Help your child overcome procrastination

It happens to adults … but to children too. If you realize that your child likes procrastinating too much, you need to intervene because doing this regularly can cause problems in the future both in his personal and professional life.

Procrastination is one of those things that even the most organized people can get into from time to time, but if it’s sporadic, it’s not a bad thing either. You may have noticed that your child prefers to watch television than finish his homework on time … but this can have a negative impact on his school grades.

So what can you do to help your children overcome procrastination and avoid the stress, anxiety, and poor performance that come from completing tasks at the last minute? Children need to learn to plan their homework and organize their time, this is how they will beat procrastination!

WORK THE FEAR

Fear is a key factor in children that can contribute to procrastination. This can involve fear of failure, fear of making mistakes, or even fear of success. In this sense, it is important to question erroneous beliefs so that children realize their capacity.

If your child is afraid of success because he secretly believes that he does not deserve it, he needs to realize that this supposed belief of personal inability could prevent him from reaching his goals. By addressing the fear that is keeping you from getting started, you can begin to overcome your procrastination habit.

MAKE A LIST

Start by creating a to-do list of the things you would like to accomplish.  If necessary, put a date next to each item if there is a deadline it must meet. Calculate how long each task will take to complete, and then double that number so you don’t fall into the cognitive trap of underestimating how long each project will take.

BREAK PROJECTS DOWN INTO SMALLER TASKS

When children are faced with a big project, they may feel discouraged, intimidated, or even hopeless when they see the large amount of work they have to do. At this point, you need to take the individual items from the list and break them down into a series of steps.

If for example you need to write a document for the school, you should know what are the steps to follow. It is necessary to write a list of the steps to use in a task to know what to do at all times.

RECOGNIZE THE ONSET OF PROCRASTINATION

When you teach your child to tackle the items on the to-do list, he will need to pay special attention when thoughts of procrastination start to appear in his mind. If you notice a “I don’t feel like doing this now” or “I’ll have time to work on this later” thought popping up … then you need to acknowledge that you are about to procrastinate and have to remedy it. .

Instead of giving in to the urge, you’ll have to force yourself to spend at least a few minutes working on your assigned tasks … it’s so much easier to finish a thing once you start doing it.

ELIMINATE DISTRACTIONS

It’s hard to do real work when you pay attention to what’s on TV or when you check your friends’ status updates on Facebook . Make your children understand this so that they will be able to have time to do those leisure activities, once they have finished the tasks they must do.

Once you have completed a task (or even a small part of the larger part) it is a good idea to reward yourself for those efforts. They can enjoy doing something that is fun for them even for a few minutes.