Study and Organizational Skills

Home Solutions to Encourage Organization

1. Help your child categorize his school materials (notebooks/binders, workbooks/texts, pens/pencils) and assign each category its own compartment or pocket in his backpack.

2. Separate ongoing projects, finished work, and school and art supplies into labeled bins, folders, file cabinets, or an under-bed box.

3. Provide a shelf for books and a bulletin board for reminders. Give your child a stapler, a three-hole punch, big binder clips, and other organization tools.

4. Fill a supply cabinet with pencils, rulers, tape, binders, and other essentials. Post a checklist in the cabinet that your child can mark when she takes an item.

5. Keep textbooks at home when possible.

6. Check your child’s planner each day and make sure he/she is writing homework each day. If homework is not noted, ask him to check the teacher’s website, or ask the teacher the next day, then follow-through to make sure homework is written. Encourage him to keep a daily to-do list, and teach him to prioritize by dividing tasks into two groups: Important (do it now!) and Less Important (do it anytime). Go over the next day's schedule together every night.

7. Prepare for the next day. As your child packs his backpack each evening, make sure that homework is in its folder and that everything he'll need - violin, sneakers, lunch money - is ready to go in the morning. Reserve a shelf or cabinet by the front door for items that your child takes to school every day. Hang a hook underneath for a backpack or sports bag.

8. Give your child a pad of sticky notes, and encourage her to post special reminders on mirrors, doors, and elsewhere.

Additional Information and tips on organization and study skills

• StudyGs

• LD Online