Teaching your child how to persevere

IT IS 8 PM on a Sunday and your fourth grader is at the dining table working on a book report. He has been at it for the last 30 minutes. All of a sudden, he runs to you and wails he has no idea how to begin. And there is absolutely no way he can finish it. It just so happens that the report is due the next day. What do you do? Do you offer to do the report yourself?

Your daughter decides one summer that she wants to enroll in ballet lessons. After a few sessions, she screams, “I quit!" Do you allow her to quit?

This is a common problem for parents -- a child who quits even when he has barely begun. What can you do to help? How can you teach a child to persevere at a task and not give up so easily? Experts will tell you that there are three things you can do: 1) Set realistic expectations of your child; 2) Teach him how to go through a task step by step; and 3) Praise his “small victories” as he sets out to accomplish something.

Set realistic expectations of your child.

Parents need to impose performance standards for a child but such standards must be realistic and take into account his age and skills. For example, you cannot ask an infant to feed himself but you can certainly expect a fourth grader to be able to do his homework. The main thing is to let children know exactly what is expected of them. Otherwise, they will feel either that they can get away with anything or that nothing they do is ever good enough.

These set expectations refer not only to homework but to other tasks as well.

Monette Cruz-Barreiro, a consulting psychologist at the Ateneo Wellness Center, notes that kids from ages 7-12 are at that stage when they are trying to find out what they can do independently. “They are actually receptive to being assigned simple things to do in the house,” she says. “Some tasks that they can do would be folding clean clothes, preparing the table for meals, sweeping the floor, feeding the pets, helping prepare desserts or sandwiches, and other similar tasks. The important thing is for them to think of assigned tasks at home as something valuable that they can contribute to the family. There must be some element of fun in it too so that their interest can be sustained.”

Cruz-Barreiro adds” “Sometimes, when kids are given things to do that are beyond their current capability, they get discouraged and leave them unfinished. Or if they are always criticized and if their parents never seem to be satisfied with their performance, they lose interest in trying to achieve something.

Teach a child how to go through a task step by step.

In her book Bird by Bird - Some Instructions on Writing and Life, Anne Lamott explains the title of her book with this story: "Thirty years ago my older brother, who was 10 years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write. It was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder, paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said, ‘Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.’”

Some children need a lot of structure. You have to help them break a large project, such as a book report or a term paper, into smaller tasks so they are not totally overwhelmed. Children in grade school need parents to help them set up a regular place and time to do homework, as well as constant reminders that they need to do it.

So, what do you do if your child puts off doing his homework and he turns in his report late? It is tempting to jump in and offer to finish it for him but don’t do it. This is the only way he will learn that procrastination has unpleasant consequences. The next time, you can pitch in and help him plan his time better.

Cruz-Barreiro agrees: “It is good to let our kids do their school projects by themselves first and just let them ask us if there is something they can’t handle by themselves. Many times, parents just take over and give directions about how to do every little thing. What is best is to just give suggestions if the child seems to be having some difficulty with the task but help them make decisions on their own. Encourage them to think of solutions or of the best way to do things. Teaching our children to problem-solve and to make decisions, according to the level that they are currently capable of, is crucial in empowering them for life.”

Praise your child’s ‘small victories’.

Lawrence Balter, PhD, an author and professor of applied psychology at New York University, believes that a common mistake parents make is routinely telling a child he’s ‘terrific’ or ‘great’ or ‘deserving’ when there is nothing concrete to back up the praise. “Such empty platitudes do more harm than good,” he says. “On the one hand, they may lead a child to overestimate his abilities; on the other, they deprive a child of recognition when he really does achieve.”

Cruz-Barreiro is in full agreement: “In praising as well as in rewarding and punishing, we must remember to give a commensurate amount in relation to what was done or accomplished. If we praise them for every little thing that they do, then its meaning and power to influence them is lessened.”

Columbia University Professor of Psychology Carol Dweck, PhD, also believes that children should be praised for effort and not for intelligence. She found out in a research project that when children are praised for intelligence, they avoid risks in an effort to keep looking smart. However, the kids who are praised for effort are actually energized by the difficult questions.

“We overestimate the power of intelligence and underestimate the power of effort,” says Sanford Dornbusch, PhD, professor of sociology and education at Stanford. His research with thousands of high school students showed that those who achieved the most had parents who gave them the right kind of praise -- for hard work and effort -- and made offers to help if grades went down. Those who performed the worst had parents who either ignored grades, punished, or criticized poor grades or paid for good grades with money or other material rewards.

Rewarding good grades with money or material rewards sends out the wrong signals. Says Cruz-Barreiro: “Giving our children money or other kinds of rewards just to get them to do something is not a good idea. We should be able to inculcate in them the desire to do things to the best of their ability, to strive for excellence, and to be proud of a job well done.”

To children, even more important than the praise and the encouragement they get from their parents is their need to know that they are accepted and valued. Cruz-Barreiro suggests that parents use the ‘language of acceptance’ to encourage their kids: “The ‘language of acceptance’ tells our kids that they matter to us, that they are individuals with their own thoughts and feelings, that we want to know what they think and how they feel, and that they have a ‘say’ in what is happening around them. The goal is to make our kids feel loved and valued just by being themselves. When a child is given acceptance and love just the way he is, he starts thinking of how he can “better” himself and how he can achieve his highest potential. That is a paradox but it is true.”