There is an old saying that a parent’s heart is the child’s schoolroom. Your dreams, your efforts, your examples and loving exhortations– these set the boundaries of your child’s education. The lessons taught in the home stay with children as they make their way through school and life, shaping their interests, ideals, and enthusiasm for learning. Parents are children’s first and most important teachers. Raising your child is your number one job. Seeing that he gets a good education is, in many respects, the crux of that task.

Several critical elements for a child’s success can come only from you. First among these is your love. Children need unconditional devotion (not unconditional approval). When they grow up knowing that an adult is always there as guardian angel and guide, they thrive. When they sense that such devotion is missing, things can begin to go terribly wrong with their educations and their lives.

Your attitude about education is another key predictor of academic success. Your child looks to you for cues about what is important in life. He is always watching for your approval or disapproval, for your interest or indifference. If you care, he cares. If he sees that you value learning, he will probably do the same. If he observes you putting education second or third, he may not take his schoolwork seriously. Consistent reinforcement means everything. The messages you send determine in no small way how well your child reads, writes, and thinks. Every morning, you must send him off to school with a good night’s sleep, a decent breakfast, and a positive attitude toward learning.

Good students usually come from homes where parents have tried to create a rich learning environment. They’ve stimulated their child’s curiosity by showing them that the world is a fascinating place and helping them explore it. This does not require you to spend lots of money or have a degree in education. It mostly consists of seeing that your child grows up with interesting things to do. It means reading aloud to him, and listening to him read aloud. It means playing games, asking and answering questions, explaining things as best you can. It means exposing him to varied experiences and visiting places together– taking walks in the woods, working in the yard, occasionally going to a museum or state park. Such activities turn children into curious students.

Education success comes from putting enough time into the right work. What one spends time on is what one ends up knowing. If your child spends endless hours playing video games, he will know all the ins and outs of video games. If he spends time on math and science, then that’s what he will know. Academic achievement also hinges, to no small degree, on the time you devote to education. If you spend time helping your loved one learn to read, master those multiplication tables, and listen carefully when others are talking, his chances of doing well in school are much better.

These are the fundamentals; your love, your attitude about education, your efforts to stimulate your child’s curiosity, your ideals, rules, and expectations. The time and attention you pay, and the examples you set. They are necessary ingredients on your end. They do not guarantee academic achievement, but they make it much more likely. They put your child’s education in the hands best able to direct it: yours.

Reading is the heart of education. The school curriculum is based on it. Better readers get better grades. Reading enriches the imagination and provides core knowledge. It builds vocabulary, teaches grammar, and makes students better spellers and writers. It will give your child years of pleasure. The groundwork you lay in the preschool years is critical.

You can begin encouraging a love for books and stories in three ways. Make sure your home is a place where books are readily available. Offer yourself as a good reading role model. Above all, read to and with your child.

Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, Judith Viorst
Are You My Mother?, P.D. Eastman
Ask Mr. Bear, Marjorie Flack
The Cat in the Hat, and other books by Dr. Seuss
A Child’s Garden of Verses, Robert Louis Stevenson
Corduroy, Don Freeman
Curious George, Hans Rey
Danny and the Dinosaur, Syd Hoff
Frog and Toad Are Friends, Arnold Lobel
Goodnight Moon, Margaret Wise Brown
Harry the Dirty Dog, Gene Zion
If You Give A Mouse A Cookie, Laura J. Numeroff
The Little Engine That Could, Watty Piper
The Snowy Day, Ezra Jack Keats
Madeline, Ludwig Bemelmans
Make Way for Ducklings, Robert McCloskey
The Polar Express, Chris Van Allsburg
Richard Scarry’s Best Storybook Ever, Richard Scarry
The Runaway Bunny, Margaret Wise Brown
The Story of Babar, Jean de Brunhoff
The Tale of Peter Rabbit, Beatrix Potter
The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Eric Carle
There’s a Nightmare in My Closet, Mercer Mayer
There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly, Simms Taback
Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak
Where’s Spot?, Eric Hill
Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne

