Homework fights almost never come down to laziness or defiance. They come down to five specific causes - exhaustion, procrastination, perfectionism, low motivation, and disorganization - and each one has its own reason behind it and its own fix.

The two tools that solve nearly all of them are the Connection Tool (for the in-the-moment big feeling) and the Limit Setting Formula for building a routine. In this episode, I’ll walk you through what’s actually going on with each behavior, and exactly what to say and do about it.

You’ll Learn:

• Why rewards and sticker charts don’t actually motivate kids in the long term.
• Why procrastination, perfectionism, low motivation, and disorganization are emotional and structural issues, not character flaws (and why this is even more true for kids with ADHD)
• How to use the Connection Tool in the moment your kid is stalling or melting down
• How to run a Coaching Conversation for repeat patterns like perfectionism
• Real examples of homework limits you can use tonight

Read the full blog post here.

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Related Episodes:

• Episode 2.34: Stress-Free Mornings With Kids: The 3-Step Easy Morning Routine
• Episode 2.35: Bedtime Routine Falling Apart? Here's How to Set (and Hold) Bedtime Limits
• Episode 2.36: Screen Time Battles? Here's How to Set Effective Screen Time Limits

Free Resources:

Get your copy of the Stop Yelling Toolkit!

In this free guide you’ll discover:

✨ A simple tool to stop yelling once you’ve started (This one thing will get you calm.)

✨ 40 things to do instead of yelling. (You only need to pick one!)

✨ Exactly why you yell. (And how to stop yourself from starting.)

✨A script to say to your kids when you yell. (So they don't follow you around!)

Download the Stop Yelling Toolkit here

Connect With Darlynn:

• Book a complimentary session with Darlynn
• Learn about the different parenting programs at www.calmmamacoaching.com
• Follow me on Instagram @darlynnchildress for daily tips
• Rate and review the podcast on Itunes

Welcome to Become a Calm Mama. I'm your host, I'm Darlynn Childress. And today on the podcast, I'm gonna talk about how to manage homework struggles, why

your kids fight with you during homework time and how to help them. I've been kind of on a practical roll lately with all of these podcast episodes and

YouTube videos. And we've talked about mornings, we've talked about bedtime, we've talked about screen time, and today we're talking about homework. I'm gonna do an episode

on chores. and on dinner. So we're in this like practical series, which I love because I think it's really useful as a parent to not only have theory but

also have tips and actually strategies and scripts to help you manage all of those difficult times with your kids. So let's get into homework. Maybe you've felt

this way. It's 4 or 5 o'clock in the afternoon and you're trying to get dinner going. And what's supposed to be happening is that your kid is supposed to be doing their homework and doing a worksheet or

working on their homework packet. And instead they're doing Anything else. They're reorganizing their Pokémon cards, they're changing all their Barbie doll

outfits or doing the stuffed animal party, or they need a snack, or they need to tell you this urgent story about recess right now. And you feel this tightness start

to build similar to bedtime when bedtime drags out, but not quite as intense as bedtime, but you start to feel like, Oh my God,

just get this homework done already and then we can move on and we won't have to worry about it. We can have this frustration, right? It's like the— feels so

frustrating to have the same fight every night. And then we also feel guilt. Like if we are like, oh, who cares? Who cares about homework? We'll just like let it go. It doesn't matter.

The experts say it doesn't matter. But then you feel bad about that cuz then the fear starts to come in. Yeah. that you're worried that if you don't have your kid do their homework, they're gonna get

behind. You're resentful, like, who assigned this anyway? Why is it my responsibility? And then under all these emotions, there's like kind of a deeper

worry about your kid in general. Like, are they doing okay? Are they smart? Are they capable? Like, are, are they behind? Are they ahead? You know, we have

this worry about our kids' academic performance because of course The school tells us how important it is, and the world tells us that, you know, getting into college and getting a career and all these things are so

important. So we have sort of like almost an existential anxiety about our kids' future that comes up around homework. So let's talk today about

homework and the homework time. First, I wanna talk about all the different behaviors that make homework hard. The first is exhaustion. The second is just

procrastination. The third, perfectionism. Fourth, motivation. And then fifth is disorganization. These are the

behaviors that show up with your kid around homework that can feel so frustrating. So what I want to do is I want to talk to you about why those happen and then what to

actually do to make the homework time less frictionful. We want to make your life peaceful and easy. This is Become a Calm

Mama. So of course we cannot get rid of all friction. We cannot get rid of all tension. We cannot get rid of all misbehavior, but we can talk about how to

make life move smoother, how to make it less frictionful. So, we're going to talk about that. And then I want to talk a little bit in general about a healthy

mindset around homework. How to frame homework to make it a right size in your family so that we don't make it matter too much, but then we also don't minimize it. So, I'm going to

give you a healthy mindset and a way to think about homework. So that you don't feel so stressed out. Let's get right into those behaviors. The first is exhaustion. I'm also thinking of this as a

lack of bandwidth. Okay, so what's happening in the afternoons? Your kid, they go to school and they pretty much use

most of their regulation budget, like their self-regulation, their ability to manage their behavior. They use most of that At school.

