Your student’s home should be a relaxing retreat, but your behavior may be causing stress and confusion for your child. It’s important for parents to avoid comparison and education shopping, and to be understanding and supportive of their child’s feelings so that they can focus on their studies.
For students, home is a symbol of relaxation and a place where they are with their parents, who are their biggest sponsors in life. Therefore, home and parents should be the most comfortable and welcoming place for students. Parents should create the best environment for students to study and help them make the best choices and do their best in every moment.
But let’s think about it again. Did they feel most comfortable at home? Was it the right environment for them to study? In my experience, in my friends’ experience, and in the stories of friends I’ve counseled, most say it wasn’t. What most parents didn’t realize is that while the security of a loving home can be comforting for test-takers, it’s not uncommon for parents to create stress and chaos for test-takers. I’m sorry if you’re a parent reading this, but often the things parents do out of love for their children are the very things that stress them out. This isn’t because they don’t know how gracious their parents are, but because they are SAT takers who are challenging themselves for the first time in their lives.
Here’s a list of things parents shouldn’t do for their kids. Before we get started, I want to point out an important fact that parents often forget. High school seniors are deeper and more rational than you might think, but at the same time, they’re also more emotionally vulnerable than ever.
First, avoid fighting with your student as much as possible. I put this at number one because it’s the most important. When I talk to parents, I often hear, “My child must have been enemies with me in a previous life, otherwise they wouldn’t fight so often.” But kids don’t want to fight with their parents, and test takers have a hard time after fighting with their parents, so why fight? In high school, both students and parents are under a lot of stress, both consciously and unconsciously, and the easiest place for students to express their stress is at home, almost the only place they can do so. It’s hard for them to show their true selves outside of school, but it’s relatively easy to do so at home. So they don’t say anything outside of school, but when they come home, they get angry at the slightest thing. Parents are already exhausted and can’t afford to take their children’s tantrums. They’re working hard to support their children, and when their children get angry at them, it leads to a big fight.
The key to this process is that “kids don’t fight because they don’t like their parents, they fight because they have too much stress.” The SAT is no small mountain to climb for a 19-year-old high school senior, and while the test may pale in comparison to other tests, it’s the first big challenge a student faces in their life. This puts them under tremendous stress. Parents are the only ones who can support them through this. If your child throws a tantrum and you double down on that tantrum, your child will feel like they have nowhere to turn. I myself was known as a strict tutor when I was in college, but when I returned to SATs after a break, I became a teary-eyed damsel in distress after a fight with my parents. Now more than ever, students need their parents to accept them when they throw tantrums and lose their temper. It’s never too late for revenge, even after the SATs are over and they’ve gotten into college.
Second, don’t compare your kid to the kid from the other house. How would you feel if your husband or wife said, “Solomon’s dad just got a promotion and doubled his salary!” or “Daniel, my high school classmate, just got remarried, and his wife is so young and pretty and has a great family!”? Even the most saintly of couples would be hard-pressed to avoid comparison, and the underlying thought is usually, “If he or she can do it, why can’t you?” Even if the comparison is made out of a desire to see the other person succeed, deep down, it’s no different than criticizing them. Naturally, this makes the person who hears it feel unworthy, and it can lead to feelings of inferiority and defeat because they’re not as good as the person they’re comparing themselves to. It’s the same with parents comparing their kids to other kids in the house. Pointing out their shortcomings as if they were a whipping boy or girl only hurts their feelings and lowers their self-esteem.
Kids already know where they fall short, and they’re already stressed about it, so they don’t need you to amplify their insecurities. Your comparisons only make them feel like they’re being judged. Over time, this creates an emotional rift between parent and child, and eventually the student feels so overwhelmed that they can’t focus on their studies. It’s better not to set the stage for mutual hurt feelings in the first place. Sure, there are the occasional examinee who is overconfident and thinks “I’m the best!” but even those kids have a lot of pressure when it comes to college admissions.
Third, don’t go education shopping. Some parents find that their child is lacking in math, so they hire two math tutors based on the recommendations of their neighbors, but when their grades don’t improve quickly, they change tutors, move to a school that is said to have gotten into many top universities, and take classes from a star teacher who is famous on the internet. This phenomenon is called education shopping. Just like impulse shopping at a department store, you’re making impulse choices about your child’s education. While impulse purchases at the mall end up costing you money if you don’t use them, education shopping doesn’t. There are limits to how much private education can raise grades. If you spend a lot of time at a tutor or school and don’t have enough time for self-study, you may feel like you’re working harder, but your grades may not improve or may even drop. Changing schools or tutors frequently can disrupt your study flow. When you change teachers, you learn to adapt to their teaching style, and if you change teachers every month or so, your studying will become unstable and you’ll spend all your time adjusting to a new way of studying. It’s a good idea to stick with a new teacher for at least four months. It’s not uncommon for a student’s grades to skyrocket once they’ve gotten to know their new teacher.
Students are psychologically vulnerable and anxious, and picking fights, comparing them to other kids, or destabilizing their learning environment when they’re not already mentally tall enough will only make them less effective and more anxious. In addition to this, it’s best to avoid behaviors such as overemphasizing your sacrifices, ignoring your child’s study methods, buying them a smartphone, or pushing them to read too much. Most importantly, try to understand how emotionally draining this is for your student and share their pain. We admire and support the students and their parents reading this!
