Notes
Helping without hovering: a note for parents
The most useful things a parent does are logistical and unglamorous. Almost none of them involve sitting next to the student.
We are asked this more than anything else, usually by a parent who is already doing enough.
1. Protect the hour, do not police it
A fixed time and a quiet room does more than any amount of checking. Enforcement conversations cost more goodwill than they recover.
2. Ask one specific question a week
'How was revision' gets nothing. 'What did you get on the paper you marked on Sunday' gets a real answer and takes ten seconds.
3. Do not teach the topic yourself unless asked
Methods have changed, and a parent teaching long division the 1994 way is a genuine source of confusion. Send the question to the tutor instead.
- Print the past papers so nobody has to find a printer at 9pm
- Keep the exam timetable somewhere visible
- Say the grade matters less than the effort, and mean it
- Book the trial lesson before the mock, not after
It is a smaller job than most parents think, and it works better done lightly.
