How to Deal with a Drop in Grades in High School
It’s a frustrating mystery why your otherwise straight-A high school student experiences a sudden drop in grades. They may have started out the year full of enthusiasm and full of promise, only to hit a sudden slump.
There are many reasons why your child suddenly experiences a drop in GPA, but thankfully there are just as many ways that you can help them to get back on track.
Why Grades Drop in High School
Here are some of the most common reasons why your high schooler experiences a drop in their grades:
Mid-Year Slump
According to StudyPug, a decline in grades occurs when the winter break finishes and kids head back to school in January.
The reason for the grade drop at this period of the year can be related to many causes: a lack of enthusiasm after the holiday bustle; a lack of energy thanks to the dark, dreary days of winter, or even just a reduced drive thanks to the disrupted routine.
Whatever the cause, many people see the mid-year slump in their students.
Change of Life/Routine
If you’ve recently moved, had a traumatic or altering life event, or preoccupation with too many extracurricular activities, you can expect to see a decrease in grades.
High school students experience stress just like you and me, and any life-altering event would be likely to cause a decline at school.
Overscheduling
Your child can feel overwhelmed if there is a lot of pressure to perform in an extracurricular activity. If their days are dominated by soccer practices, piano recitals and more, there is less time for studying and resting. A tired or overscheduled mind is not always the healthiest mind.
Too much TV/Internet
It’s almost impossible to control all the media that our children are exposed to today, but it is vital that some effort is placed into this area.
For example, if your child has access to a cell phone all night, or has a TV/computer in their room, there is a chance that they may be up too late watching shows instead of studying.
Medical/Psychological Issues
It’s important not to rule out medical problems, such as anxiety, ADHA or even bullying, especially if the grade drop is sudden, unexpected and occurs for an extended period.
How to Deal with a Sudden Drop in Grades
Talk to Them
Be patient and listen to their situation and try to be understanding, as perfect grades are not always the ultimate goal in life. As a parent, it is extremely valuable to let your high schooler know that you care about them, regardless of their school performance.
Let them know that good grades are necessary, but so is their happiness. They will feel supported if you take this approach.
Help Them to Set Goals
Help to understand their classes, what they’re learning, and where they’re struggling. You can help them get onto a path of success by guiding them through the process.
Keep Your Eyes and Ears Open
If your child is anxious about something, experiencing ADHD, or being bullied, you will likely see behaviours in their home life that may include withdrawal, sullenness, and a disconnect.
Ensure that they know that their well-being is paramount and you are there for them.
Chat with Their Teachers
This may not be a socially acceptable thing to do in the eyes of your teen, but if the problem is severe enough, even a simple email to your child’s teacher may help. It may also allow you to understand how you can guide them to success.
Make an Appointment with Your Child’s Counsellor
If you set up a meeting with your child present, you may be able to come up with a game plan for success.
Overall, as a parent, you need to have a good understanding of what your child is capable of doing. Remember, we want to challenge our kids, and we don’t want them to learn just to give up.
Be an advocate for your child and if you believe the work is too difficult, be sure to support them and help them get to where they need to be.
Warehouses Explained
Warehouses are large facilities that are used and accessed by various sectors, such as manufacturers, exporters, and importers. According to fmicanada.com, they are primarily used for storing and housing goods as they make their way from production to the end user or retailer.
Warehouses will usually unload the goods from the manufacturer, inspect the goods, organize stock and inventory, and provide storage and dispatch. Depending on the good being stored, the warehouse may serve a specific function – such as cold storage or protection of dangerous goods. Further, they play a major role in the supply chain and for inventory management.
Here is a list of the various types of warehouses available:
Shipyard Warehouses
These types of warehouses are located on or near the docks or ports of coastal cities. As these kinds of facilities are usually bringing in the majority of overseas shipments contained in large shipping containers, and as such are bringing in a large influx of goods, they are often managed or controlled by the government.
Government control allows for customs to monitor and inspect the goods that are coming into the country. The goods are stored in these warehouses until cleared and sent off to their respective destinations.
