Help Your Child Transition Back to School After the Holidays

Originally published on the motherhoodlater.com website

The holidays are filled with festivities, treats, and loads of family time. However, the break from school is also a time when kids tend to do little if any academic work. As a result, the shift back to school in January can be a tough one for many students. Help your child have a successful transition back to school with the ideas detailed below.

Re-set routines

Before the holidays, your child may have finally settled on their school routine: each morning they woke up, got dressed, packed their backpack, ate breakfast, then came home from school and completed their schoolwork on a regular basis. Yet during the holidays, routines and schedules often go awry and your child may need some routine re-setting before school starts again. To help them, reset routines gradually. If they went to bed very late during holiday time, start setting their bedtime 15-20 minutes earlier each day for four or five days before school starts. You may want to also create checklists to remind them of their morning and afternoon routines before school begins. For example, a morning chart might include waking up at a certain time, brushing their teeth, eating breakfast, and packing their backpack. An afternoon checklist might include unpacking their backpack, having a snack, completing their homework, putting their finished homework in their backpack or turning it in online, eating dinner, and getting ready for bed. You might want to also try limiting screen time before school starts to help set the stage for a focused, organized return to school.

Academic activities during break

Your child may become accustomed to lazy, school-free days during the holiday break. To help them transition back into school-mode, start to integrate academic activities before school starts. For example, read with your child for 20 minutes each night and discuss the plot, characters, and setting with them. Ask them to create predictions about what they think might happen next or make inferences about certain events in the story to help engage them in the book. Older children can read independently for 20 minutes each night but ask them similar questions about their book even if you aren’t reading it with them, to make sure they fully comprehend the material. You can also do math exercises when cooking or grocery shopping with them, or have them write in a journal about their favorite activities during the holiday break. The more academic activities you can integrate now, the better!

Discuss expectations

Your child may be nervous about returning to school and may face similar jitters that they felt before the new school year started. Talk through these feelings with them. Are they nervous about their workload? Anxious about waking up early again? Worried about friendship issues? Whatever the issue is, be there for them – listen to their worries and help them come up with solutions to help ease these anxieties. You can also discuss any assignments or projects they may have coming up and help them create a plan for competing them in an organized fashion.

Executive functioning strategies

Your child likely wasn’t focusing on executive functioning strategies during the holiday break. They probably didn’t have to worry about organizing their school assignments, planning their after school activity schedule, or organizing their academic work. Help them re-integrate executive functioning strategies before school starts again. Make sure they have a dedicated homework space where they will complete their assignments each day, filled with all necessary supplies. Discuss with them what time they will work on their homework daily after school and keep that time consistent. Help them set up an assignment book, especially if they started using one at the start of the school year but then used it less and less in the fall. If they have lengthy homework assignments to complete, help them break the assignments into steps and put each step into their assignment book. For time management, have them predict how long they think each assignment will take to complete, then compare it to the actual time it takes. The more systematic executive functioning strategies you can integrate, the better, and if your child continues to struggle with these skills, executive functioning coaching can help them tremendously.

The holiday break should be a fun-filled time that all kids enjoy. Yet the transition back to school can be a tough one. Try using these ideas at home with your child to help them start the new year on a positive, organized, and successful note.