Calm Parenting Podcast - Child Procrastinate? How to Help Kids Focus.

Episode Date: November 1, 2021

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Calm Parenting Podcast listeners get an exclusive 20% off an IXL membership when you sign up today at ixl.com slash kirk. Visit ixl.com slash kirk to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price. So you have a child who procrastinates, who waits until the last minute to get things done. Maybe you have a child who procrastinates, who waits until the last minute to get things done. Maybe you have a teenager who waits until late at night to complete that project that he or she has had for like three weeks. Maybe you have a child who in the last moments before you have to go somewhere, you know, they've kind of dawdled the whole time and got distracted by other things. But then in a 30 second last flurry of activity, they have to go

get everything ready. And it causes you a lot of anxiety and it's annoying and it's difficult. Why won't they just get their work done now? Right? If you're a homeschooling family, look, if you just get your work done now, you'd have the rest of the day to do whatever you wanted. And yet they still don't do it. Or maybe they struggle with focus. And I know that causes you a lot of anxiety and it's difficult. So that's what we're going to discuss today on this episode of the Calm Parenting Podcast. You know the drill. This is Kirk Martin. I'm founder of Celebrate Calm.

You can find us at CelebrateCalm.com if you need help. Reach out to us personally. Email our strong-willed son who struggled with procrastinating, with focus issues, with everything your kids struggle with. C-A-S-E-Y, Casey, at CelebrateCalm.com. Tell us about your family, age of the kids, what do they struggle with. If you know the root of their frustration, let us know that, and we will reply back to you personally because this is our family mission,

and we will help you. If you need help with any of our programs, one, go to the website, CelebrateCalm.com. You will see specials on there. There's a Get Everything package, which has everything we have ever produced, so you can really understand your kids inside and out. If you need help with specific programs, ask Casey. He will put together a custom package based on your budget, right? It's easy. So here's the email that I got, and this is going to have a lot of different dimensions, so hang in there with me. Our daughter has had a rough week getting her classwork completed. The teacher has taken away recess, art, choir, and PE from my daughter with no results.

Side note here. Think what we're really saying. And this is not bashing the teacher or bashing us, but I really want to drill down on this. Think what we're really saying. So the daughter's having trouble getting classwork completed, so the teacher's taking away all these good things. What we're really saying is, I don't like the way your brain works, or I don't understand the way your brain works, or it makes me uncomfortable the way your brain works. So I'm going to punish you slash take things away, hoping that causes your brain to work in a different way, right? That's what we're saying, rather than understanding how your child's

brain actually works. So in some ways you can see why this is counterproductive, right? In my notes I said foolish, but I don't want to use that word, but it's counterproductive. And in some respects, if you really think about it, it's actually mean. It's actually a very harmful, mean thing that we're saying when you frame it that way. I don't like the way your brain works, and it's not working the right way, which is my way, so now I'm going to punish you for it. And that's what we tend to do with these kids. We tend to punish them instead of understanding where their brain works and then giving them tools to succeed, right? And then we wonder why consequences don't work, right? And I encourage you, if you have the Strong Willed Child Program or the ADHD University

Program, by all means, share those with your child's teachers because teachers need tools just like we do to understand how our kids' brains work. So let's get back to the email. So today, our daughter had only completed putting the title on her notebook paper in a span of two hours. Side note, that makes sense to me. She's a slower processor. I'm a very slow processor. The way that I do podcasts is I get the ideas.