Cold Storage Warehouses
These warehouses are used for storing goods that are perishable, such as food products, milk, meats and fish, vegetables, poultry, and more. Because of the time-sensitive nature of the products that are stored in types of warehouses, they are usually located close to city centres, airports or docks, as they have a quick turnaround to be delivered to other facilities.
These warehouses are generally state of the art, with control technology that tracks expiration dates, shelf life rotations and high levels of movement. This technology is essential to the utilization and nature of the products that they store.
Private Warehouse
Private warehouses are owned and operated by suppliers or resellers that control their own distributions. Major retailers are examples of those who own their own private warehouses, and these facilities may exist nationally to accommodate the retailers.
Public Warehouse
The public warehouse is a space that can be leased to solve a company’s short-term distribution needs. These are usually rented to retailers that need additional storage, as their facilities have reached maximum capacity.
For example, these types of facilities are used at peak times of the year, such as Christmas, or during large in-store sales and promotions.
Automated Warehouse
These types of warehouse rely on the technological advances in computer and robotics to allow their automated functions to perform. This can range from conveyor belt transportation to full automation where humans are not needed at all.
These warehouses can be huge – some are the size of a few football fields – any may process thousands of goods and packages per day.
Distribution Warehouses
Distribution warehouses are usually public warehouses that receive large quantities of goods from a variety of manufacturers. These products are stored in the warehouse until they are transferred to the retailer or the new buyer.
It is the warehouse’s responsibility to ship these goods to their ultimate destination, so a distribution warehouse essentially acts as a midpoint for the goods.
Value Adding Warehouses
These warehouses are involved with adding value, such as labelling, repacking, or gift with purchase, to the goods. The workers that are employed with these types of warehouses help to keep track of the goods received by them, and as the name suggests, exist to increase the retail price (or value) of the products that they process.
Long Term Storage Warehouses
Some warehouses will often lease a section of their premises to various entities, such as banks and businesses. The space is usually used to store sensitive documents, and the organization and privacy of these documents are paramount.
These documents, which are typically stored and organized in coded cartons, are maintained by the warehousing company.
Trans-loading Warehouses
These warehouses are a midway point for rail car goods and are temporarily stored until they receive approval to continue on their way to their ultimate destination.
Considerations When Buying a Recreational Property
The idea of purchasing a recreational property can be a large undertaking that involves a lot of weighing of pros and cons. Whether it is a mobile home, a cottage or even a lakefront house, many factors need to be considered – for example, the price, taxes, upkeep and of course the idea of maintaining another household!
Also, a vacation property rarely provides a monetary return five years later; in fact, according this website, most people buy vacation properties as a lifestyle investment, as opposed to a financial investment.
Here are some particulars and figures for you to consider before you take the plunge and buy a recreational property.
Affordability
Before purchasing anything, you should do some serious financial calculations to see if you can afford the property. Depending on where you are buying, some cottages can be almost as much as a house – costing anywhere from $200,000 to $600,000 or more. This cost usually will require a mortgage, as well as other expenses such as insurance, property taxes and upkeep costs.
Also, these upkeep costs can tend to be more expensive for a cottage that is in a secluded area than a regular home, and can include rotting wood, septic tank maintenance, critter invasions (racoons and squirrels) and more.
You should also evaluate the resale value of the property, should you decide that you want to sell. For example, a saleable property on the waterfront within a few hours’ drive of a major city will usually be more appealing to buyers, as opposed to a secluded cabin in the middle of nowhere with limited access.
One way to offset the cost of having a recreational property is to rent it out. With word of mouth and websites such as VRBO and AIRBNB, which offer a database of vacation rental properties across the globe, having a recreational property can be a very lucrative income generator – especially if your property is appealing to renters (waterfront, beach access, etc.).
Time
Before you purchase a recreational property, you should ask yourself if you are going to have a chance to spend time there. Take into consideration whether or not the property is close enough to your home. If it’s within a few hours’ drive, you will be more likely to visit it.