So by the time you pick them up from school or aftercare, it's later in the afternoon. They have less energy. They've been working really hard

at school all day. They may have less bandwidth for stress, right? Their stress tolerance has declined. And then of course, it's also challenging for

you. You've been having a long day. You've been at work or you've been caring for younger children or you've been doing housework. whatever your life looks like, you are also getting towards the end of your day

and you're feeling tired. And now all of a sudden this heavy lift of homework comes into play. Now, this is not an excuse, right, to skip it,

but I do want you to have more understanding that during that time of day, your kid is running on empty and so are you. So what do, what do you do about that? What do you do about

the reality of it? The first thing I want you to do is just give yourself permission to know your own capacity. If homework is not your thing and you have

a partner that you can swap out with, great. If your kids can do it at aftercare, great. If you wanna bring in a little mama's helper or something like that to manage homework

and take the tension out, do that. It's okay to resource yourself in a way that works for you, but of course that's not always available to us. Sometimes

we're the ones, right, that have to do the schoolwork, or we're the ones who have to like manage our kids. And so, if that's true for you, then I want you to listen to the rest of this episode and really

use the tools that I'm going to teach in this episode because it will increase your bandwidth. It will help your kids stop procrastinating. It will help them not

have so many issues around perfectionism. You will learn how to create more motivation as well as creating a little bit more organization in your time and your

space. And the way you set boundaries around homework. But I wanted to start here to normalize that homework is hard for families. It is a task and

a heavy lift for most families every day. So if you're feeling frustrated by it, I just wanted to normalize that that's what's happening. Everyone is tired. It's the end of the day. There's not a lot of stress

tolerance available. And so you're gonna have challenges, but if you follow the tips from this episode, you'll have less challenges. So let's talk first about procrastination,

especially if you have a kid with ADHD, like I raised a kid with ADHD. You're like, okay, it's homework time. And then all of a sudden they have to go to the bathroom or they need to sharpen their

pencil or they're really starving all of a sudden. And you know, they have to tell you a story and there's no real like getting to it, right? There's

this feeling that they are avoiding doing the hard work and it's really easy to think, oh my God, my kid is so lazy. Especially Especially ADHD kids are often

accused of laziness, but actually procrastination is not so much of a work habit issue. It's more

of an emotional issue. Your child is trying to avoid a feeling that they don't want to have. So they found a

strategy called procrastination to make it so that they don't have to do that hard thing. Right? Maybe they don't want to feel bored, so they avoid their homework. Maybe

they have low confidence around their schoolwork, like they're thinking, I'm going to be bad at this, but if I don't try, then no one will know. Or they just have dread, like they're just

burned out, they don't want to do it. So their brain has come up with a really good strategy to cope with that negative emotion by avoiding it, right? So if you think

about stalling and procrastination, procrastination as a coping strategy instead of thinking of it as a character flaw or an issue around defiance, it will help you. I want to reframe

it and have you think of it as a big feeling cycle. When your kid is procrastinating, even though it doesn't look like a temper tantrum or a meltdown, it's still an

emotion that your child is either trying to avoid or has, right? They have dread, so they just are avoiding their homework. In that moment that you

notice that your kid is having a hard time getting started, you can use the connection tool in that moment by narrating what you see,

naming their feeling, validating that feeling, giving them a regulation strategy, and then setting a limit. The connection tool is really useful

because it helps your child feel seen. It helps them feel heard. It helps them feel supported. It helps them feel like they have a partner in this struggle that they have around homework

instead of feeling like you're judging or criticizing or angry with them. It's really hard for kids to feel judged by you and then

also try to do what you're asking them to do. It's much easier to get your kids to feel supported by supporting them.

It's much easier to get your kids to do what you need them to do by showing your connected, compassionate support. So what does this sound like? First, instead of

saying, hey, did you start your homework? Or you keep saying that you're gonna do your homework, but you haven't done it, right? Noticing that you might be annoyed, catch yourself, re— your

nervous system, get into that compassionate space, and then notice what they're doing and then narrate that. I notice you've reorganized your desk 3 times and your folder's still closed. Or

I noticed that I said it's time to get started on homework and you immediately ran to the bathroom. I noticed that when I said that it's time to get homework started, you needed a

snack and then you needed a second snack. And then we go into the naming. I wonder if homework feels really boring, if today's a really boring one and it's hard to get started.

