Tips to Improve Learning Skills & Academic Success

Essential Learning Skills for Academic Success

It is never too late to work on improving your child's learning skills. Focusing on specific learning and academic skills will help prepare your child for future learning and will provide a strong foundation for success. Many of these skills are easy to integrate into daily learning activities and can have a profound effect on your child's academic future.

Consider these learning skills to help prepare your child for a successful school year:

• Planning ahead Knowing what is on the horizon is essential for academic success. Most teachers will provide a course syllabus or outline that details expectations and a calendar for the term. This is an important document so your child knows what to expect. Work with your child to add course expectations and deadlines to a master calendar. Once your child sees all of the required coursework in one place you can begin to plan ahead for the work load. You may notice that one particular week is full of exams, quizzes, projects, and presentations while the weeks leading up to it are relatively quiet. This knowledge will help your child plan and prepare carefully while ensuring that no deadlines are missed and no requirements sneak up unsuspectingly. 
• Reviewing what has already been learned Looking ahead to this year's classes is important, but not at the sake of previously mastered learning. In order to properly prepare for the upcoming school year it is vital your child spends time reviewing what has already been learned. Revisiting mastered concepts, skills, and knowledge is a great way to connect with future learning. The professional tutors at Huntington Learning Center are trained to reinforce previously mastered concepts while helping students become proficient with new skills and knowledge. For example, if your child participates in tutoring sessions for trigonometry the tutor will ensure new concepts are mastered while reinforcing what was already learned in the student's algebra classes. 
• Staying organized Many students struggle simply because of disorganization. It is hard to buckle down and begin studying when you can't find the proper reading material, notes, or a class syllabus. Staying organized provides your child with a system to ensure all classroom texts and materials are readily available and easily accessible. There are no perfect organizational systems, and every student will do things a little differently, but working with your child to become more organized is highly beneficial. You may want to start by providing school supplies with built in organization. Consider a color for every class and buy a binder, folder, and notebook that all match. Some students prefer an all-in-one system that organizes all materials, regardless of the class, together. Check your child's materials on a regular basis to make sure the system you helped devise is still operating smoothly.
•  Being proactive Don't wait until your child feels overwhelmed by the required classwork to ask for help. Intervening early when your child needs additional assistance is an excellent way to boost both confidence and academic learning. Spend time with your child on a regular basis reviewing classwork and discussing class requirements. This will help your child identify when to ask for help and what, specifically, is causing the most trouble. Being tuned in to these struggles will benefit your child when asking for help. Teachers, and tutors, can be of the greatest assistance when they know where the specific learning breakdown occurred. This information, coupled with careful diagnostic assessment, helps Huntington Learning Center tutors devise a customized tutoring plan. These tutoring plans meet students where they currently are and work to move them forward in both understanding and academic confidence.