1. WORK. Schoolwork, homework, and teamwork all involve very real work for young people. It is not too early to start teaching what diligence is all about. It is important to give your child little jobs he can handle- raking a corner of the yard, rinsing the grapes before lunchtime, washing part of the car with you. Carefully show him- several times, if necessary- how to do each task. Demonstrate how it can be done cheerfully and with pride.
2. RESPONSIBILITY. Instill responsibility in your preschooler by giving him routine chores (which will require reminding by you): putting food in the dog's bowl once a day, watering a plant every Sunday, etc. Raise him to know that he is responsible for following certain rules: dirty clothes must go into the laundry hamper, toys must be put back into the chest at the end of the day, teeth must be brushed before getting into bed.
3. PERSEVERANCE. In school, your child will run into math and science problems that he won’t understand at first. In English and History, he’ll sometimes get long reading assignments. He’ll need to know how to stick with a task and complete what he’s started. Encourage your child to complete the games and activities he starts. At times, that may mean putting a task aside for a while and coming back to finish it later.
4. SELF-DISCIPLINE. Little children come without the ability to govern many things about themselves – their tempers, their appetites, their bladders. Since they do not have much self-control, it is their parents’ job to put limits in place for them. Ultimately, the point is to instill self-discipline. Parents do this largely through repeated practice of appropriate behaviors, until good habits are formed.
5. RESPECT. Teach respect for authority, including teachers and other parents. That includes training your child in some basic rules of civility such as being quiet when others are talking, and never being sarcastic to adults. Raise your youngster to live by the Golden Rule and to remember that others have rights and feelings. Teach respect for property, such as how to take care of your own things, and how to take special care with others’ belongings. Show your child how to treat the environment with care (no littering, no wasting).
6. HONESTY. Truth is the aim of learning. If education is to be of any real value at all to your child, you must teach him to recognize the truth, and raise him to love it.

Here are some study skills your child should learn. You may want to pick out one or two she needs to work on, and spend a little time practicing them together. Most are obvious, but you’d be surprised how many parents and students violate these common sense rules. They call for self-discipline on the part of all family members.

• Set up a study area. Make sure there is a place in your home that is designated for study – a quiet, well-lit area. Wherever it is just make sure this cardinal rule goes into effect: during study time, the area is off-limits to other activities and shielded from interruption.
• Get rid of distractions. It is astounding how many parents let their kids “study” in front of the television set. Because study is work, you’ve got to make certain that more entertaining options are not available at the same time. No social phone calls. No computer games. Lay out the rules clearly, explain why they are important, enforce them, and make sure your child is not diverted while hitting the books.
• Schedule study time. Children respond well to structure. If the family routine includes designated study time on school nights, you are apt to encounter less resistance – and your child is more likely to get serious work done.
• Find the right amount. Talk with your child’s teacher about how much time is needed each day for homework and study. This will vary by age.
• Get the incentives right. Getting good grades and doing well in school may be sufficient reward for some children, but others need more immediate carrots and sticks.
• Spread it out. Children are more apt to learn material well by concentrating on it during several shorter sessions spaced out over several days, rather than trying to stuff their brains with a bunch of unfamiliar ideas and facts immediately before a test. Don’t buy into the myth of successful cramming.
• Study regularly. In elementary school, most lessons build on what has come before. Next week’s assignments will probably require the base of knowledge and skills being constructed this week. If a child goes for extended periods of time without cracking a book, she may miss important building blocks, and will have a tough time understanding new readings and problems.
• Monitor understanding. Some youngsters fall into the habit of reading page after page, their eyes just following the words, without fully absorbing the content. (“I studied it, but I don’t remember anything!”) It is important to train your child to pause frequently – perhaps at the end of each paragraph or page – and ask herself: “Do I understand what I’ve just read? What’s the main idea here?” The point isn’t to memorize every single fact, but rather to make sure she’s grasped key concepts.

Here are a few of the reasons you should be concerned about the amount of TV watched in your home:

• Too much TV means bad grades.
• Families and children lose opportunity time. Opportunity to talk with you, to read, to write, to exercise.
• TV is too easy. Most TV viewing involves less concentration and alertness than just about any other activity.
• TV caters to short attention spans and immediate gratification.
• TV makes moral education harder.

Here are some guidelines to keep in mind regarding children and television:

• Set rules. First, establish clear limits on when and what your child watches. Boundaries must be set. Some families use the rule “no television until homework and chores are finished.”
• Stick to those rules. Setting limits does no good unless they’re steadfastly enforced.
• Be selective about what your family watches. Much of what’s on TV is junk, but there is also some programming that can inform, educate, and even uplift children’s minds. While children are very young, you need to pick their programs.
• Be prepared to suggest alternatives. Many parents fear turning off TV because they don’t want to hear their children whining about not knowing what to do. You may indeed hear that for a while when you first put them on a TV diet. Most parents soon find that, once their children lose their television dependency, they become more resourceful at finding other ways to have fun.
• Talk to your children about what they see on TV. Despite your best efforts to filter out the junk, they’ll surely be exposed to plenty of bad ideas, improper conduct, and rough language. When they see promiscuity or violence rewarded on the screen, and hear messages like “if it feels good, do it,” talk to them about what is right and wrong, and let them know that real life often brings unpleasant consequences for such behavior.