So we're really just kind of like naming what we see and connecting that, what we see on the outside to what could be going on for our kids inside. And then we

go, yeah, that makes sense. Homework isn't always the most fun, and that's hard. It's hard to do the hard thing. I get it. I understand. And we

give a little space for that validation, for that sitting in the grumpy moment, right? Allowing that emotion, being okay with the big feeling. All sorts of

times when I procrastinate, when I avoid doing what I need to do because I either don't think I can handle it or I don't want to. And it's nice if someone comes alongside and says like,

this is hard. Yeah, I can see you don't want to get started. That makes sense. And then you want to offer your kid a little regulation strategy. So the connection tool

is narrate what you see, name the emotion that's driving that behavior, validating that emotion, and then regulating. Narrate, name, validate, regulate. Where

regulating is that small next step that gives your kids a little something to do with moving their body or moving their mind. We're gonna give them a little

bit of activity to get that feeling to shift so that they're ready to do their schoolwork. So we can start with saying, you know what, why don't you

stand up for a minute, do a shimmy shake, and then grab your pencil and write your name on the top of the paper as small as you possibly can. So we're making a little bit of a small

task that's a little fun, gets our kid engaged, And who cares how the size of their name on their paper? You can have them rewrite it at the end, but just kind of getting into

the assignment, giving their body a little bit of motivation and a little bit of movement is really important. We've talked about exhaustion. We've talked about

procrastination. Now let's talk about perfectionism. So what does that look like? I'm sure you've seen it if you have a kid who has, you know, high

expectations of themselves, right? It's that meltdown over one Smudge, or the paper ripped up and started over for the 4th time, or tears because there's a

worksheet that is basically already perfect but they don't think it's perfect. They don't want to turn it in, and they might be saying, oh, I'm so stupid, I'm so bad at this, my teacher's gonna be so

mad at me, or this is not good, right? So they might be words with it as well as actions. So what is going on when your kid is

demonstrating perfectionistic qualities. They are at their root worried that they're not going to be okay if they get it wrong.

They haven't had enough experience with failure in order to know that they can handle not being perfect. One of the

primary motivations of kids is to determine whether they're capable. And if your kid has a high standard for themselves and they think capable

equals perfect, Then they're going to look at their work and not just see that it's not perfect, they're also going to say, this means I'm

not capable. I'm not good enough. I'm not likable. Something's wrong with me. That's a mindset issue. Your kid is worried

about their value and their self-worth and they're connecting it to whether or not their homework assignment is Meeting the standard that's in their head.

So in that moment, again, you're going to use the connection tool. And I'm reteaching this connection tool and the limit setting formula over and over and over again, because these are

the primary tools of the connected parenting process. These are the primary tools I want you to be using in your parenting practice all the time. The better you get

at the connection tool, the limit setting formula, following up with restitution, taking calm breaks if you're dysregulated. Mm-hmm. You will become a calm mama. That's the

foundation of this program that I teach is the Connected Parenting Process. So in the moment when you see your kid showing those perfectionistic tendencies,

you're going to notice that that meltdown is happening, right? So that's our check-in first is we're noticing, and then we narrate what we can see out loud. I noticed you erased

that answer 3 times and now you're crying. Yeah, I wonder if you're scared of getting it wrong. I wonder if you're worried that your teacher will be mad at you.

And then you can validate that. Yeah, that makes sense. You really care about doing well and you're worried that you're not going to do it right. Of course. And then regulate.

Put the pencil down together for a minute. Move your body. Maybe just stop to say, you know what, homework time is over. You can set a boundary. You have one more minute to

Make any final corrections you want, and then that needs to go back in the homework folder. Don't keep letting them do it over and over and over. Maybe they do it once, maybe they do it twice, but then that's enough.

You can set that boundary. You can regulate their feeling by giving them a task. Do it one more time and then homework time's over. You're going to put that back in the backpack.

Now, if your kid crumples it all up and they have a big feeling cycle and they ruin the homework, No problem. Part of homework is having your kid go to school

with an incomplete assignment or having them not turn something in. That is the indication for the teacher that your child needs more support. So you can send a

quick note to the teacher and just say, struggling with perfectionism again, this one got smushed up, and let the teacher know. Maybe they need to take your child aside and, and tell them that they're not going to be in trouble

if they don't do it perfectly. Your child might need to hear that they're okay, that they're capable, that they're lovable, that they're worthy, that they're likable from you as well as

their teacher. And that is something that teachers have dealt with for generations, right? Perfectionism. Now, if it's a repeat pattern and your kid keeps showing that

perfectionistic tendency, then it's time to switch from the connection tool into a coaching conversation. Coaching conversations replace

lectures and monologues and just telling our kids information. Coaching conversations are where we teach new skills, new concepts, new perspectives,

but it's a little bit more collaborative than a straight lecture. So a straight lecture when it comes to perfectionism would be saying, hey, you know what? You're good enough. You don't need to worry about it.

