? I don't like homework." So they're struggling getting it in on a consistent basis. Is that a moral deficit? What's happening there, and how do you correct it at a later stage?

Guest (Female): Well, I think it's a deficit in what they're wanting isn't rightly ordered. It's a matter of them learning again that there is a consequence to what they're doing, and they're choosing to do other things. I mean, seventh and eighth graders you're mentioning are at a very different stage. They love peers. They love to take downtime. They like to do the easier things.

But it's pointing them to the future and always being the vision caster as parents. I think one of the best things we can do is to affirm our kids, point them to where they're headed, speak words of life over them. "I know you're wanting to become a vet or you're wanting to do well in high school. What are you doing right now that's helping that happen?"

Jim Daly: That seems rooted in self-motivation. In other words, a child that has that desire that's even said to you, "I want to become a veterinarian." That's a big want. That's a big wish. That's healthy and that's good. What about the child who says, "I really don't care about it. I don't like school." Some children are in that spot. What do you say to them? They don't seem motivated. They don't have a bigger vision, and they don't particularly like you casting a vision for them.

Guest (Female): You know what? I'm a firm believer that all kids deeply do want to do well, and something's gotten in the way. Sometimes it's a perfectionistic ideal that they think they cannot be good enough. I always tell parents, don't fall for that. Start to figure out how to cast a vision. Pray, in a way when you're praying, rather than praying about what's wrong, saying, "I'm so glad Johnny is wanting to do better and figuring out how to do that." You don't fall for that.

Jim Daly: Yeah. Talk to us about the overdoing of praise. Because you can see that as well. When children aren't really earning your praise, but because we've been told as parents, make sure you're praising your kids, we say, "Wow, I've never seen anybody eat a bowl of cereal the way you've just eaten that cereal. You're awesome. High-five me." Kids can go, "Wow, that's all you need for strokes here. That's pretty easy." Do we give our kids a challenge when we're over-praising them?

Guest (Female): I think not only do we not give them a challenge, but we also kind of set ourselves up as liars. Like you say, "You're the smartest kid in the entire world." And the kid figures it out. "Wait, I got a C on this. I'm not the smartest kid in the entire world. My mom lied to me."

Jim Daly: Do they really process it that way?

Guest (Female): I think some older kids could. I think the important thing is to praise the effort, to praise the process. "You worked really hard on that math assignment. I'm proud of you. You've done a really good job of trying to learn patience."

Jim Daly: So don't overstate it.

Guest (Female): Right. Praise the process and the effort and what they're working on instead of these amazing feats. Also, don't praise something that God gave them, like, "You're the most beautiful person in the world." That's a gift from God.

John Fuller: Well, Danny, as we focus this month on everyday parenting, especially around school, we heard there at the end of the clip that you shouldn't falsely praise your kids. I get that. My wife, I think, was probably a little bit falsely praised as a kid. She just has this sniffer, if I can call it that, that she feels like, "Well, my mom told me I was the best even though I wasn't because she was my mom. She just did that."

Danny Huerta: Yeah, and part of that's normal.

John Fuller: So how do we offer warranted, real encouragement and praise to our kids without overdoing it?

Danny Huerta: It gets tricky because we're trying to encourage our kids and just let them know, "Man, I absolutely love you and I believe in you." As parents, there are great intentions there. For your words to have power, you want to have things that are descriptive to that child because then they will believe it.

If you say, "Man, that was responsible. I noticed that. That was awesome," you're pinpointing what you saw in them and you put a label on it that was correct. If you just say, "Man, you're great," or, "You're so smart," they come to expect that they're supposed to get everything.

But if you say, "Man, I noticed you worked so hard on that. You've been working really hard. I'm proud of you." Or maybe you could work a little harder. It's okay to also bring life-giving words that encourage a child to push a little harder. Sometimes as parents, we feel that maybe we're going to demoralize our kids. Is that criticism? It's constructive in nature.

