How to Deal With Children and Exams: The Parental Guide

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Exams not only help to get good marks, secure a better stream, or a scholarship, but a successful performance in exams can help boost the confidence of a child. While your child is facing a lot of pressure from school, friends and society, it’s your turn as a parent to make your child motivated and confident enough to prepare for the exam.

Here’s how you can support your children during the exam:

Don’t put much pressure on the students

Each year, crores of students appear for exams from different boards. You can imagine the immense pressure your child may face during the preparation of the exam with such competition.

As a parent, you should realize the stress factor and not set any unrealistic targets for them. During the exam, you should give an assurance to your child that you will be there to support them irrespective of the exam result. A gentle motivation and encouragement will be much more helpful to boost the child’s confidence.

Help them to manage time and prepare a timetable

While a child is going to face the board exam, they have to give proper time to revisions, solving previous year’s questions, memorizing, etc. They must have an hour or two for rest and recreation. Parents need to help their child create a proper time table to meet the daily study target and ensure that each day remains balanced.

In this process, they might not need your consistent help. But you have to be there at the initial phase to help them stay on track. It is the moment when as a parent you have to be firm forward yet supportive to your child.

Monitor the progress and encourage them to create Self-Help Aids

Daily assessments can do much to track your child’s progress. Encourage them to take up regular mock tests seriously. Figure out their strong and weak areas from the mock assessment. Also, please do not allow any extra time, restricting them to complete a paper within the given time limit. By this, they will be more organized at the time of the real exam.

Sit down with them, take an oral test. Once your child is done with each mock and oral examination, ask them to list the patterns of mistake, and areas needing further revision. In this way, they can create a better revision plan and can improve their performance efficiently with time.

Make sure you are giving proper attention to nutrition, exercise/activity and sleep

Your child needs to look after themselves. It is very common for students to forget to eat or sleep at a proper time when the exam is just one or two weeks away. They get busy with their schedule and due to stress, sleeping and eating on time, takes a back seat.

As a parent, you have to make sure that your child remains mentally and physically healthy during this time. Make sure they have a healthy and balanced diet. You can encourage them to take juice or fruits at a regular intervals. If your child prefers to study late at night, encourage them to take frequent power naps in the day time. This will boost the mental capability in such a stressful time.

And don’t forget physical exercise. Take your child out with you for a walk or a cycle ride. Make sure they have a regular break from studying for nutrition, physical activity and sleep.

Provide a proper environment for study

Do not create a national library in your home, instead create a calm environment. Make sure you are not organizing any house party at the time of exams.

Give your child the support they need during the examination, be that pillar and help them to flourish in their exam and not be afraid of it.

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When my cousin gave birth to her daughter, her life was completely changed — physically, emotionally, mentally, behaviorally — it was drastic.

But what was more overwhelming for us was the constant poke by some of the self-acclaimed mom experts who didn’t want to stop sharing their gyaan on how to raise a kid. Yes, it’s good to have experts around, but I think once a woman becomes a mother, she kind of knows what needs to be done — that’s the instincts that help her.

In my cousin’s case, she was barred from doing most of her favourite things because, ‘beti ka dhyaan kaun rakhega?’ She had to keep moving to other rooms to breastfeed her, change her and sometimes had to face the wall while feeding her.

I wondered if every woman had to face the same? And what if there’s the only room where you can feed her? How many times will you face the wall? How will you feed the baby in public?

While I’m finding the answers to these unwanted stigmas of the 21st century, read about this supermom Stuti Agarwal, who loves to be a breastfeeding advocate and be vocal about the activities which are ‘natural’!

Stuti’s gynaecologist & an IBCLC, post-delivery, told her that she has to be with her kid 24×7. Stuti hooked on to that statement and took him along everywhere. “Being an exclusively breastfeeding mom who hasn’t used a bottle ever, I have breastfed almost everywhere — malls, movie halls, restaurants, Kuala Lumpur Tower, ship, train, flight, zoo, Disneyland, museum, temple — you name it, and I have done it,” shares Stuti. “However, I felt judged many times. I was told by people to go to some other place and feed as male members were present.”

Ever Breastfeed Breastfeeding In Public_ This Super Mom Will Tell You How To Do It! — Stuti with her kid

And this was not different in her home too. She was asked to face the wall of her room while breastfeeding her baby. “I felt like I was doing a crime! I had to feed him almost any and every time, and apparently, I was facing the wall for 20 hours a day! Eventually, I ignored the folks and started feeding my baby as per our convenience. And the first time I breastfed my baby in front of my dad, it gave me some confidence to feed him in public as well,” she continues.

Stuti recalls an incident when her first one wasn’t even a month old, “A neighbour was visiting me, and I started feeding my baby. She closed the eyes of her then 4-year-old! That made me realize what a taboo breastfeeding was, and I took the pledge to normalize it. I breastfeed my second one freely in front of my almost 3-year-old. My 11-year-old nephew, who used to step out of the room when I fed my baby, is now comfortable with me feeding in his presence. People need to realize that breasts aren’t just organs or something for sexual pleasure, but to feed babies and nourish them.”

“Once, I was at Siddhivinayak temple in Mumbai, feeding the baby in the temple compound when a temple official asked me to accompany her and feed the baby in a dingy room. My own family has felt embarrassed of me feeding in public,” she continued telling how she became a breastfeeding advocate over time.

By the time Stuti’s kid was six months old, she had already travelled to six countries without worrying about his baby’s food and health. “My family members were a bit wary initially because they rarely saw women breastfeeding in public, but they have now accepted that it is normal to feed babies anywhere and are even proud of me that I exclusively breastfed my kids,” Stuti laughs.

“Here are five reasons why I believe in nursing in public :

My baby wants food; she gets it. I’m not going to let her bawl while I look for a room or give her a bottle of formula just because “log kya kahenge”.

My baby, my breasts, my rules.

I want to promote nursing in public and normalize breastfeeding. I want more people to see that breastfeeding still happens; it is normal and can happen in public too.

I want my baby to get used to being fed under the sky, on the grass, on the restaurant table, in a noisy place, whenever wherever so that she develops acceptance of situations.

My convenience. I don’t have to pack too many things and not run around to find a place to feed.”

Stuti follows the two-t-shirt method to feed. She works as an independent content writer and loves sharing her kids’ tales. Connect with her on Instagram to hear some of those.

And while I’m finding the answers to these unwanted stigmas of the 21st century, I am encouraging all mothers not to give up. Dear moms, do not give up on your dreams, do not hide in the closet due to the society — be you, be what you are and show your kid the world you believe in!

#Breastfeeding is bliss. Don’t let your child be deprived of it!