Pam Withers - Jump-Starting Boys: Help Your Reluctant Learner Find Success in School and Life

JUMP-STARTING

BOYS

HELP YOUR RELUCTANT
LEARNER FIND SUCCESS
IN SCHOOL AND LIFE

PAM WITHERS
AND
CYNTHIA GILL, MA, LMFT

FOREWORD BY DR. JOHN DUFFY

Praise for Jump-Starting Boys

For parents who want to be sensitive to the struggles in their boys lives, here are wise words from two parents who have been through these trials and lived to tell the tale. Jump-Starting Boys is loaded with hints from the experts, but it never strays far from the experience of raising boys in a world that is less and less responsive to their needs.

Michael Sullivan,

author of Connecting Boys With Books 2: Closing the Reading Gap

In an age when the culture of childhood is defined by digital screens, consumerist messaging, and cynically violent and sexualized media, Jump-Starting Boys provides sage advice on what parents can do to help kidsparticularly boysgrow into responsible, happy, and well-rounded individuals. Encourage reading, help with homework, and limit screen timethese simple measures have proven effective time and again, as Pam Withers and Cynthia Gill show. A must read for parents, teachers, and anyone else concerned about children.

Joel Bakan,

author of Childhood Under Siege: How Big Business Targets Your Children

Pams books have wide appeal to boys and girls, to avid and reluctant readers, to teens and to younger children who are looking for a challenging high-interest book.

The Bookmark, newsletter of the British Columbia Teacher-Librarians Association

Copyright 2013 by Pam Withers and Cynthia Gill.

All rights reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in newspaper, magazine, radio, or television reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Published in the United States by Viva Editions,

an imprint of Cleis Press, Inc., 2246 Sixth Street, Berkeley, California 94710.

Cover design: Scott Idleman/Blink

Cover photograph: Dorling Kindersley/Getty Images

Text design: Frank Wiedemann

First Edition.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

E-book ISBN: 978-1-936740-49-9

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Withers, Pam.

Jump-starting boys : help your reluctant learner find success in school and life / Pam Withers and Cynthia Gill, MA, LMFT

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Academic achievement. 2. Underachievers. 3. Home and school. 4. Boys--Psychology. 5. Parenting. I. Gill, Cynthia. II. Title.

LB1062.6.W57 2013

370.154--dc23

2013009246

Dedicated to our father, Richard S. Miller, and our late mother, Anita Miller, who both instilled a lifelong passion for reading in their children.

underachiever: a student who performs less well in school than would be expected on the basis of abilities indicated by intelligence and aptitude tests.

Jump-Starting Boys: Help Your Reluctant Learner Find Success in School and Life offers positive, practical solutions to parents of preteen and teen boys who are underperforming in school and in life. With this upbeat guide, parents can stop despairing and start working with their child to help him be the best he can be.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

IF YOU HAVE A SON WHO IS HAVING PROBLEMS at home and school, dont panic. Pam Withers and Cynthia Gill have bottled so much wonderful reassurance, advice, and practical wisdom into this informative gem of a book that will help turn your struggling childs life around. I keep a copy of Jump-Starting Boys on my shelf and I highly recommend it to every mom and dad who is raising a son.

Young adolescents grow tremendously; their bodies undergo so many changes so quickly that its easy to forget their brains are growing and changing at the same breakneck pace. Remember what it was like to be a teenager, addled with hormones and bursting with the desire to make your way in the world, all while having to deal with algebra homework and annoying parents? Its easy to forget how stressful that is!

Many of my patients are teenage boys who cant remain focused in the classroom or dont care about school at all. One of the most common reasons for their problems are endless distractionsTV, video games, texting, mindless time-sinks on the Internetand their parents need help with these twenty-first century issues. Is it any wonder, then, that many teen and tween boys lag behind their peers?

In my book The Available Parent, I implore parents to check in on their kids when theyre not in school. Dont smother your kids (and spoil their fun) by being overbearingjust check in a couple times a day to let them know youre interested in what they do during their spare time. I promise you wont regret it, and it could reveal habits or activities that are holding your children back.

My pointalong with Pam and Cynthiasis that I think all teenagers have dormant passions that can only be uncovered through acknowledgment and listening. Your teen may be afraid to speak of his interests for various reasons, but if you stay curious, the outlines of his passions will evolve and change shape as they come into focus.

The story of how Pam and Cynthia came to research and write Jump-Starting Boys never fails to amaze me. Pam is an author whose young adult books became popular among teen boys. She discovered that they preferred her novels because the stories were full of action and matched their maturation levels. This inspired Pam to rise to the challenge of encouraging boys to read and succeed. Pam spoke to her sister, educator Cynthia Gill, about the phenomenon of underachieving boys, and together they researched and interviewed experts about what it takes for boys to get excited about reading.

Jump-Starting Boys is their solution. This book is filled with more than two-hundred methods parents can use to work with their sons to discover their learning styles, ignite their passion for reading, and ultimately succeed in school and in life.

Ive worked with hundreds of teen and tween boys over my career as a clinical psychologist. I can absolutely confirm that helping your child cultivate a love for reading and lifelong learning is one of the best things you can do for him as a parent. Following the advice that Pam and Cynthia provide in Jump-Starting Boys will give you the tools you need to help your child grow into a competent, confident person.

Dr. John Duffy,

author of The Available Parent: Radical Optimism for Raising Teens and Tweens

Boys are falling victim to an epidemic ofhaving the ability to read and no compulsion whatsoever to do so.

MICHAEL SULLIVAN, CONNECTING BOYS WITH BOOKS 2

EVERYONE KNOWS BOYS ARE FALLING BEHIND girls in education. And that has lots of people, especially educators and politicians, busy pointing fingers and engaging in loud discussions.

Largely left out of this discussion are parents of boys, who are perhaps more aware than anyone that their bright, eager sons hit an invisible wall somewhere near fourth grade, after which they go from engaged to unengaged, discouraged, and disaffected. By their teens, too many seem determined to be slackers in school regardless of parental pleas, incentives, or discipline.

There are lots of books on underachieving boys, but most address educators and come complete with intimidating graphs, case studies, academic-speak, and lists of remedies on which parents are powerless to act.

What about the average guilt-ridden, frustrated mother or father of an underachieving boy? Someone who wants to know in plain language whats behind this trend and what they can do about it? What about mentors who crave positive support, not political shrillness?