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Health & Fitness

Homework without Stress

What if homework could be easy and stress-free?

Does homework interfere with your family life and create stress, tension, and tears in your household?  Students often struggle to find the time to fit in homework after a long day at school and a busy schedule of extracurricular activities. In addition, parents often have had a full day at work or have been involved in the day-to-day activities that come with raising a family.  Homework time comes and avoidance rears it’s head, tempers flare, crankiness builds up and frustration abounds. What would it take for homework to be an experience of ease and joy? Does it really have to be a chore that is dreaded by all? What could be different about homework?

How many decisions and conclusions do you have about the “right “ way to do homework? How often do you argue and disagree about homework and how much does your child resist doing the homework? Have you decided when, where, and how homework must be done? Does that work for you and your child or is it a constant battle? Or does your routine work sometimes but not other times?

If it is a constant battle would you be willing to look at a different possibility that may allow for more ease in your life? 

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What if there was no “right” way to do homework? What if all our beliefs and everything we were told, and everything we read about “how” homework should get done are actually what’s getting in the way of it getting done? Would you be willing to wipe the slate clean and look at a different way to parent your child through homework? What if you could parent from awareness rather than rules? Would you be willing to parent from what works for you and your child rather than what works for others?

An open-ended question empowers, where a decision or conclusion disempowers.  It’s like taking a solid rock and breaking it apart in space so there is room for what you are asking for to show up. You can ask, “what will it take for homework to get done with great ease today?” or “what can I do or be today that would support my child in getting their homework done?” Another great question is, “what will it take for today to be different than it’s been in the past and what contribution can I be to my child today?” The questions are asked without requiring an answer. The question can create an awareness of what is required for your child on that particular day. Just asking the question allows a different possibility to show up.

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In fact, everything you or your child resists or reacts to becomes stronger and more solid. When we make decisions and come to conclusions about how and when homework should be done and your child that doesn’t work for your child then it’s as if we’ve just put up a wall. When we create a wall there is no space for anything to be different. With solid points of view nothing has the space to change. When you let go of decisions about how and when homework should get done you will create the space for a different possibility to show up.

Some parents and kids have become aware that homework becomes easier to complete if the child is listening to music or other background noise.  That may go against everything we have been taught but it actually works for some kids. Others have noticed that some physical activity, TV time, or quiet time before diving into homework actually allows more ease with homework. What if you asked each day, “what would contribute to more ease with homework today”? What are the new possibilities for stress-less homework?

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