Or don't, don't stress so much. Just relax. You know, it's kind of like giving advice or telling them like, stop doing that. That's not okay. Your teacher's gonna get mad at you. And

then like reinforcing their fear. Those are lectures, those are shame sprinkles, those are criticisms that don't go anywhere. A coaching conversation is

more collaborative. We ask more questions and we get our kid to do some more thinking. So this would happen outside of homework time, not in the middle of one of these big feeling cycles

around the perfectionistic tendency. You would say, before we start on homework today, I do want to talk to you about something I've noticed happening. And that's when something doesn't come out

right the first time, you want to start over, or you get really frustrated, or you crumple it up. Have you noticed that about yourself? And then you let them answer the

question. I call this reflection. We're reflecting on the behavior and that broad pattern, and we're bringing awareness to the kid about the pattern of

perfectionism. You can also do this with procrastination. You can say, hey, I've noticed this pattern in you. And I'm wondering what's going on. Have you noticed this

pattern? So we invite the child to reflect and answer yes or no, right? Do you see this? Have you noticed this is true? And then you give them a chance to

answer. Now, some kids will not want to answer. They will feel embarrassed. They don't like being vulnerable. They don't want to talk about this. And

if you try it one day and there's a lot of resistance, That's fine. Maybe today's not the day, but do it a few times. If you keep getting resistance,

then you will have to set a boundary and you say, you know what, we are gonna talk about this hard thing and you can go play or watch a show or look online for Amazon, whatever

things they like to look at. You know, have your snack or like we can make those cookies that we talked about or whatever the thing is that they wanna do. You can set that boundary of saying, we can do that fun thing once we have

this hard conversation. So with teaching, you're giving them a new concept, or you're explaining a behavior, why it doesn't work.

You're talking about the perfectionism in this example. And so you would say, mistakes are how your brain learns. They're not proof that you're

bad. They're not proof that you're dumb. They're not proof that you aren't a good student. What mistakes do is they show us what we still need to learn.

And it's important to have mistakes because if you don't have mistakes, then your brain won't learn. So it's okay to make mistakes and then have the teacher look at your work

and help you. It's okay to make mistakes and have mommy look at your work and help you. And then we move to practice, where you give your child a practical

skill or tool to use and learn from. And in this example, you would say, what's one other thing you could try instead of

giving up? Or what's one other thing you could try instead of erasing? What's one other thing you could try instead of crumbling up your paper? And come up with

some ideas. They might say, I don't know. I'm gonna give you a few examples of things you can offer to your kids when they are feeling frustrated that they've made a

mistake or that their paper isn't perfect. One thing that kids can do is they can circle it instead of erasing it. They can mark the mistake with a small circle or a dot and

keep moving instead of erasing it and crossing it all out. Or they can circle it and then put a little line and rewrite what the right answer is. I would love for your teacher to be able

to see your child self-correcting, right? To notice that they made a mistake and then they fixed it. And you can even sell your kid on that. You can say, You know, your teacher's gonna like to see that you

made a mistake and then that you fixed it, so why don't we circle it instead of erase it? That will help that feeling of like, you know, a big scribble out. You can also tell them,

why don't we use a fix-it color? So you can correct your work in a different color pencil so the mistake stays visible, we can see your progress, and that shows your teacher that

you're learning. That's a good thing. Mistakes are a good thing. You can also teach them to— when you see a mistake, maybe you could take 3 breaths and come back to the

same line and start again. So this is if a kid wants to give up, or they are frustrated, or they want to, you know, forget about it. They just want to leave it because it's not— they can't do it, right? They get

frustrated. You can say, so what you can do when you feel that way is you can take 3 deep breaths. Why don't we practice right now? Yeah, let's do it again. Why don't you start to do that in the middle

of your homework? You can take a little Mid-worksheet breaks so that you don't feel so frustrated. You can also offer your kids something that they could squeeze, right, when they're really, really frustrated. Maybe you give them a

little stress ball or a squishy toy or a stuffed animal, or they can— and then they can release it, and then they can pick their pencil back up and try again. All of these little

strategies are really helpful for your kid to be thinking about what they can do instead of scribbling out, giving up, or crumpling up the A piece of paper. So you're giving your

kid some ideas, then you say, let's practice. Let's practice these. Let's practice right now taking 3 deep breaths, or let's get your homework out right now. Let's pretend you made a mistake

and let's circle it instead of erasing. When you do that last step of practicing, it really does reinforce and help your child

create a neural pathway for the next time that that thing happens. It's a really useful tool. Sometimes we just tell kids what to do, but we don't give them opportunity to

practice it. And then when they're in that big moment that they have that feeling, they're not able to reach for that tool. The more you practice self-regulation tools and different coping

strategies outside of big feeling cycles, the easier it is for your kid to tap into those regulation strategies when they're in the middle of it. So they always say like

