Does your child have difficulty starting their homework?

Is it hard to get them to make a phone call or to choose what to wear? Everyone has the odd bad day. However, if this is the norm for your child, it could be a sign that they struggle with perfectionism.

Dyslexia and Perfectionism

Getting Harry to make a start on his homework is next to impossible. I’ve drawn someone pushing a boulder up a hill because this is how homework feels to him.

Ellen Hendriksen, PhD, who calls herself the Savvy Psychologist, has written an excellent post on perfectionism. In it, she says:

‘Contrary to the name, most perfectionists aren’t driven by the pursuit of perfection, they’re driven by the avoidance of failure. Being a perfectionist isn’t about being perfect, it’s about never being good enough.’

Perfectionism isn’t healthy. Harry’s perfectionism doesn’t just show itself in his homework. It’s difficult for him to leave the house if his hair isn’t perfect (by his standards). Choosing what to wear is tricky for him. Harry’s school has a uniform, but four days a year, students can dress in their own clothes. For this privilege, they make a gold coin donation. It’s a simple way for the school to raise money for worthy causes. I feel I should get some of it to pay for my therapy after trying and failing to get Harry to attend school on these days.

Signs of Perfectionism

According to Marianne on Homeschooling with Dyslexia:

Some signs of perfectionism in children are:

• extreme reactions to perceived failures

• putting themselves down or highly critical of self

• unwilling to try new things

• a strong fear of failure

• hypersensitive to criticism

• tend to seek approval from others

• have rigid ideas of how things should be

• think that tasks should be easy or that they are easy for everyone besides them.

Sadly, Harry has now taken perfectionism into his sport. He’s always been a super sporty kid, but this year he’s refused to join teams because he feels he won’t be as good as everyone else. He’s tall — 6 foot 5 inches (195 cm). He ducks to get through doors. Anyone can see he’s perfect for basketball. On his first day of school, after the welcome assembly, the basketball coach tapped him on the shoulder to ask if he would trial for the basketball team. Harry said no. Why? Because he was sure the other kids would laugh at his lack of ability.

Coping with Mistakes

If you have dyslexia, making mistakes is inevitable. Things that other people find easy are more difficult for you and they may take you longer. Perfectionism develops because a person with dyslexia attempts to hide their sense of shame over their slow work or silly errors.

I cover the difference between guilt and shame in my book, Dyslexia. Wrestling with an Octopus.

Shame

Guilt is easy to fix. If you feel guilty, you can attempt to put whatever you have done right, say sorry, and move on. Shame is feeling bad about who you are. It’s much more challenging to remove these feelings.

Shame dogged my early years. As a coping mechanism, I became a perfectionist. In striving never to make a mistake, my health took a huge hit. It has taken almost half a century for me to accept that I can’t measure myself against others and anyway, there are no perfect people.

It’s tough that dyslexic issues come to the fore just as a child is trying to work out who they are. Children between the ages of six and sixteen ask themselves, Am I lovable, capable, competent? Dr Michael Ryan, in his article about social and emotional problems related to dyslexia, states that:

“Research suggests that these feelings of inferiority develop by the age of 10. After this age, it becomes extremely difficult to help a child develop a positive self-image. This is a powerful argument for early intervention.”

What can a parent do to help a child struggling with dyslexia and perfectionism?

It is important to tackle this issue. If you don’t, not only will your child not fulfil their potential, they may go on to develop depression, anxiety or other issues such as anorexia. For ways to help your child love their brain, see this post.

1. Encourage a growth mindset

If you get nothing else from this blog post, please spend 10 minutes watching Carol Dweck’s brilliant YouTube video on how to encourage a growth mindset.

People with a fixed mindset believe they have a certain amount of intelligence. They are afraid to try new things because they don’t want to look dumb. Students with a growth mindset know they can learn from watching and listening to others. They appreciate even geniuses like Einstein had to put in years of effort before they became successful.

I’m going to ask Harry to watch this video. It’s done with clever illustrations, which will make it fun for him. In it, Carol Dweck talks about a study of 373 7^th grade students who had identical test scores in mathematics. She monitored these children for two years and assessed their attitude toward learning.

At the end of the study, the students with fixed mindsets had the lowest test results.

Those with a fixed mindset believed if a person had ability, they shouldn’t need effort. (Carol believes this is one of the worse beliefs any student can have.)

They orientated their lives to avoid any tasks that would show their differences or weaknesses

These fixed mindset students also believed setbacks, or a deficiency measured them and revealed their limitations. Therefore, they spent a lot of time hiding any mistakes they made. Often, they claimed tasks were boring to cover their fear of trying and failing.

2. Praise your child’s effort, not their intelligence

Research into praising children has shown praising effort, and not intelligence is the best way to encourage learning. Carol Dweck’s says

“Praising intelligence turns kids off to learning’. It sets them up to refuse to try hard tasks they may fail. Praising effort allows a child to attempt something without fear of failure.”

Therefore, praise the process of learning. Your child’s final grade isn’t as important as the knowledge they get from doing the project.

3. Review your value system

Make sure you express the fact that learning something new shouldn’t be quick and easy. The struggle is a necessary part of acquiring new skills. To convey this, you could ask at the dinner table, “Who had to struggle today?” Make sure you give examples of your own struggles.

4. Watch movies together where the chief character deals well with making mistakes

The movie Meet the Robinsons has a positive take on failure, which may encourage your child.

5. Use phrases that include the word ‘Yet’

“It’s okay, you can’t do it yet. You are just learning.” Saying Yet means you acknowledge they are on the learning curve. Teach them to say, “I can’t do it, yet,” rather than “I can’t do it.”

6. Help your child set realistic goals

People with dyslexia often set unattainable goals. They need help to break a task or problem into manageable chunks. A friend of mine told me of a homework rule she has implemented in her home. She tells her children she is available to help with a project any evening apart from the one before it is due to be handed in. This sounds like an idea I need to try.

To end on a more positive note, I contacted the basketball coach and encouraged him to ask Harry to attend the fun basketball sessions. Last night, Harry went along and loved it. When he came home, he told me he was proud of himself for going. He’s now thinking of joining the team.

This was music to my ears. I must remember when talking to Harry about basketball that it isn’t about him becoming a champion player; it’s about him improving and having fun.

Thankfully, basketball is one thing he doesn’t struggle with.

Do you have a perfectionist child?

What have you found helpful?

I taught my son to read and spell in 30 minutes a day. Here are my affilate links to the resources I used, All  About Spelling and All About Reading.

If your child also struggles to learn the multiplication tables, check out this blog post on how using stories will help them remember the facts.

Speechify is an app that can help children at school as it reads text from websites. Here is my affiliate link.

P.S. I was thrilled to see dyslexiaoctopus.com ranked 18th on the top dyslexia blogs on Feedspot this week. Check out Feedspot, here .