Unlocking Academic Success: Guiding Your Child’s Learning at Home

Educational research shows a positive correlation between parental homework support and improved academic and social skills for the student. Supporting your child’s homework and home-based learning is a concrete way to improve educational outcomes.

What Does the Research Say?

Studies published by journals such as the Journal of Education Psychology, Journal of Developmental Psychology, and Educational Review all explore the positive relationship between parental involvement and improvement in academic performance. Parents who read with their children, explore nature together, or play educational games at home show increased academic performance and critical thinking. 

The National Education Association (NEA) has research showing that parental involvement improves students academically, boosts confidence, and improves their social-emotional development. 

For decades, educational researchers have shown an extremely positive correlation between parental education in the home and improved academic and social skills for the student. Each family can include plans and structures to help ease the burden on the family and keep educational time productive.

Create a Designated Space for Homework

Setting good examples in your house can be a great first step in supporting your child’s ongoing education. For example, set up a designated reading or quiet area, such as a library, den, office, or quiet nook where your child knows people in the house go to read or study. This sets an expectation of what happens in this space and helps establish a good learning environment.

Foster a Learning-Friendly Environment

Besides making a room readily available, making it learning-friendly is also a key step. Making sure the room is free from distractions—for example, having a no cell phone or tablet rule for the designated study room—is a good way to start.

Make sure the room has only the necessary technology, maybe a sound machine for white noise, a radio to listen to music (at a low volume), or a computer that can be used for research and word processing only (no social media).

Make sure that this room also has any other supplies needed for the child, such as pens, paper, markers, scissors, tape and glue, rulers, etc., and any other items that could be used for creating projects.

Laying the foundation early, with all rules communicated, will help set expectations and increase the chance of a successful study room.

Set Times and Use a Timer to Create a Habit

Once a space is established, create times when certain members of the house, specifically the children, can use the space. This helps set the standard of what the room is to be used for and helps create a schedule. Designate times when the parents can also be in the study space to help answer questions and look up answers together. Learning together can increase recall and help make learning more exciting for your child.

Use a timer to form the habit of a specific time for study and homework. For example, set the timer for an hour and then allow for a 10-15 minute break before restarting the timer.

Get to Know the Curriculum

This step will require some extra work on the parents’ part because it requires that the parent be fully involved in the student’s coursework. This means that the parent is aware of what classes the student is enrolled in and of projects, assignments, or papers the student should be working on.

You can do this in several ways. First, request the student show their class syllabus to map out entire months of projects. If the student does not have a syllabus (some teachers do not utilize them), then a clear line of communication with the teacher of the course must be formed early.

Being fully aware and involved in your child’s coursework will help ensure that assignments are not missed and that your child gets the most out of each class.

Once all course information is gathered, sit with your child and write goals with a timeline. This will help you and your child track the goals throughout the weeks, months, semesters, and school year.

Practice Goal Setting

When goals are met or not met, discuss this with your child. Discuss why meeting the goal was successful and how you can replicate that. Or discuss why the goal was not met and what course of action your child can take to improve outcomes in the future. Goal setting is an important life skill; mastering it will improve your child’s academic performance.

Work WITH Your Child, Not FOR Your Child

As any parent would want their child to succeed, it is hard to step back and watch a child fail or not be as successful on a paper, assignment, or project. However, failing is also a great learning opportunity. Failing but continuing to improve helps the child develop resilience in the face of adversity, which are excellent skills to carry into adulthood. While it might be hard, do not complete work for your child or push your child in the direction you think they should go. Instead, become your child’s assistant, gather supplies, set up things, and ask how to help. This step will probably be one of the more difficult ones for parents, but allowing your child to be the project manager on their assignments will ensure they get the maximum learning out of each assignment.

Lead by Example

Lead your child by example. Spend time reading and learning, maintain a healthy diet, and exercise regularly. It is much easier to convince children to complete tasks when the expectation is being held for all family members.

The Takeaway

Here is a recap of the steps you can take to support your child’s learning at home.

1. Stay motivated by acknowledging that increased parental involvement leads to better academic outcomes.
2. Institute various household educational standards, such as study times and a well-developed study room.
3. Encourage healthy habits, such as diet, exercise, and appropriate sleep for age.
4. When working with your child, be their assistant, not their project manager.

By maintaining consistency in the home, you can watch your child flourish academically!

Resources

1. Hill NE, Tyson DF. Parental involvement in middle school: a meta-analytic assessment of the strategies that promote achievement. Dev Psychol. 2009 May;45(3):740-63. doi: 10.1037/a0015362. PMID: 19413429; PMCID: PMC2782391.

2. Hayakawa M, Englund MM, Warner-Richter MN, Reynolds AJ. The Longitudinal Process of Early Parent Involvement on Student Achievement: A Path Analysis. NHSA Dialog. 2013;16(1):103-126. PMID: 27867317; PMCID: PMC5115270.

3. Goodall, J. (2019). Parental engagement and deficit discourses: absolving the system and solving parents. Educational Review, 73(1), 98–110. Link

4. How to Establish Strong Parent-Teacher Communication