practice makes progress. And it's true even in parenting. So having your coaching conversation where you reflect on the behavior, you teach your kid, hey,

you know what, mistakes don't mean that you're not good. Mistakes don't mean that you're not capable. Mistakes are a good thing. Mistakes mean that you're learning. And then you say, so

instead of scribbling out, why don't we do this instead? And you give them some ideas and then you practice. So we've talked so far now, we've talked about Exhaustion,

procrastination, perfectionism. Now I want to talk about motivation. You might be thinking while you've been listening to this is like, my kid doesn't procrastinate, my kid's not a

perfectionist. What my kid does is does not care, right? They do not care if they get a zero. They have no urgency. They have no stress about the

consequences. There's no meltdown or stalling. They're generally unbothered by the homework. Like, they literally are not motivated for

it. They do not have any urgency within them. This is also especially true when it comes to kids with ADHD. All of these things are true for kids with ADHD. It's just like

ratcheted up a notch or two, right? It's a little more intense, but these are like common things that we see with all kids and then especially with kids with ADHD.

So motivation is a big issue. When your kid isn't motivated to do their homework, we don't need to make it mean anything about their

character. Parents often look at procrastination or lack of motivation or disorganization or even

perfectionism as if there's a character flaw or a character trait in your child that something's wrong with them. And it's just not true.

especially when it comes to motivation. It's not about being lazy or not caring. Kids don't have the same adult wiring around long-term payoff.

When your kid is thinking about June and their grades, they really cannot create motivation because they don't spend much time thinking about the future.

They don't spend much time thinking about consequences. They are in the moment. That's the cool thing about being a kid is that you live in the middle of the experience, right? You're like a

little kid. You don't care about the future, and that's the benefit of being a child. But as a parent, you do want to have your kid be motivated enough to get their

schoolwork done. So when it comes to motivation, we really want to be leaning into the limit-setting formula in the connected parenting process. You want to

be building structure that motivates your kids. And having a routine where this comes first and then that comes next, that's what

creates motivation. So long-term, like people pleasing their teacher, some kids have that, especially perfectionists, but a lot of kids just aren't into

making sure that their teacher's happy or their parents are happy. They're not motivated by people pleasing. They're not motivated by doing a good job.

They're not motivated by a grade. They're not motivated by college, especially a second grader. They're not thinking about like, I need to have good work habits so that I get into college.

They don't think about the future, so we need to bring the future to them using the limit setting formula. I'm going to give you examples of what I mean by the limit setting

formula in terms of setting boundaries around homework. So the first is pretty clear. You're welcome to play outside once you've done your afternoon tasks,

had a snack, and finished one page of math. If you think about it, this is really a rhythm for the afternoon. You come home, you have your chores, like you put your backpack away,

you put your lunchbox away, you put your homework folder on the table, you have a snack, you do a little bit of your math, then you go play. Now the timing of this is

determined by you. You will know whether your kid responds better to playing first and then coming back to doing

homework or Do— is it very hard for them to stop playing and then come back to homework? Maybe it's better for your kid to just stay in that school mode right when they get home.

Obviously, if you have after-school activities, if you have enrichment, if you have religious events or family events, different things like that, every week you're going to have

different stuff going on. So thinking about your day, thinking about your week, figuring out your limit, when does homework need to take place. These are limit setting

examples using the limit setting formula. They don't need to be your limits. I don't know if your kid wants to do homework right after school or if you want to have a

break. You know best when it's best for your kid to do their schoolwork and you might have to play around with it a little bit. Maybe your kid comes home and they do it with ease and they get

it done and it's over. Maybe your kid just really needs to move their body. They've been sitting still too long. They need to wiggle. They need to do movement. They need to eat something, they need to play,

they need to, you know, bug their sibling for a few minutes, and then you can get them to do their homework. Also depends on how your afternoons are built. If you have enrichment, if you have sports, if you have

activities to go to, maybe you don't get homework started right away because it'll be interrupted. You have to figure out your own rhythm, and then you use the limit setting formula to

set that boundary up. Here's another example of a limit around whether or not you're going to help your kid with their homework. Because some kids will only do it while you're sitting

there, but then they don't want to do it until you're starting dinner, and that doesn't work for you. So you can set a boundary by telling your kids, I'll be happy to help you with

homework between 4 and 5 or 7 to 7:30. So you're essentially saying, I'm not available from 6 to 7:30. Whatever

time you are available for homework, let them know that. Communicate your boundary. Now, if they want your help and it's 5:30 and you set that boundary, you

don't help them. You say, oh nope, I'm sorry, I'm not available for homework right now. We'll have to do it at 7. Well, I need your help. You said you'd help me.

