Motivating your child to learn more at school, read, do chores on his own, follow through with a task, or achieve a particular goal is a challenging experience for most adults. If you are trying to help your child become more motivated, then take a look at the following list. Here are 8 ways to motivate your child that you might find very useful.
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8. Get Involved
When a kid knows that his/her parent or guardian is interested in what he/she is doing, then this often results in the child wanting to partake in many more activities. You don’t have to only become involved in extracurricular activities. Showing a genuine interest in what your child is doing will let him/her know you do care and the urge to make you happy might be motivation enough.
7. Help Your Child Come up with Goals
Kids don’t always know how to approach a problem or task. Showing them how to set up and achieve a goal of any size might help them become more motivated to reach their goal all on their own. Write down steps that need to be taken to reach the goal and have the child check them off as they are completed. Having a visual aid helps kids see that they are truly on their way to accomplishing their desired goal.
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6. Motivate Your Child to Read More by Reading Aloud
Some children never see their parents read and aren’t read to when they are very small. Reading aloud with your child can help him/her know that you can read that you enjoy reading. The more exciting you can make it, the more your child will want to read as well. Try making a yummy dessert and have your child help you read the recipe. Being able to create something tasty by reading accurately can be quite the treat.
5. Celebrate Small Achievements
This method can be used to help kids who need motivation in school or with daily activities. I think as long as you don’t make every little task a reason to celebrate, then this motivational method will work very well. You don’t have to have an all out party, but maybe watch a movie together, go to a favorite restaurant, or let your child choose what to have for dinner.
4. Make a Game out of Something when Possible
I remember how difficult it was to get my oldest son interested in reading at first. I decided to make a game out of learning sight words by writing down words on index cards and then laying them all over the floor through out the house. He was fascinated by the game we called ‘Hot Lava’, where the ground is hot lava and only pillows and furniture are safe objects to stand on. We used the cards as the safe rocks in this game. My son would say a word he recognized and then step onto the next word card if he knew what it said. Traveling all over the house, in this manner, made reading a lot more fun for him.
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3. Show Enthusiasm when School Work is Completed
I know many kids need lots of motivation in order to complete homework, especially once summer starts creeping closer. Kids love it when an adult cheers for them when an assignment has been completed. Even if it’s a seemingly easy assignment to you, try to think about it through the eyes of a child. Try to remember how happy you were whenever you completed a task at school that you weren’t thrilled about doing in the first place.
2. Provide Lots of Encouragement
Sometimes kids can be motivated simply by hearing you tell them they are doing a great job. A little bit of encouragement really does go a long way. Positive reinforcement can mean the world to a child, even if the task seemed like it was a simple one for the child to complete.
1. Come up with Creative Rewards
I remember doing chores around the house because my parents asked me to. I never saw any reason not to want to help out. My son, on the other hand, was completely different. He expected something exciting to happen when he helped out. All it took were rewards of some type to get him in the mood to help out a bit. He loved baking and decorating cookies, so sometimes the reward would be to bake something fun. Other times we’d go swimming in the lake, take a hike in the woods, or he’d get out of a school assignment for the day since I home-schooled him.
I hope these 8 ways to motivate your child are ones that will come in handy for you. What methods have you used in the past to provide some form of motivation for your child?
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