If there’s one thing I’ve learned as a parent and education reporter – and continue to learn – is how huge a role parents play in their children’s education.

What parents say and do, the attitude they display at home and their expectations speak volumes to kids. From all that, youngsters and teens clearly understand whether their parents consider school a big deal or not.

As the first day of school arrives, we asked educators to offer advice to parents. Here’s what they had to say on how parents can help their children transition back to school and be a successful learner throughout the year.

The advice is from Lewiston’s Montello school third-grade teacher Michael Parker, now in his 34th year; Vickie Gaylord, principal of Auburn’s new school on Park Avenue; Gary Oswald, principal of Farmington’s Mt. Blue Middle School; and Lewiston High Principal Gus LeBlanc.

First day of school:

Grades K-6

Talk to your children about school in positive ways. Talk to them about the new friends and experiences they’ll have.

Explain expectations. Outlining their responsibilities as students.

Enforce a school schedule. Make sure your sons or daughters go to bed and get up early.

Establish, stick to routines. Help children set out their clothes the night before. Everything from showering to packing the backpack builds structure and predictability. “Structure helps kids feel organized and secure,” Gaylord said.

Make time for a healthy breakfast. Students who don’t eat healthy before school lose energy and are not as attentive in class.

Cover your child’s books with brown bags. Covering books preserves the texts, which saves taxpayers’ money. Using brown bags from the grocery store is a cheap, if not free, way to cover books.

Grades 7-8:

Talk about expectations. Outline their responsibilities as students. Don’t bad-mouth the school, that will make school more stressful.

Establish routines, schedules. Even though they’re older, middle-school students still need to go to bed at a decent hour to ensure enough sleep.

Make time for breakfast. Middle school students like to eat and run, but try to insist they sit for breakfast to eat healthy, and maybe talk to you.

Don’t let your middle schooler push you away. “Middle school students may act like parents don’t matter to them, but they do,” said middle school principal Gary Oswald. “Be the adult.”



High school

Make sure your teen goes to bed and gets up early. “Lewiston High starts at 7:45 a.m.,” LeBlanc said. “That’s probably pretty early if you’ve been sleeping in all summer.”

Make sure your teen eats healthy. Kids who show up at school and haven’t had nutritious food are at a disadvantage in the classroom, LeBlanc said.

Talk to your teen stressing they can’t miss classes. “Have an honest discussion that attendance is critical. At high school when you miss school you’re not only missing the written work, you miss the discussion, the interaction between students and teachers.”

Set boundaries. Parents need to create ground rules that classes are not to be missed, LeBlanc said. “(There have) to be boundaries. Parents need to help the school.”

How parents can help their child be successful in school:

Grades K-6

Set aside a study place. And create a nightly routine of 15 to 20 minutes studying or doing homework. The study place should be uncluttered and quiet. If your child has no homework, help them review learning with flash cards, or ask them to write down 5 or 10 important ideas from a science or social studies chapter.

Establish routines. Structure is important.

Look at homework assignments, and classroom work. Expecting your child to write down assignments and show them to you helps them develop needed skills. Help your child review their work for tests.

Avoid your child saying, “I forgot it at home.” Set aside a place by the door where the child can put, then retrieve, books brought to and from home and school.

Meet and stay in touch with your child’s teacher. Educating your son or daughter is team work, said Montello teacher Michael Parker. Tell your child’s teacher about potential problems or changes in the family (death, divorce) that could impact learning. Share some information about your child, such as special talents.

Read with them. Establish a regular reading time when you and they read together.

Grades 7-8

Establish, reinforce routines. Make sure they have a place to do homework and study where there aren’t distractions, such as a loud television.

Make sure they have a good place to do homework. That spot should have the tools they need.

Limit distractions. “As children get older they’re so connected to the world with cell phones, computers, TVs and I-Pods,” Gaylord said. “Limit those distractions.” Some pre-teens may insist they’re not being distracted, but that often isn’t the case “when they’re sitting there with four screens of instant messages or text messages,” Gaylord said. “Some work OK with a little music. Try to find a happy medium.”

High school

Ask about homework Provide students with the time, space and resources to do homework. Show sincere interest in whether their kids have homework, are they getting it done, and even look it over occasionally.

“One of the misconceptions is that when we send kids off to school the school takes care of everything,” LeBlanc said. Parents do need to honor that their supervision of their high schoolers is not the same as when they were in elementary school. “But even though students are older it’s still a responsibility of parents to know what their student does outside the school day,” LeBlanc said. “Parents need to be engaged.”

Find out who are your son’s or daughter’s teachers.

High schoolers typically have four or five teachers. When teachers have met the parents it’s easier to share concerns or information with parents, LeBlanc said. Communicating with your son’s or daughter’s teachers in high school is as critical as the elementary level, LeBlanc said, but it can be harder. Some teens resist.

Meet the teachers. Make the time to meet your student’s teachers by attending open house and parent-teacher conferences. Lewiston is scheduling an open house, and talking about reinstituting parent-teacher conferences, LeBlanc said, dates and times to be announced.

Parents can also e-mail teachers. Call the school to find out your student’s teachers and the teachers’ e-mail addresses. “If you don’t have access to e-mail, call the school and ask the teacher to call you back,” LeBlanc said.

Most high schools have Web pages with information for parents.

Lewiston’s address: http://www.lewiston.k12.me.us/~lhsweb/. Faculty e-mail addresses are on the parents page.

Edward Little’s: http://elhs.auburnschl.edu/

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