I said, yeah, I'd said I'd help you within this time. Now it's time for me to do my chores and my afternoon activities. Having your children work within your schedule

and your timeframe and your boundaries will create more peace for you. Here's another example. If you decided to use screens in the afternoon, you can let your kids know, hey,

you're welcome to watch a show after dinner as long as your homework is done by 6 o'clock. So that prevents that after-dinner drama where

they want a show but they haven't done their homework. If you want all that to be done before you serve dinner, you can set that boundary. And then if they don't make it, they

don't keep the boundary, they Don't finish their homework by 6, no show. After dinner, they gotta do their homework. Maybe they finish it really fast and they say, oh, I finished, I finished, now let me watch my show.

No, I said you can watch a show as long as your homework was done by 6. It's after 6, so that means no. I want you to feel comfortable being strong in

your boundaries and knowing that you can handle the big feelings that come. And the stronger you are about your boundaries, The more compassionate you are when you set them and your kid

is upset, the less friction you will have in your family long term. So in the short term, when you set boundaries, your kids are going to be really upset. They like the

old way where they got to negotiate and make promises and have bribes and all of your anger because that was like the only consequence. They like that, but they don't like it

long term because it does create stress. What your children really want is for you to be the leader of their family. And they want you to be strong. I'm encouraging you to

be okay with having your kid be disappointed and having a consequence. Here's another one about homework hours, because what happens to some families,

especially as kids get a little older, is they don't do any of their homework until after dinner and they don't want to start it till 8:30, and then they stay up till 10:30 and they

need their Chromebook or they need their laptop, and it's a whole— problem. You get to tell your kids when homework hours are. So you can say, hey,

homework hours end at 8:30. I hope you get everything done by then. Now notice you have to be okay with your kid going to school without their homework being complete.

And I want to encourage you when I talk about mindset that that is actually a good thing. It's a good thing for your kids to fail and not have everything perfect all the time. And experience those

consequences of the teacher talking to them or them having to stay in at recess or any of those things. But you have to get comfortable with the fact that your kid might not be perfect. You have to

get okay with that. So putting that boundary on homework time. You can also connect weekend behavior to homework packet behavior. A lot of

schools do a homework packet. They assign everything, you know, on a Wednesday and it's due the following Wednesday or something like that. So if you know your kid has a homework packet, you can let them know

that they can play video games on the weekend, or they can watch TV on the weekend, or they can go on that playdate on the weekend, or they can have a sleepover on the weekend, as long

as their homework packet is turned in on time. So if a Wednesday packet is due and they don't turn it in until Friday, then no problem. But

Saturday when they want their TV time or their screen time or whatever their thing is, You just say, no, we're not doing that because you did not finish your homework on time. That reinforces the fact that

it is their responsibility to get their homework done and it's in their best interest to get that homework done. Again, are you gonna have a disappointed kid? Yes, you are. Is that okay?

Yes. Is it good? I'm gonna tell you yes. So again, I'm happy to drive you to your playdate this weekend as long as there are no problems getting homework done this week. So, think

about that boundary. When you have a kid who procrastinates and perfectionism and no motivation and all of these problems that are created because they

are resisting doing their homework, maybe you want to consequence that resistance and set a boundary around it. I like to say the limit is the pivot.

So, if you have a strong limit, it will pivot behavior towards what you want them to do, but we have to have that firm boundary in order for the kid to be

motivated to pivot their behavior. So the limit is the pivot and the consequence is the experience of that limit that creates that external

motivation. So I'm happy to drive you to your playdate this weekend as long as there's no problems getting homework done this week. Again, you have to be willing to follow through with these consequences.

Another example, you can do park playdate on Wednesday as long as the homework packet is halfway done by Wednesday. So imagine you have the homework packet gets assigned on

Monday, it's due on Friday. Midweek, your school gets out early and you usually go to the park with all the buddies. You can let them know, listen, I'm happy to do the

Wednesday park playdate as long as the packet is halfway done by Wednesday morning. That way they're motivated Monday and Tuesday to get it done and work on it. So we're not

using threats, we're not using bribes, We're just teaching our kids that this is the rhythm of our family, and once we do this thing, then we can do this thing. I do wanna talk for a split

second about rewards and sticker charts in terms of motivation. They are very effective in the short term, probably for like one week or

so. If you wanna reinforce like getting homework together and doing it for a week, you know, you can have a little sticker, you can have like, you get an M&M or whatever

after you finish this one piece of paper. If you need a short-term motivation, that sticker charts and bribes and things like that are effective.

The problem is they're not effective long-term. Limits are effective long-term, and boundaries and following through are effective long-term. So

feel free to use a sticker chart, but don't expect it to make that change in your family that you really want. Okay, the last topic I want to talk about is disorganization,

and this happens to families quite often, Especially with kids with ADHD. And that means that they have maybe finished their homework, but the worksheet is balled back up in

the backpack. Nowadays, we don't have that much stuff we have to turn in because it's pretty much all online, but they do have some pieces of paper that they need to connect with at

home and then turn back in. I actually— this is a tangent, but I miss those days where kids had to take something from school, hand it to their

parent, have their parent fill it out, and then they had to be responsible to turn it back in. Because of the digital life that we live and everything being email and online and in

portals and all of that, the kids are really missing out that opportunity to connect the responsibility that they have for their lives. This is like magic.

