“Oh, the places you’ll go…” – Where is Your Student Headed?

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.”  ― Dr. Seuss

When your children were born, you probably had wondrous visions of what their beautiful life would be like.  By high school, they’ve come a long way and hopefully are on a good path toward happiness and success. But at what are they pointed?  Every great achievement begins with a vision – much as you probably had when your children were born.  But what vision do your kids have – for their future?  With our students (at Launch-Your-Life), we start developing a Master Dream List – everything they ever hope to achieve, experience, possess or become. We have found that almost all of our students have ignited their own academic focus after their dreams have been identified and then narrowed – to 1 or 2 or 3.

What does this mean for you?  Some younger people aren’t very skilled or practiced at dreaming.  Dreams are pretty close to hope – and hope is all we have, most days!  Depending on their age and ‘maturity’ – they may not do well at first.  But recent research on the teenage brain indicates that with repeated efforts in this area, you can almost speed up maturation.

• Begin asking them now.  At first, they may be suspicious.  That’s OK – it’s a standard part of the parent-child tug-of-war. 

• But keep asking, as days and weeks go on.

A couple key thoughts:

• Almost whatever they say, respond with “that’s good!” –

• or “that sounds great” or “sounds like fun”

• Any negative or challenging comment has the potential to shut them down. These are only dreams – so no worries at this stage. 

You may also want to follow up with

• “Why is that important to you?” –

• Or “what is it about that dream the really excites you?” – or similar.  

And again, as time goes on, ask them how that dream is coming in their thinking – and maybe ask – “what do you think you’ll need to do to get there?” – or similar questions.  And don’t forget – be supportive, no matter what.  Because - there’s another side benefit: by beginning to dream – and possibly then find out they couldn’t get there, that ‘failure’ provides them the strengthening benefit of rebounding from defeat or a wrong decision.  And lest you think that’s cruel – recent research and evidence is the opposite: professors and coaches are finding that very intelligent and highly skilled young people are virtually paralyzed by defeats and failures. So when they fail, or reject the dream – make it a teaching moment: query, discuss, draw conclusions – for (their) next time.   

Good luck!

ME - a Helicopter parent??

We’ve heard a lot recently about helicopter parenting.  Most all parents immediately reject the notion that they might be one.  In defending themselves, they usually reference protecting their kids’ safety, success and happiness.  It’s probably not worth indicting or crucifying them.  The issue is – where do we go from here?   Here’s a parallel: when I worked in a school district, in assessing student’s learning problems, oft-times a neurologist was called in to determine if there was brain damage. REGARDLESS of the neurologist’s finding, the prescriptive remediation and individualized educational plan WAS THE SAME.  In like fashion, whether you or anyone is ‘convicted’ of being a helicopter parent, here’s what you should do or should have been doing:

• ·        EVERY failure, whether in the classroom or athletic field should be treated as a learning opportunity. Years ago, I heard the expression “don’t lose the lesson.”  Life teaches us lessons about itself every day – but we must be attuned AND open to learning them.

• ·        In a casual, conversational, non-accusatory way, walk your student through the defeat: in your heart of hearts, being honest with yourself, what went wrong?” “Did you not put enough effort into it?” “Did you not know, clearly and specifically what you were supposed to do?” “Were you too embarrassed to ask what you thought would be heard as a dumb question?” [The answer to that is “the only dumb question is the one you didn’t ask” – because – inevitably – someone else ALSO didn’t get it.

• Treat them like peers or friends.  The minute you talk down to them, you’re losing them.  Value their mind and their thoughts.

• Remember – recent research shows that a negative comment has FOUR TIMES the impact of a positive comment or compliment.

·        In my (other) work, developing business leaders, there are two basics: Leadership is influence. To influence anyone, you must (a) listen to them and (b) meet or fill their needs.  A manager who dictates what employees should do gets far less productivity than the one who connects the needed task(s) or projects to the employee’s dreams and goals.  Same thing with your student!!

• As a parent, your function is to LEAD your student toward his/her optimum success and happiness. Teach them a model or process to deal with defeat and failure and they’ll learn and value one of life’s most valuable and powerful lessons. Explain how you’ve handled defeats and whether or not it worked. As in much of life, showing your vulnerability can be bonding.

·        Whether you’re helicoptering or over-parenting or just compassionate, allow them to fail and get themselves back up.

·        And if you have questions or comments, don’t hesitate!

Steve Simons, Launch-Your-Life.com

FOUR Actions to Strengthen your student’s success this year

 By now, your student(s) have been back in school for a week or several.  As you envision their school year, keep the following in mind:  The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.  Whatever you saw them do or not do last year will probably RECUR this year!  In addition – and this is a hard one for many people to believe – all behavior is successful – at living out ‘the script’ that’s in our heads, whether conscious, sub-conscious or other.  Hopefully these are successful behaviors.  But often, they can be self-defeating actions or self-fulfilling prophesies, etc. The ONLY exception to that explanation MAY be that they may simply don’t KNOW any other response.  But if you want your student to change, you have to change the results they experience.  [ACTION 1] The best way to achieve that is to alter or fine-tune their PROCESS.  [ACTION 2] You may (probably?) have to guide them, in explicit detail, in planning what and when they will do something – prioritize, plan, write it down.  Recent research regarding the teenage brain tells us their ability to balance and weigh priorities and thence to plan is weak, not fully formed and incomplete at this age.  That incomplete brain maturation also leads to easily forgetting what they were doing.L  [ACTION 3] Helping them plan toward big projects – and breaking the project into more do-able chunks, perhaps using a large wall calendar or such can be a great tool and strategy to help them see the bigger picture and then to guide their WEEKLY actions.  [ACTION 4] One secret which helps overcome several different issues is SMALLER & SMALLER.  Take any task and break it into smaller chunks. This diminishes procrastination, fear, avoidance, too little time, poor planning, etc.  It also increases the person’s self-confidence [self-confidence comes from repeated successes], hence increases their MOMENTUM toward the next step.  And the key is to ACT NOW. If you’ve seen a problem or weakness in the past, don’t wait until it mushrooms into major problems – begin the correction now.  And please report back on your results!  Steve Simons, Launch-Your-Life.com