I've had this idea for over a week now. I noodle with it. I think about it when I'm going for walks, when I'm working out. I begin to think about it. This morning, I thought I'm going to do this particular podcast. So I go through some notes. I have some other thoughts. I then record it once because I want to get

everything out. And in the process of speaking, I learn new things and have new insights. So it's a long process. I know it doesn't sound like it sometimes because we don't produce it in a fancy way, but it takes some time for me to get clarity. There's the other part, which is your daughter, your child probably doesn't like to be watched. They don't like it like, okay, do this assignment. I'm going to walk around and watch you, right? When I was in the corporate world, I would do my best work in the evenings in my living room

because fortunately my boss wasn't there at night, right? So then the mom goes on. She was supposed to copy a poem off of the board. It took her the rest of the afternoon to complete it. However, with 30 minutes remaining in the day, our daughter was able to complete everything, in all caps, everything else that had been assigned from the day. So all day long to get one assignment done, and then in a measly 30 minutes, she had everything else completed. Now, it's not a matter of her not knowing or understanding the material or what's being asked of her. So what can we do? So I have three big points. The first is this. Think about what this mom said.

However, with 30 minutes remaining in a day, she was able to complete everything else that had been assigned from the day. So my contrarian view is this. She got everything done by the end of the day. Why isn't that enough? Now, I realize it may be, quote, better if she did her work as the day progressed or actually got it done sooner, but this is probably the way she will work for the rest of her life. An alternative view would be to say, hey, honey, good job getting everything done today. But we don't do that, do we? We want every child to be the same, and usually that means the same as us.

Do you know why so many kids that we have worked with, so many young people that I know in their 20s and even into their 30s, so many adults, like even some of you, have struggled with depression and suicide even, and feeling listless and not motivated sometimes. It's because we as the adults, as the authority figures, we've given into society's pressure. We've given into our own anxiety and control issues, and we've gotten on these kids, and nothing they do is ever good enough for us. And so we miss opportunities. And so this girl got all of her work done by the end of the day. That was the goal today. Everything done by the end of the day and she did it. And yet we still find fault with it and we still give consequences

instead of simply taking them as they are and saying, nice job, you got it done. Now, inside, I get the anxiety. I would have preferred that she had done it early in class, which some of your kids do as well because they're so smart, but now they're bored and they end up getting in trouble, right? Because they get in trouble because they're bored and they got everything done and now they're going to walk around class and they're curious. See how that works, right? Because they get in trouble because they're bored and they got everything done and now they're going to walk around class and they're curious. See how that works, right? So why don't we just say, hey, nice job working under pressure there at the end, right? Because we have to understand

our kids inside and out as individuals who learn differently and who value different things that we do. Otherwise, this is larger than procrastination issue. This is on just about everything that your strong-boiled child does because you have to understand them inside and out that they're different and they value different things so you can say, hey, nice job getting that done. Now, here's the problem. I don't like the way they get it done, and neither do you, but I don't want you to miss that. Let me

give you a quick example. Casey now is moonlighting out where he lives. He's working for a catering company at weekend weddings because they pay 30 bucks an hour plus tips, so why wouldn't he, right? It's part of that opportunistic mindset that many of your kids have with money. Now, these are really high pressure weddings and affairs with lots of moving parts. Casey has zero experience in this field, yet he has quickly become the team leader and he's the go-to person when things go south. Why? Because his personality type and his brain wiring lends itself to thriving in high-intensity, high-pressure situations. Now, when he was a kid, if you asked him to pick up his socks or clean his bathroom or do something simple as a kid? Never, right? This is stupid. I can't do it. I don't have time. But he can handle a 150-person wedding serving seven courses with all kinds of

demanding people and the electricity going out. He can do that because that's the way his brain is wired. And I want you to know your kids well so you can enjoy them and you can draw out these parts of them, successful parts, instead of always noticing what they do wrong or what irritates you. Number two big point. Think of what's happening here. Why is this girl able to complete her assignments in the last 30 minutes so well? You've heard me say this before.

