Top Tips to Help Kids Get Organized (and Stay That Way)

Marin Mommies presents a guest post by Maggie Heaps Lauffer, director and tutor at Sage Educators. Sage Educators is a Marin-based customized tutoring and test-prep center, with offices located in both Mill Valley and Larkspur.

With the new year comes a new opportunity for students to get organized! Here are a few tips to avoid TBS (Tornado Backpack Syndrome) and stay on top of schoolwork in 2014:

1. Toss the monster Trapper Keepers. For the student who has a hard time staying organized, an oversized binder can quickly become a black hole, swallowing handouts and homework assignments never to be seen again. Instead, use a separate binder of a smaller size (1” to 1.5”) for each class.
2. Create a “Homework” folder. For some students, remembering to turn in homework is harder than completing it. Help them by making a folder that keeps daily homework away from everything else. Use a simple, brightly colored file folder and label it “Homework.” It will hold homework assignments that need to be completed as well as those that need to be turned in. All homework worksheets go into the folder during the school day; at the end of each night’s homework session, all completed assignments go back into the folder to be handed in. Place the homework folder at the front of the backpack so that the student can easily find and take it out during every class throughout the day.
3. Use a planner the right way. Students may resist this, but it’s critical to write down all homework assignments in a daily planner. It’s important to maintain this habit even if some teachers use websites—you never know if the internet will cut out or the teacher will forget to post the homework one night. Also, if there is no homework in a certain class one day, the student should write “NONE” in the space provided. This practice will ensure that the planner is accurate and reduce stress about possible unknown assignments. Finally, if the student loses the planner, buy or make a new one immediately. Students will often get completely derailed by a lost planner. Don’t let a week go by without replacing it.
4. Keep neat. A tidy and organized backpack makes students feel GOOD. Keeping a pristine binder creates an incentive to get work completed and filed in its place. Check it once weekly (Sunday evenings are good for this) to make sure everything gets back in place.
5. Make space for homework. Create a set space for homework, and keep coming back to work there every day. Establishing a homework routine in a given space causes the brain to associate that environment with focus and productivity. This is why doing homework in bed is a major no-no, not only because the student is more likely to fall asleep on the job, but also because it causes brain to associate bed with work, potentially causing sleep issues in the future.

Maggie Heaps Lauffer is a director and tutor at Sage Educators, a customized tutoring and test-prep center with offices in Mill Valley and Larkspur. For more information, call (415) 388-7243 or visit www.SageEducators.com.