Every parent I know wants the best for their child.

They want their children to do well at school, in sport and generally be healthy and happy. When children are young there is a tendency for parents to want to do everything to help them in certain situations. Revision time, particularly before exams, is one such situation. You want your children to do well in their exams. So how do you help them and at the same time make sure that your child is allowed to do ‘his or her own thing’?

In this section, we will cover the primary age groups, from 4-11 years of age. In order to help your child, remember the one simple golden rule of Parenthood - PARENTS.

Praise
Activities/Associations
Rewards
Encouragement
Never!
Time Management
Stress Management

Praise
If you have one child in secondary school and one in primary school, you will see that the basic techniques are more or less the same to help your child revise. With young children, the really important thing is praise. Children respond well to praise and this helps motivate them to do better.

One way of engaging children is a fun revision chart with their favourite characters, maybe Tweenies or Bob the builder for the younger age group, Sabrina for slightly older children.

On this chart, set realistic goals and milestones for your child and give them praise when they achieve them. When you praise your child you are acknowledging their effort and making them want to do even better. If they don’t manage to reach a milestone that has been set it isn’t a cause for worry. Find out what went wrong and let your child try again. Do not criticise your child and make them feel they’ve failed.

Activities
Studying is always associated with being boring, but it doesn’t have to be like this.
As a parent you can plan activities with your child. These activities will stimulate them mentally and physically. Have a tea party, organise a sleepover or maybe a walk (weather permitting) for their friends and play some fun educational games. This way, revision still continues but it is in an enjoyable group scenario.
If your child is studying about the Vikings at school, have a game that involves answering questions on the Vikings and a little prize at the end. The advantages of fun learning are that:

• It reinforces learning
• If your child is still getting to grips with a particular topic, the fact that other people in the group might be facing similar problems, can be a huge consolation.

Associations
Learning through associations always makes it more fun. For example, if your child is learning mathematics, take them to the local supermarket. Let them pick out some items like soap, bread and cereal. You can later refer back to what you bought and how much you paid. Your child will remember this as they are part of the association. Another idea for association could be to relate learning to the songs of their favourite pop star!

Rewards
The idea of a reward works for all ages whether you are 3, 30 or 60!
A lot of the time the biggest reward is ‘job’ satisfaction at a task well done! However, most children will gladly put in that extra bit of effort around revision time to get a reward. This could be a promise of camping with friends, a game for their Playstation, an item of clothing, a book or even a trip to see Harry Potter at the cinema.

The reward will obviously vary from child to child with parents judging what incentive works best for their child. Sometimes the child puts in a great deal of hard work but for one reason or another, doesn’t achieve the set goal. You should still reward them for their hard work.

Encouragement
Children progress at different levels and different speeds. Two children of the same age could have completely different abilities. Not all children are ultra confident and some children need to be drawn out of their shells.

Approaching exam time children get apprehensive and nervous about learning and become worried about making a fool of themselves. As a parent, you can encourage your child to learn new things and develop their existing skills. Encourage them to use the internet and look at relevant revision sites (supervised by an adult).

• The NEVER rule
  A handy hint for most parents is the ‘Never’ rule. Follow it and revision time need not be the nightmare most parents think it could be.
• Never compare your child to someone who is doing better than him/her.
• Never tell your child that they have let you down.
• Never lose your patience when revising with your children.
• Never tell your children ‘at your age I was brilliant’ or anything providing comparison to your own study methods.
• Never force your child to study if they are tired.

Stress Management
The time leading up to exams is one of anxiety and stress. Make sure your child gets plenty of food, sleep and relaxation. Play soft music and avoid constant, unnecessary interruptions to your child’s revision routine. Make sure that if your child is unable to complete a particular task, you don’t make it out to be a big deal. Instead just carry it over to the next day. This way your child will be mentally and physically relaxed.

Everything aside, the main thing to remember is that your child needs you and however difficult things might get, never give up on your child!