It's about brain stimulation, but I'll take it one step further. There's an idea that we talk about of time compression that forces the brain to focus. And I discovered this with all these kids that we worked with at our house. We had 1,500 kids that came into our home and I'd watch them, I'd observe them,

how they got things done. And I really noticed this and used this with Casey. When he was a teenager, he would travel with me to work events, so we'd have an event. We'd have to get there 30 minutes early to the event, but we often rolled into whatever town it was, let's say 48 minutes earlier, 37 minutes before we had to go, So we would often find a Panera because they had decent food, right? We could get a spinach salad with grilled chicken, okay? Not what Casey ate as a kid, never. But when he got older, he would eat that, right? So relax a little bit. Relax a little bit with freaking out over what your kids eat. It will come. Just model it for them. They had free

Wi-Fi, and they were everywhere. And so we would sit down. We would get our food, and Casey knew he only had, say, 37 minutes before we had to leave. He'd often get his writing assignments done, which were very hard for him, during that limited time because time was compressed. See how that works? It's why I often like to see a teenager gets home from school at 3 o'clock and they go to bed at, say, 11 o'clock or midnight, some of your kids later. They've got like seven or eight hours a night to get all their work done. Same with homeschooling.

Part of the problem is you have too much time to get everything done, so you just put it off and put it off. It's why I like teenagers sometimes working a job at night or volunteering or participating in sports or extracurriculars because it compresses the time that they have to complete the work. But it also works for young kids. And I want you to try that. See, time compression stimulates the brain to focus and complete the work. So my question to this mom was, how else can we stimulate her brain earlier in the day? Try that. See, time compression stimulates the brain to focus and complete the work. So my question to this mom was, how else can we stimulate her brain earlier in the day?

Consequences don't affect this, and so they won't work. Is there a reward of some kind we can give her for getting one or two things done early or even on time? How can we jumpstart her brain? Letting her listen to music, move a bit, do schoolwork under a desk, lying on the floor. See, let's give her tools to succeed rather than consequences for failure. Let me repeat that, partially because my voice changed there. Let's give your child tools to succeed rather than consequences for failing. So the mom replied back and said, oh, so is that why she thrives on timed math tests? I'm like, yes, there's time compression there, right? So the mom, so we started brainstorming about getting a timer during the day. Could we do a, could the teacher do a beat the clock kind of strategy or challenge for her, right?

Let's start thinking of ways to stimulate your child's brain, right? And that's how I want to talk to teachers. What tools can we give my child to succeed? Third point, and this is important too, why does this make you so uncomfortable, right? You may have a child who stays up late to get schoolwork done and it bothers you, right? Why wouldn't you just do it earlier

when you have all this time, right? Same with homeschooling families. You got all day to do it and you have to wait and wait and wait and put it off, right? Now you know why they do that. But the bigger question is, why does that bother you so much? Right. It's because of your anxiety, your control issues. Also, because you're a good parent and you just want your child to get their work done so they feel good about themselves and they have time to relax and they can get a good night's sleep, of course. But maybe you're type A, right? That's the way I just knock things out. I've got an agenda. I get things done. I get that. I'm the same way. But the point is that your anxiety, your control issues,

the lectures that come from that, that pressure doesn't actually ever help change anything. It always makes it worse. Your child not only doesn't do the work that you want them to do, but it begins to ruin your relationship because you only focus what they don't do wrong, right? This email started with a lot of things about like, well, how can we get our daughter to change? And we missed the fact that she got all our work done by the end of the day. And we missed an opportunity to say, nice job working under pressure. You know what? I can see you one day working the kind of job where there's a lot of stress under there and there's time compression and you have to pull through and you're cool

under pressure. Man, you're really prepared for that. See, I create a whole different vision for my child in their brain and in their hearts so they feel confident and good about themselves rather than continually pointing out you're not doing it the right way because it's not my way. So let's work on that this week. If you need help, reach out to us. Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, celebrate.com. Work on these things. It will change the way you view your child. It will change your own life. So you can begin to enjoy these kids again and really understand them. Do share the programs. If you have our programs, share them with teachers, right? They will thank you for it because it's insight that they haven't been taught.

And we know that because we've trained a lot of teachers and they're always like, nobody taught us this before. So if you want us to train your teachers, reach out to Casey as well. But thank you for what you do. Thanks for listening. Please share this if you get an opportunity and we'll talk soon. Love you all.

Bye-bye.