The Most Important Lesson For This School Year

It’s back-to-school season and I’m seeing many online posts of proud parents taking pictures of their child’s first day in a new grade.

And with each new grade comes an anticipation of a new stage of growth—not just academically or biologically, but in emotional maturity too.

I remember the day when my son asked me to stop walking him all the way to his classroom. Not because he was embarrassed. He had just started second grade and wanted to be able to do it by himself.

He turned 21 just over a week ago and having ADHD, school was quite the rollercoaster ride—not just for him but for us as parents!

He often got bored or distracted in class and liked to be the class clown. Sometimes that resulted in getting in trouble with teachers and other times that resulted in difficulties with other students.

We got to know all his teachers really well!

When he was bullied in middle school, I stepped in probably too much wanting to protect him. Rather than empower him, he felt weaker.

Then there’s the time toward the end of his freshman year when he was on his last strike. We had him in the local private Christian school, which had higher behavioral standards than the public school. When COVID hit and they transitioned into online school for the last few weeks of the year, Amy and I breathed a sigh of relief. I remember saying, “Well at least he can’t get expelled now.”

Well, Carter has a way of surprising you! The school was very technological with their assignments. He used his newfound skills to create a video of the “Top 10 Beefs” between people in the school—both students and teachers. Then he emailed it to his entire class. It was supposed to be funny, but that didn’t go down well with the administration.

We then had to scramble to find another school for the last two weeks of the year so he could finish out the grade without it showing as an “incomplete.”

Now, why am I telling these stories? Because as parents, when our kids struggle, it also activates our stress systems.

They forgot their homework? We want to bring it to school.

They’re having struggles with a teacher? We want to help them write an email.

They don’t make the starting line up? We want to call the coach.

They’re having friendship problems? We want to tell them exactly what to say and how to fix it.

They act out in class? We want to ground them.

And obviously, there are times our kids genuinely need us to intervene as well as apply appropriate consequences. But all these experiences are part of the overall lessons for them to learn as kids, and for us to learn as adults, because parenting highlights our areas of growth too.

And this is where attachment is so important.

If we want our kids to be emotionally mature, we must model it for them.

Yet, we can’t give what we don’t ourselves have.

My parenting struggles didn’t primarily come from my kids’ emotional immaturity, they occurred because I needed to grow in my emotional maturity.

The one thing I wish I had done differently is to have more emotional conversations during these experiences. Not only asking about theirs but also appropriately displaying my own.

“More is caught, than taught,” as the saying goes.

So, this school year, when your child comes home stressed about about a grade, a teacher, a friendship, or something that went wrong—and you notice your stress system activating—get curious first.

Don’t just ask, “What happened?” but also “How are you feeling about this?”

Then provide some comfort, empathy, and understanding for what it’s like to have that problem in their age and stage.

Because when we soothe, before we solve, this models for your child how to use the situation to also grow in emotional maturity.

And that’s often the most important lesson the school years can teach.