If you have a solid relationship with your child, you can say, "Boy, I've noticed you've been tired, and I've also noticed that you've started giving up on this. I believe in you. And I think you can give another ounce or two. Let's figure out how you celebrate at the end of that pushing yourself." I can tell that this is hard for you.

In sports, some parents feel the need to tell their kids that they're excellent, that they did great. The game didn't go as good and they just want to compliment them. The child knows that they just lost, or the child knows that they didn't do so well. Just check in on them emotionally. That's a good way to be life-giving there. "How are you processing this? What are you thinking about right now? I want to go in there with you."

John Fuller: Yeah. I heard somebody talking about how this world is set up to win and lose. And you know if you're winning or losing. But we've kind of robbed our kids of understanding that experientially because everybody gets a participation trophy or everybody gets a word or everybody gets to stand up.

So there's an element of failure and not winning that shaped me, for sure. I wasn't very athletic as a kid. I wasn't overly intellectual as a kid. I didn't stand out in any way, shape, or form. That did something to me. So you're saying praise the good stuff specifically and don't try to overcome feelings of "I didn't measure up."

Danny Huerta: Yes, and I want to put an "and" to that. There's also a time when a child fails where it wouldn't be helpful to say, "Man, you just failed," and it wouldn't be helpful to say, "You did great," because they know that. This is the question you asked earlier. "How are you feeling about this?"

Or you can just say, "Man, I'm right here. This was tough, wasn't it? I love you. I want you to know that." Just let me know if you just need me to listen, just be here with you. That shows that you are willing to still—your love is steadfast. It doesn't depend on any of their performance. That's something your kid needs to know. That's very encouraging.

John Fuller: Yeah, I so appreciate that. You always bring life-giving words and you're very good at reminding me of things I could have done differently, but I can do with other people.

Danny Huerta: We all wish we could press rewind. All of us, me too, John. We'll get there.

John Fuller: And you'll get there, mom and dad. We believe in you. So one of the things that Focus developed is a free parenting assessment. Danny, this is a terrific free thing that parents can do. It's going to take 10, 15, 20 minutes. Actually, it depends on how many kids they have.

Danny Huerta: That's right. It's per child. Know that we did that intentionally. That was after polling many parents on what would be most helpful from this assessment. From that, we decided it needed to be per child.

John Fuller: So I come and I take the assessment for my firstborn, my second, my third.

Danny Huerta: And then it gives you, "Here are your two strengths, make sure you use those often. And then here are your two opportunities for growth out of these seven traits." Again, it's easy to take, it's quick, but it gives you an initial playbook to work off of as a parent.

Some ideas that you don't have to do all of them, but some ideas to work off of as you invest in your relationship with that one child. If you have seven or eight kids, just spread it out and take the assessment at different times. The idea is that you're taking initiative towards growing as a parent, and we're always growing as parents.

John Fuller: You're a student of your child when you're parenting well. This tool is designed to help you have lots of great info and perspective. Again, it's the free parenting assessment and the link is in the episode notes.

Get a copy of the book from Aaron McPherson called *The Christian Mama's Guide to the Grade School Years*. It is a terrific resource for moms with younger children, great for a church library or for a neighbor or friend or family member or for you. Make a donation today of any amount and support this show and this ministry. We'll send the book to you. Details are in the show notes.

Next time we'll talk with Linda Ranson Jacobs about how she worked through a really challenging scenario with one of her kids who was misbehaving at school. For now, on behalf of Dr. Danny Huerta and the entire team, I'm John Fuller and thanks for listening to the Focus on the Family Parenting Podcast.

Guest (Female): If you're a pastor wanting to save and strengthen marriages in your congregation, we've got a great tool for you. Marriage 911 by Focus on the Family trains laypeople to mentor couples who may be on the verge of divorce or who want to strengthen what they already have.

The kit includes two leader guides, four workbooks, and all the training necessary to meet with and mentor men and women who need help. Visit marriage911.com. That's marriage, the numbers 9-1-1, dot com.