This year has required substantial readjustment for students and teachers alike. Many students had not fully engaged in remote learning the year before and needed to adjust to both being around other students again and relearning what it means to be a student. Teachers, on the other hand, while prepared for some change in student preparedness, had to rethink their approaches to many things to accomodate both students who had become more independent learners as well as those who were working very hard to avoid anything that required effort on their part.

Technology has become an intregal part of both our lives, and how we deliver school. Helping students to use their technology as a tool, rather than a toy, is something we work on every day. Part of this process has been to encourage students to be in charge of their own destinies and having them reflect on the things they need to do to be more successful in school at least once a month, specifically organizational and time-management goals.

What I would recommend for the summer is helping your young person take charge of their progress on any activity that requires focus and persistence by removing distractions in ways that are non-threatening or not anxiety inducing. An example of this might be rather than take their phone away, have them put it on the counter across the room. This way, they can still see their phone, and see that it is secure, but it is a little less likely to be the primary focus of their attention. Help them turn off notifications for apps that don’t require their immediate attention, and set specific people’s contact information so that their messages can always ring through in an emergency, if you think that is needed.

For some of you, this removing of the phone distraction may need to be more incremental. First, they try putting it across the room. You may have to warn them a couple of times to keep it there for their own good. Finally, if they find themselves incapable of this self-management in the moment, take their phone away until they’ve completed the task at hand, using it as a tool to help them, not to punish them. This helps them learn that you are only seeking to help them improve themselves for their own good, and can also help them get better at taking initiative in this regard.

Finally, the one thing I’ve had to learn as a teacher is to implement what one professor calls “micro-affirmations.” The idea here is putting out a stream of positivity for every positive thing a young person does, even minor. The art of a good micro-affirmation is that it should feel affirming, not pandering, however. Here are a list of some I might say in any given week at school.

“Thank you for turning that in!”
“I can see you worked very hard on this.”
“I missed you when you were gone.”
“You’ve almost got this.”
“You’ve got this!”
“I appreciate that you let me know…”
“I hope you feel better soon.”
“Thank you for pushing in your chair.”

Non-verbal affirmations might be things like a fist bump for accomplishing a task that required persistence and effort, sending a cute Bitmoji with a text-based message, or stamping something as a form of acknowledgement for effort spent. Kids, even teenagers, often like a hand stamp if it’s novel and something they like, like a cupcake, for instance, or a holiday theme.

For more on micro-affirmations, visit this link.