Bad Progress Report: Now What?

For struggling students, few things can be as daunting as progress reports or report cards coming home. Even high performing students can feel anxiety over the dreaded grade reports. Regardless of how our children performed on their latest grading period, the dialogue we have with them surrounding their progress reports and report cards should be constructive. Here are some grade-appropriate tips for discussing poor grades with your children, provided by Doug Tynan, Chief Preventative Health Psychologist at Nemours Health & Prevention Services, and former director of programs for children with behavior and learning problems at the AI DuPont Hospital for Children and the Children’s National Medical Center:   Grades K-3:

• Help your children understand the details of their progress reports or report cards so they can understand in greater terms than just “good” or “bad” – for example, helping them understand that a report card lets you know how hard they have worked, and measures how much they have learned.
• Open up dialogue about their performance in specific subjects – find out which ones they like/dislike, which ones they find easy or difficult, and ones in which subjects they may be learning a new skill.
• Remind them of how much progress has been made since the beginning of the year, offering specific examples such as, “Remember when you first started the school year and you needed mommy’s help to read a sentence? Now, you can read a whole page without anyone’s help.” And remember – praise them for their accomplishments!

  Grades 4 and up:

• Don’t wait for them to bring up the topic of the report card because they usually won’t! Start a dialogue by asking them how they think they did that grading period.
• Try to find at least a few positive things in the report card before talking about the negative.
• Take the teacher’s notes into consideration – they may give you better insight into your child’s classroom behavior, effort, participation and attendance than a simple grade. If there are no teacher notes, consider requesting a parent/teacher conference to discuss the details behind the grades.
• If grades are low or don’t meet your expectations, set a plan with your child to show improvement before the next grading period. Try to figure out what’s impacting the grade negatively (missing homework assignments, classroom behavior, low test scores, etc.) and then work together to set realistic goals for improvement. You may also consider hiring a tutor to help him/her improve grades.

  We’ve Talked…Now What? After the discussion with your child, you may be considering rewards or punishments for good or bad performance, respectively; but both should be tempered with realistic expectations to achieve your desired outcomes for the next grading period. For example, while rewards will most likely be appreciated, it's best to keep them small so that the right expectations are set for future grading periods. If you give them a new video game console for a solid report card this semester, what will they expect for a similar performance on the next report card? Instead, you may want to consider something that will involve the whole family, such as a dinner at a restaurant of their choosing, or taking them to a movie they’ve been dying to see. Similarly, punishing your child for a bad report card isn’t likely to increase his/her efforts on the next one. It may even lead to a cycle of negativity and anger that could further worsen his/her academic performance. Developing a realistic action plan for improvement is a better approach to realize results. Consider creating a dedicated homework or study hour for your child each night. Work with his/her teacher to verify assignments and course progress – many schools post grades and even progress online. Make playtime with friends contingent upon completing all homework assignments. Working together with your student will help him/her to develop the proper motivation to improve. A united effort between you, your child, and your child’s teachers will ensure success for all!   The good news: there's still time to see a positive change in your child's grades before the end of this school year!  Many students benefit from working one-on-one with a qualified tutor, such as the instructors at Club Z! Because in-home tutors are able to dedicate 100% of their attention to a single child, results happen quickly. This individualized attention from a qualified education professional can help students move from feeling frustrated at their poor grades to being proud of their accomplishments, often in just a few short weeks. If you think your child could benefit from the help of a tutor, please call 800-434-2582 today to reach the Club Z! location nearest you.