Things just happen magically for them that they are all of a sudden on a field trip instead of having that personal responsibility of like filling out that permission slip. That's just the

thing, the way that schools are run nowadays, it does take a little bit of responsibility away from kids. and puts it more and more on you, which is frustrating, right? But we do have kids who don't know

what the assignments are. They, they finish their homework, they don't turn it in, and that is a frustrating thing. But what I've noticed is sometimes that happens when

the kid has ADHD, but sometimes it's an organizational issue within the family. So it might not just be the kid. There may not be a good system in your

family for where the backpack goes, where the homework folder goes, how it gets brought from the backpack to the table, from the table back to the backpack.

And there might not be a system for where stuff is and how it is handled. And that's an easy fix on your part. But if you have any sort of

ADHD or overwhelm, it may be really challenging for you to put these in place. I do want to encourage you to think about in your house, Where does

stuff go and where does my kid do their schoolwork? Where are the materials stored? Because we want our kids to be as independent as possible. So

having a rhythm around coming home, putting your backpack away, getting your homework folder, putting it on the table for later, putting your lunchbox on the

counter, emptying it out if there's any trash or uneaten food. They can put that back in the refrigerator if it hasn't gone bad. They can actually eat it for snack if it's still good.

And having those systems in place, right? Come home, put your backpack away, put your socks and shoes away, get your homework ready. Having those routines

is what prevents you from having to remind and nag and follow up and like pick up backpacks and socks and shoes and have a big mess in your house. If you don't wanna mess, you gotta teach your

kids where to put stuff and when to put it away, especially someone with ADHD. As someone who raised a kid with ADHD, I really did have a lot of systems in place.

I'm built that way. I love systems, as you can tell based on the way I teach. But what has happened now that my son is 22 is that he has a bunch of systems for

himself. He did not have the ability to create that order in his mind, but because I was able to create that neural pathway, he's now used to it and

he knows he relies on that pathway. It's really important for him to have those routines. He knows where he puts his wallet, he knows where he puts his keys, he knows where he puts his

laptop. You know, he's in college, so he has systems that he comes home and he's said to me, I have to do it that way, otherwise I will lose everything. And that is

such a gift, right, to teach your kids how to manage their things and manage their time. So creating that rhythm is really good. I want to talk a little bit

about consistency and predictability here because I think it can be really frustrating for parents when they're Like, have a consistent time that the kids do their homework when

you have an inconsistent schedule. So I know when I was raising my kids, there were some days we had soccer practice, some days we didn't. Some days we came straight home from school, some days we went to the

dentist. Like, we always had sort of stuff going on, and it wasn't like I could just have homework be at the same time every day. But what we did always do is

come home, right? So, because that was consistent, then the routine when we came home was consistent in terms of where we put things. And I

would often look at my week and decide, okay, when is the homework time going to happen here? Or if you're trying to figure out if you have time for screen

time based on last week's episode, are you looking at your calendar and you're like, are we even going to have an hour for screen time this week? No. Right? If we add in homework and movement

and social life and all of those things. So picking a general routine per week is great. Like ideally you like to come home, have a snack, have your kids do their

homework, and then they start playing. But if there's a day or two that is a different schedule, then you wanna look at those days and pick a new time where

the homework gets done. And then you set those same limits that we've been talking about. So using that limit setting formula, like, hey, we're gonna leave for practice once your backpack's already packed

and by the door for tomorrow. And you would say that maybe 15, 20 minutes before you need to leave, or 10 minutes before you need to leave, so that your kid has a little bit of time to kind of get

organized. And then you stand at the door just like you do in the morning routine, waiting. And they're like, we gotta go, we gotta go to practice. Or you're like, we gotta go to practice. And they are,

you know, Dilly-dallying and things like that, and you're like, okay, we can leave once you have put your backpack and your homework back in your folder and your backpack by the door so that we're all set for tomorrow. So you're

setting those boundaries based on what works for your family. As we wrap up, I do want to talk about a healthy mindset for homework because I think it can be

confusing, like I said in the beginning, whether it matters or doesn't matter. So in general, I would not stress too much about homework. Especially in elementary school.

The research shows that the academic benefit of homework in elementary school is generally mixed, or it's kind of small. Although it doesn't have necessarily

academic benefit, there are real benefits of doing schoolwork at home. One of those is that it helps you assess your kid's skill and development.

