Helping your child enjoy school

Make an appointment to meet with your child's teacher. Ask the teacher to describe your daughter's strengths in the classroom. Is she a good reader? Does maths come easily? Is she particularly artistic? Is she a good friend to her classmates? Discovering her strengths may help you deal with her weaknesses. Ask for specifics regarding her academic progress. Find out where she needs support.

In addition to meeting with the teacher, ask if you can observe your child in the classroom. (There should never be a problem with this, as long as it's not a frequent occurrence.) Watch your daughter's body language and listen to her during class discussions. Pay attention to her actions during lessons. Does she listen carefully or struggle to attend to instructions? You indicate in your letter that you feel that the teacher is treating your daughter unfairly. Observing your child interact with the teacher may help you to understand their relationship better. If you observe antagonism between the two of them, a change of classroom may be in order. Try to be objective in your observations, and be sure to take notes.

While working with the school to help your daughter improve her academic performance, you can also work with your family at home. From your description it sounds as if you and your husband are not in complete agreement on how to handle your daughter's behaviour. Chances are that your child is aware of this disagreement, so she may be acting out to play the two of you off against each other. If the rules and consequences are not consistent, she will not know how to behave or what the limits are.

My advice to you is to sit down with your husband and discuss the expectations that you have for your child. Set some goals for her and determine what you can do as her parents to facilitate meeting the goals. Because you have a multi-generational home with two sets of parents parenting two different children, there are bound to be some challenges. Perhaps you will need to include your son in your discussion of expectations for the children. Remember that children need stability and consistent parameters. If your daughter has different rules than your son's child, she may become confused, frustrated and resentful.

One of the most effective techniques in creating a peaceful home is the family meeting. Choose one day each week to have a meeting in which every family member will participate, even the children. Forthcoming events, problems and schedules can be discussed at the meetings. Family meetings are first and foremost an opportunity for all family members to be heard; all opinions are welcome. For more information on family communication, visit the parenting section of your local library or bookshop.