Studying has become a demanding activity for many students over the years. For many parents, motivating their children to study means being aware of them and always providing reinforcements (in the form of rewards) just to get them to their study hall. Some parents I know even pay their children for every book they read. With so many distractions taking kids away from their textbooks, like computer games and shopping malls, finding ways to make studying a fun learning activity for them has become a daunting task for many parents. There are ways to develop good study habits in a child. Here are some useful ones.
Have a regular time to study. An effective way to develop a child’s study habit is to have a regular time to study, either before or after school hours. Try to determine the best time of day for your child to study. Should it be in the morning or in the afternoon? Also try to figure out how much time your child should spend studying a subject. Depending on your child’s needs, the situation may vary, but this should be done regularly for most effective results. Children easily develop a habit if an activity is done and repeated regularly. Studying is no exception.
Designate your child’s hideout for studying. It would be to your child’s advantage if you provide her with a specific place to go whenever she wants to study. It doesn’t have to be a big place. A small room or corner of the house will do as long as it offers enough space and quiet that is conducive to concentrating on study lessons. Create a safe and comfortable atmosphere by designing the space in a way that promotes clear thinking for positive learning. Too many accessories can clutter the room, so avoid these unnecessary accessories. Instead, try fresh plants or flowers in a clear glass vase or an aquarium with goldfish. Either one can help stimulate the student in a relaxing way. To complete the atmosphere, soft and calm music should fill the air. Purely instrumental classical pieces are ideal for this purpose; none of those with words, to keep her child’s focus on what she is studying instead of the background music. Also check the light in the study room: it should not be too dim and not too bright.
Understand your child’s learning style. Find out what makes learning easy for you. For example, is your child a sequential learner who learns through a step-by-step process? Perhaps he/she is a visual-spatial learner who needs to imagine the scenes of the story he/she is reading in order to understand it well. Or maybe she needs to highlight or color important keywords in the learning module. Whatever your child’s learning style, it should work for him/her and should be nurtured. By the way, if your son gets to understand or memorize better while she eats, let him have some snacks in study hall.
Help your child allocate his study time. He/she only has so much time in a day to review his/her lessons and do all the homework. Help her budget study time wisely by figuring out which subjects she needs more time to review. It might be the one he’s not very good at, or the one he gets low grades at. Ask him to spend more time on these weaknesses.
Encourage your child to be creative. Your child should have fun learning. Studying does not have to be boring and onerous. Apart from designing your study room, you can also make your study materials look attractive. For example, your notebooks can be personalized with your own cover designs.
Give your child the break they need so much. He/she gets tired too, you know. Some studies indicate that most students have an attention span of 25 minutes or less. If your child has to study for a longer period of time, let him take a 5-minute break for every 30 to 45 minutes of studying by stretching or relaxing his eyes. This will help your child clarify her thoughts and put him in a better mood to absorb more information.
It is not bad for parents to give their children a prize from time to time for studying well. This is positive reinforcement that can further help develop good study habits in your children. Have I mentioned my sister’s reward scheme for her son who is now in sixth grade? She can probably best describe it by saying here that her son has always excelled in her class since first grade.