If you are reading aloud with your child and you see a reading gap, That's really good information for you so that you can communicate that to the teacher. Or if you notice a skill gap around

math or concepts that they don't quite understand, having that flagged for you because you did a little bit of homework with your kid is useful. Another benefit of homework is that it

creates good work habits, and those work habits that you establish in 1st through 5th grade then carry over into middle school. Ideally, we want

our kids to be able to get to middle school and have a good routine around knowing that their homework matters, knowing that they need to get it done in a certain amount of time, and knowing how long

it takes to get homework done, that they have a lived experience of doing homework so that when the stakes are a little bit higher in middle school and then even higher in high school, the

stakes being graduation from high school or getting into a good college, that they have had enough experience with homework and self-motivation that they know how to

internalize that so you're not dragging around in high school with missing assignments begging your kids to do their schoolwork. Now of course, some kids with ADHD, they're going to

have a lot of trouble for many years trying to create this habit on their own. You may have to continue to build these rhythms in all the way through high school with some kids with ADHD,

but the hope is that you're developing these work habits so that they can take them into their adult life. So, when it comes to homework, there are benefits to having that

routine and establishing that rhythm, but I don't want you to feel so stressed about what your kids' grades are or did they miss one week of the packet or

did they turn it in late. Like, that's not that important long-term. What we're doing is we're establishing rhythms and habits and things like that

and using the limit-setting formula so your kids know that they should listen to you and that you're going to use homework as an area where you teach them that it's in their best interest to listen to you.

What's your responsibility when it comes to homework? How much should you help? How much should you not help? Be available to help your kids. Sit next to them if they need a

little bit of love and guidance, especially when they're first establishing these habits. Look over their work a bit. If you notice an error, you can point that out

and see if they have a concept that they don't understand, or was it a careless mistake? You do want to have an eyeball on that homework, but don't stress too

much about it, right? If they're complaining a lot, you can give some validation and then you can say, you know, I'm going to let you do this on your own for a few minutes. I'm going to start the pasta and I'll

come back and check on you. So you give them validation. I hear you. This is frustrating. I know you can handle it. And then you set a boundary. I'm going to go start dinner. I'll check on you in 5 minutes. I

hope to see you have started on at least one problem. You're giving them a little bit of a task and you're setting a boundary around how much you're willing to listen to that complaining. When

you take a break and you step back away from your kid, it does give your child the time to self-regulate instead of borrowing your nervous system and

always co-regulating with you. You take a little break, they have to learn to self-regulate, self-soothe, self-correct, kind of get themselves together a bit. So we

validate and then we allow them to regulate on their own. If it's a huge big feeling cycle, bag it. Let them know they don't have to do it tonight,

and they probably aren't going to have the privileges that you've attached to getting homework done later in the week. But don't threaten that. Don't tell them that now in the big feeling cycle. Let them fail.

Let them experience the consequence. That is where all the real lessons learned. So if your kids don't finish their homework, don't stress too much. Let your logical consequences come

into play. Having them have a missed privilege, or they had a teacher pulls them aside, or they stay for recess, or maybe even they get a lower grade. Allow for those

mistakes, especially as they're young. That's where all the teaching and learning happens. So if your 7-year-old brings home an imperfect homework assignment or they get a bad score,

don't make it mean anything about the future. Just notice, oh, you're still learning. Yeah, you didn't know that one very well. That's okay. We can get some extra work. Or we can do some practice

exercises, or, you know, a lot of times the teacher will repeat content and keep teaching it to make sure that your kid learns that concept. So don't worry too

much when they're young and they're not necessarily right at grade level. Be in an open conversation with their teacher, be looking at their homework but not owning

it as if it means that much. It's just information for you, for your kid, and for the teacher. So just to recap, these homework

fights that we are talking about, usually your kid is resisting that negative emotion or they're not motivated or they're disorganized because they don't have the

ability to organize themselves. Applying the things that you learned in this podcast are really going to make it easier for you to deal with that procrastination, deal with

perfectionism, deal with that lack of motivation. and manage your kids' and your family's organization in new ways using the connection tool and the limit setting

formula. I always like to leave you with one practical tool or tip for the week. And this one, what I want you to do is to think about your week

in general. When do you want your kids to do their schoolwork and what is the order of events? What are the things that your child can have? Or

do once their homework is done. Putting that limit in place is gonna be really important for motivation, but also for teaching that it's good for them to

do their homework at the time that you specified, in the time that you specified, and without a lot of negative emotion. So pick your time, establish your

limit, and then see how it goes. All these past episodes have been about the limit setting formula, And creating rhythms and routines in your family so you feel less stressed. So keep

working on them. All right. I really appreciate your time. I'm glad you're listening. If you love this episode or you found it useful, please share it with a friend or go ahead and do like a thumbs up thing on

YouTube if you're watching this podcast. And in the meantime, I hope you have a peaceful week and that homework is without tears, and I will talk to you

next week. Bye.