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Major problems in public education are being talked about these days like no other time in recent history.  Some of it justified and some of it is the response of the growing trend in America to pass off parental responsibilities on teachers and the school system due to the breakdown of the family.  I would like to focus on the parenting part.

How do major problems in public education get handled?  I would like to start with a situation I found myself in a few weeks ago.  In my city we have neighborhood associations.  At our last meeting, we had a school board supervisor come in to discuss problems.  Immediately, the parents were going off on how lousy the teachers are and how bad the supervisors are performing.  I couldn’t speak to the supervisors, because I couldn’t clearly understand what they were doing, but one thing I did know was that the teachers were young and fresh and ready to teach.  What I wasn’t hearing from the pareents was anyone asking what they as parents could do to help.  I got up and mentioned how I had 4 teenagers and all of them were doing well and asked the supervisor how many parents come for parent teacher conferences or to the parent teacher nights.  The room immediately went silent.  The supervisor thanked me for the question.  He said only 10% of the parents show up.  You see actually I knew this statistic. That’s why I sent my kids to the next town high school where parent participation was 90%.  The 2 schools are literally 5 miles apart.  My kids school has a 80% graduation rate and 60 % college attendance rate.  The school where these parents live has a 50 % drop out rate.

Major problems in public education quite often are directly related to lack of participation of the parents in their children’s education.  Oh, I heard some parents say well we both work, “how can we go to these meetings”?  I mentioned both my wife and myself work and we always go to the meetings.  Again, there was silence.  This pattern went on and on and each time I had to mention about the sacrifices my wife and I made to make sure my kids were in the top 10 % of their class.

I am not here to make myself sound like the worlds greatest parent.  But I do want to say your kids are your kids.  No one does care or should care about them as much as you do or should.  Major problems in public education stem primarily from parents forgetting that the family is the most important element in public education not the school.  Schools across the country have similar curriculum.  Often we see towns that are right next to each other where one town has 70 % going to college and the other has a 49% graduation rate from high school as is the case where I live.  In almost all the cases the difference is the parent participation level.

The bitter pill if you have kids, be a leader.  Raise the bar, go to meetings at school, not to complain but to get involved and watch the results skyrocket.

Dr. Robert Bocknek is a problem solving expert for parents and families.  See him at take back the home project, or keyboardculture.com or contact him directly at bocknek@takebackthehom.com.

Tough love parenting is a term which is thrown around, usually with the meaning that the parents have tried everything and nothing worked so now we have to make our child miserable until they behave.  Here’s the thing.  Kids need guidelines and leadership, from the parents, in their life.  It’s no wonder that kids from single parents are 3 times more likely to have a run in with the law than two parent homes.  If you exclude two parent homes where one of the parents has an addiction the data skews even more to 5 times more likely to have a run in with the law.

So then, if the family is a two parent home with no addictions, the main reason why tough love parenting is needed is that the parents have been lacking in guiding and leading their child for quite some time.  Rather than be offended whether this is true of you or not lets do a quick quiz and see how you do.

tough love parenting quiz

1. Do your children have chores that must be done by them?
2. Do they do them? or Do they complain when you remind them?
3. Are their grades in the top 20% of their class?
4. Do your children talk back to you often?
5. Do you honestly enjoy your children’s company?

These are only 5 questions but there could be many more.  If you answered no to at least one of these questions or answered yes to #4 then you need a boot camp on rules and parenting.

Here’s the thing, what a lot of parents call tough love parenting really ought to be renamed leadership parenting. Often simple guidelines like the ones mentioned in the quiz above, when enforced, are enough to totally transform your child into just a great person who is a joy to have around.  If you need help creating this kind of consistency, I highly reccommend you contact Dr. Bocknek at bocknek@takebackthehome.com or visit the website at takebackthehome.com.  Dr. Robert Bocknek is the problem solving expert for parents and families.  You or your family can take one of his courses or can have him come to your town for one of his empowering talks or seminars.  If you are considering painful tough love parenting steps beyond what what the quiz talked about, its not to late to first try Dr. Bocknek’s easy to follow and phenomenally effective guidelines to a great home.

Good luck.  Sincerely, Dr. Bocknek, the problem solving expert for parents and families.

www.takebackthehome.com, www.keyboardculture.com

When issues arise in the family it is important to have a system and a behavior that facilitates getting through the crisis.  I use the word crisis because it is important to label things in a way that makes you get into action.  If you think its a crisis you should naturally want to sit down and resolve issues immediately.  For this short blog I am going to cook book some ground rules that can systematize the progress.

1) Start conversation in a calm state.  If you need a cool down period, definitely take it.  If your partner or child needs it…be sure to not start in until they are calmed down.

2) No one leaves until it is resolved.  Resolved means each party says they are ok with what the problem was and that they feel that they understand the others position.

3) If your goal is to resolve an issue, never blame.  In the process, avoid  “you did this”.  Or worse yet…”You always do this”.  No one responds to a blame, especially if they are guilty of the crime. Worse yet, no one will ever respond well to a generalized blame like you always do this or that.  (Remember, in fact no one ever does something always or never.)  The surest way to not resolve an issue is to blame.

4) Confront with statements like”I need to talk.” and then “I feel this and this.”  “Please tell me your side of it.”  Then allow them to respond uninterrupted.

5) Make sure they respond to your comment, not something that is interesting.  Often people avoid the point, especially when they are guilty.  An example would be “Hey the chores are not getting done”.  They respond “billy doesn’t have to do chores”.  In this example they didn’t respond to the question.  In this instance you must go back to an already agreed upon point.  You can say “Thats interesting about billy but we had an agreement, which you accepted, so please follow through.  OK?”  Depending on age you can give an example of something you do like “What if I don’t go to work? or Don’t cook?” Then finish with “Don’t make this a discipline issue.  Please, I need you to do the stuff you know you have to do”.

6) Make all resolutions about agreements made.

7) Always close with the reassurance of love and how you depend on the other.

These simple rules will go a long way in problem solving in the family.

Dr. Robert is the “Problem Solving Expert for Families”.  Contact us for any help you need.