7 Practical Tips on How to Get Your Child Organized for School
Leading a well-organized life is not something a person perfects in one day; it is something that has to be learned and imbibed over the course of one’s lifetime. Every human being has their formative years, and the type of upbringing they’re exposed to largely influences the kind of adult they’ll become.
Now, you have your child, and you’d like to see him or her organized without being told all the time, especially when it comes to school-related tasks. It could be getting his/her homework done, or having all school items appropriately stored.
It’s laudable if your child does all these tasks on their own, but in truth, these tasks require having a good memory and focus. Among children without Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), remembering and organizing their daily school life is hard enough, how much more kids with ADHD; it can be challenging.
Getting Organized for School
A parent or guardian can tackle such a challenge by ensuring that there is a system in place which helps them be in control and stay on top of organizing their activities. The following tips will help get your child organized all the time for school.
1. Make sure your child’s room is orderly
Keep finished projects and ongoing projects separately. Keep school supplies and art materials in specially labeled bins, cabinets, folders or in a box. Keep books on a shelf and place a bulletin board where you can pin reminders. The idea is to have everything that your child needs for school in specific places meant for them so that they can be found with ease when required. Label each folder, bin or cabinet compartment with the name of the content in them. Doing this will help your child find things easily since a tag or label identifies what’s kept where. For custom designed tags and labels, check Wunderlabel.com
2. Use reminders
Teach your child to have a schedule for upcoming events and get hard copy organizers to help them remember. A pad of sticky notes should suffice. He or she can post these notes in areas where he frequently goes such as the mirror or the bathroom door.
3. Gift your child a daily planner
A daily planner is a great way to monitor deadlines, upcoming events, and appointments. By keeping a standard to-do list, he/she can prioritize on what tasks to get done immediately and which one can be done later.
4. Always have him prepared for the next day.
Never in the morning of the D-day, but the night before. Pack his/her books every evening before the next school day; keep the homework in the right folder and every other thing he/she may need – the clarinet for the school band, sneakers, snacks – make sure these are available for the next day. During weekends, check the backpack to ensure everything he/she needs for the coming week is available.
5. Get your child school gear that helps them get organized
Some backpacks have multiple compartments; there’s a compartment for big books, for smaller books, pencils, and other stationery; for a water bottle, etc. School gears as such will help your child remain organized and conscious of what’s missing from the items he/she ought to take to school.
6. Have structured weekends
If your child has ADHD, most Sunday evenings will leave him or her panicking because there are some things that he/she should have done over the weekend, but didn’t. Create a weekend routine in which you go over the week’s work to make sure nothing’s left out, and your child can go to school on Monday without any worries. You’d be surprised at how much kids worry about not getting their homework done.
7. Offer support and praise
If you see your child adhering to instructions about being organized and putting in the effort, let him/her know that you see the efforts and that you are proud of what he/she is doing.
Even as adults, being organized takes a lot of effort and it’s only natural to do if you are already used to it. So, to shape your children into adults who will take organization very seriously, you need to start from a young age.Thanks for reading and till next post!