october 26, 2026

prioritize regular, timely attendance to prevent learning loss

Your teen was up late last night, and this morning is pleading. “Can’t I sleep in just this once?”

You don’t want a fight. And you find yourself wondering whether it really matters if your student participates in every class every day.

It does matter. It is important for your teen to attend and participate in classes. The association between poor attendance and lower academic achievement has been demonstrated in every U.S. state. Missing just one or two classes in a subject can start a downward spiral.

What can you do to keep your teen on track? Here are some tips:

Limit your teen's late-night job hours to the weekend. School is your student's most important job.
Make sure your teen has an alarm clock with a loud alarm.
Stress to your teen why it is important to be in every class on time. No future employer will let your teen just show up when it feels good.
Work with the school if your teen is facing issues that prevent regular attendance. Your teen's counselor may be able to help you and your student overcome them.

Share strategies for boosting reading comprehension

Reading comprehension—the ability to understand and apply what is read—remains a challenge for many students, even when they get to middle and high school.

This often comes as a surprise to their families. After all, teens are long past the age when they are expected to learn to read. But in middle and high school, students are presented with increasingly complex and specialized material. It requires serious concentration from the reader. Teens must work to stay on task as they read, and then to make sense of it all.

Share these tips with your teen to build reading comprehension:

Ask yourself questions about the text. Teachers recommend questions known as KWL. It stands for:
K = What do I KNOW?
W = What do I WANT to know?
L = What have I LEARNED?
Read aloud. This allows your teen to learn the material using two senses—hearing and sight. For extra help, have your teen read a page to you. Then you read it back.
Restate the main points. After completing a section of the reading, have your teen take a minute to summarize the material. If this is a challenge, your teen should read the section again.

a good night's sleep keeps teens alert & ready to learn

Your teen may be taller than you are and may look like an adult. But teens need more sleep than adults. In fact, your teen needs nearly as much sleep as a younger child. And adequate sleep is essential for the best performance in school.

Students who lack sleep may:

Struggle to pay attention in class.
Fall asleep during the school day and miss classes.
Have more discipline problems.
Be more prone to depression.
Be involved in traffic accidents.

Clearly, these are serious results you want your teen to avoid. To help your student get enough sleep:

Encourage your teen to work on assignments in the afternoon, not late at night.
Limit extracurricular activities to no more than two.
Help your teen limit recreational screen activities. Students may need to be online for school. And social activities online have become a lifeline for teens. But your teen may be wasting hours on TV, games and videos, rather than spending it on more productive things, such as reading, exercising or sleeping.
Encourage your teen to wind down at night. Set a digital curfew a half-hour before bedtime. Suggest a warm shower and some soft music, instead.

let your teen plan to reward hard work

Many students can feel overwhelmed at times with school assignments, especially when the work involves large projects or a teen’s “worst” subjects.

To reduce procrastination and stress, encourage your teen to plan a small reward for finishing a difficult task. Knowing there is a treat waiting can make students more eager to get the job done.

The reward could be playing a game, reading a book for pleasure, or chatting or texting with a friend. Your teen knows best what will be motivating.

Share these reward-setting guidelines with your teen:

Make sure the treat isn’t more than the work merits. Watching a movie for two hours is far too big a reward for completing a 15-minute science review.
Avoid using sweets and junk food as a treat. They’re not healthy for the brain or the body.

help your teen overcome common schoolwork obstacles

Helping with schoolwork struggles does not mean doing assignments for your teen—that should never happen. But you can help your student cope with common schoolwork issues.

Here are some strategies if your teen is:

Not doing schoolwork, or not turning it in. Let your student know you are concerned, and make it clear that completing assignments is top priority. Have your teen make a to-do list each day and check off completed work.
Not caring about schoolwork. Motivate your student by praising progress—don’t wait for the finished product. Make it clear that other activities will have to wait until assignments are finished.
Taking too much time to complete schoolwork. If your teen doesn’t understand the directions or the work, encourage speaking with the teacher.
Doing too much homework, or not enough. Talk to your teen. How is your student doing in the class? If the answer is fine, then the volume of work is probably the right amount to reinforce concepts being taught. Have your teen speak to the teacher if assignments consistently take all night or if your teen is not doing well in the class but seems to have only a few minutes worth of work. If necessary, contact the teacher yourself to ask about your teen's workload.

share a 5 day plan for test success

Whether it’s a chapter test in history or a midterm exam in math, a big test is something your teen should study for—for more than one day. Share this five-day study plan that can help your teen go into any test prepared to do well:

Four Days Before the Test—Have your teen gather everything that will be covered on the test. This should include class notes, outlines, quizzes and handouts. Your student should arrange them by date. If one or two handouts are missing, this is the time to find them.
Three Days Before the Test—Your teen should study the gathered materials. Have your student make a list of questions that may be covered on the test. Did the teacher spend four days on the defeat of the Spanish Armada? Odds are, that will show up on test day. If your teen has a list of facts to memorize, suggest making flash cards and drilling together.
Two Days Before the Test—Have your teen review the reading. What are the chapter titles? What are the most important topics? Have your student list more questions that might show up on the test, based on what is in the reading. Then your teen should choose several of the possible test questions and make notes of how to answer them.
One Day Before the Test—Have your teen do a self-test. If there were facts to memorize, your teen should try to write them correctly. If there were formulas to learn, your teen should try to apply them. Then, make sure your teen gets a good night's sleep.
The Day of the Test—Encourage your teen to allow a few extra minutes to get ready in the morning to avoid feeling rushed. If students will be allowed to use notes during the test, have your teen check to make everything needed is packed and ready to go.

you found liquor in your Teen's Room--Now What?

You honestly weren’t snooping. But when you put away some clothes in your teen’s drawer, you saw a bottle of liquor. A nearly empty bottle of liquor.

At one time or another, most teens experiment with alcohol. And, sooner or later, they get caught.

Ask your teen, as calmly as you can, how the bottle came to be in the drawer. You don’t need to yell and you don’t need to make your teen feel like a criminal. Stay calm and ask questions.

You may be accused of invading your teen's privacy. Then you may hear a story that isn’t quite true. A friend gave it to your teen. Your teen tried a little but didn’t like it.

Keep asking questions. It might be the first liquor your teen has ever had. Or your teen could have a serious problem.

Alcohol is one of the substances most commonly abused by young people. In a recent survey, nearly half of 12th graders reported drinking alcohol in the previous year. Alcohol use can have tragic consequences. Talk with your student about the dangers. Express your love and say that you don't want your teen to be hurt. Be clear that it is against the law for teens to drink and you will not allow it.

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