If it’s a long distance away, you may not have the time to get there. Also, consider the needs of your family – do you have small children that require more care or more supplies that need to be packed back and forth to the property?
Will they not be capable of making that long trek in the car every weekend? Or perhaps you have children that are heavily involved in sports, which takes up much of your weekends all summer long, thus making it difficult to visit the property at all. These are all factors that need to be considered before purchasing.
Land and Property Specifics
Before purchasing a recreational property, it’s important to evaluate certain criteria, such as land boundaries, zoning bylaws, road access, sewage resources and such.
All of these factors can determine whether or not you can expand the property if necessary, reside there permanently should you decide to retire there, and even if you need to update septic or sewage systems before purchasing.
Lifestyle
As mentioned above, having a vacation property can be a lot of work and financially taxing. However, if you commit to using it to the best of its abilities, and you’re willing to make the variables work, having a cottage away from home can be an absolute dream.
It can be a place where you can escape the hustle and bustle of the rat race, where you can relax in a hammock at sunrise with a coffee in hand, or most of all, where you can make the best memories of your life with your loved ones.
Setting Up your Backyard for Outdoor Play
It’s more important now than ever to encourage your children to engage in outdoor play. The fresh air, the sunshine, the exercise and the skill development that comes with creative and imaginative play outdoors is not only amazing but essential to your child’s development. If you have a backyard, and you’re looking for some ideas to make it a great play space for your child, consider these fun ideas sourced from Outdoor Living Today:
Create a Sandbox or Dirt Play Area
The saying is that the less a toy does, the more a child will learn!
Sand is such a great sensory plaything for kids. Touching, dumping and sifting sand is wondrous as they explore their sense of touch and play, feeling the amazing texture of sand and dirt.
Your child can scoop, pour, measure and make designs for hours in these mediums. A sandbox can easily be made and filled with basic sand from any hardware store, and a dirt pile can become a road, a mountain, a construction site and more! Sand and dirt provide hours of fun.
Outdoor Play Structures
Whether it is a simple swing set or a more complex unit with a slide and a treehouse, an outdoor playset is a place where to run, jump and hide, and explore, while learning risk-taking, fine and gross motor development and physical exercise.
Outdoor playground equipment is essential for the child to learn his or her limits as well – how high can they swing, how fast can they go down the slide, or how high can they climb – without feeling fear, or before we experience our limit? It’s wonderful to learn about cause and effect through the exhilaration of a swingset or the speed of a slide.
Playhouse
Playhouses provide an opportunity for a child’s budding imaginations to flourish. Not only are they engaging in imaginative play, but they are also mimicking what they may see in their homes, which helps them to make sense of the world around them and assist them later in life.
They may make a garden around the house, or decorate the inside with bits of material, rocks and flowers. Even the simple act of pretending to cook a mud pie in their playhouse can be an educational experience for a child.
Trampoline
Kids love trampolines – and even better, they are a great source of exercise in disguise! There are many health benefits associated with jumping on the trampoline, among other benefits. For example, learning skills such as bum drops or flips on a trampoline requires practice and persistence, and because it’s so fun to learn, a child will usually persevere to do so.
Once they have mastered that skill, they have improved their self-esteem! It also helps with motor skill development, balance, coordination and strengthens muscles. Add a bit of fun to the equation by throwing some balloons into the trampoline and watch them bounce around while your child bounces! Trampolines offer hours of fun.
Outdoor Imaginative Play Area
This type of play area could be anything you imagine in your back yard – for example; you could use a few old tires filled with soil, plants and toys, or an old garden box filled with rocks and wood shavings for an imaginative area.
Essentially, any contained receptacle with a variety of sensory mediums inside will provide a fantastic imaginative play area for your children. They can take their dolls, their toy cars or any other items that they’d like and create a pretend world of their choosing in this area. Make it even more intimate by hanging a hammock or an old sheet from some branches and make a tent for a lovely, cozy area to play in.
Regardless of what structure or idea you choose, providing your child with an opportunity to play outdoors is essential and beneficial to their happiness and livelihood.