Buy a 3-ring binder with one plastic folder for each class (they’re more durable).

Problem: Your child’s backpack has been deemed a disaster area by the Department of Homeland Security. Special forces units are currently sweeping his bedroom looking for last week’s homework. And, worst of all, missing assignments and lack of notes have taken a toll on his grades.

Solution: “Some kids are just messy” isn’t an excuse. And while it may be true that brilliant minds can’t be bothered to keep things neat, Einstein still found a way to turn his work in. Luckily, organization and note taking doesn’t have to seem like a chore. Here are some ideas to suggest to your child:

• Binder with planner/calendar
• Set aside time to organize
• Look into specific note taking systems
• Don’t forget the devices

Binder with planner/calendar

This will always be the first thing a teacher recommends for a messy, forgetful student (if they don’t require them for everyone already). Buy a 3-ring binder with one plastic folder for each class (they’re more durable). Stick in a planner/calendar and a pouch for supplies. For extreme cases, contact your child’s teachers and have them review the notes taken on the planner for accuracy and sign them. You do the same when they come home. That way the student learns not to try to put anything over on the adults.

Set aside time to organize

It’s the rare student that decides for themselves when it’s time to clean up. They need help. So make it a point of regularly setting aside time to remind your child to clean out their backpack, binder, locker, room, etc. Once a week will probably work. Program a reminder into your phone if you have to.

Look into specific note taking systems

Although note taking skills are technically the domain of the teacher, you can step in if that ball is being dropped. There are plenty of organized note taking systems out there that make taking notes easy. The one used by Cornell University is particularly popular. So are certain graphic organizers and other diagrams.

Don’t forget the devices

Backpacks and lockers are all well and good, but in some schools they are also obsolete. They’ve been replaced by devices in a 1:1 or BYOD scheme. If you child is a heavy user of technology in school, don’t forget to help them organize their digital data as well. Make sure folders are being used and data that doesn’t need to be saved is deleted.

Do you have any other organization tips for children? Share them in the comments section or share this article on your favorite social network to start a conversation of your own.

50 million students in the US still attend public school, funded by a combination of local, state, and federal taxes.

Perhaps back in our day, choosing a school was a lot simpler. You had either public or private schools. Parents now have a wide range of options with which to educate their children, some of which being quite complicated to understand the difference. Let’s go through the options that may be available in your area, how they are similar, and how they can make a difference in your child’s educational experience.

Public schools

50 million students in the US still attend public school, funded by a combination of local, state, and federal taxes. That being said, even the public school system now has layers:

Charter schools are schools established by an entity outside of the school system, such as a community group or a for-profit corporation, that operate under a charter (sort of like a contract) with the school district. They receive per-student funding at the same level as traditional schools, but they might also fundraise for themselves. Cost of attendance is free.

Charters tend to target an underserved segment of the district’s population. Charters are often granted because the group says they can reach those particular students better than the district can.

Magnet schools are established by the school district. They might be a school-within-a-school or have their own campus. Each magnet specializes in a certain program, like STEM or the arts. They tend to be made available to every student throughout the district. Some districts provide busing so more students can attend the magnet.

Turnaround schools are those under state or federal oversight for a recent history of continued failure. The governing body has often taken some control of the school from the local district (such as replacing the administration or the entire faculty). They might have even turned the school over to a charter organization. These schools then receive more funding and more oversight in an effort to turn the school’s performance around.

Private schools

Most people are familiar with parochial schools, those that are affiliated with some sort of religious organization. There are about 32,000 of such schools across the country. Most are run by a Catholic diocese, but there are also protestant and other religious orders that run parochial schools. They are funded by tuition, donations, and endowments and do not have to answer to the local school system. Students receive religious education in addition to their general education courses.

Independent private schools have no religious affiliation but operate in a similar way to parochial schools. The funding sources are the same, but a difference might be in the competitive nature of these schools. In large areas with multiple independent schools in addition to the public school district, they try to differentiate themselves from the crowd by offering cutting-edge courses and experiences. After all, they are a non-profit business.

Teachers love Pinterest almost as much as party planners. It’s quickly becoming the most popular way for them to trade lesson ideas and resources.

We recently ran a series highlighting ways that parents can help their children with homework in the four major subject areas. What was missing was a simple idea: parents can use some of the same resources to help with homework that teachers use to instruct the students in the first place. There’s no law that says you can’t mine teaching websites for help.

Success in homework might require a quick reteaching of the subject matter, so thinking like a teacher in this regard can save a lot of stress. It might also be a fun activity for both of you to engage. Who knows? You might learn something yourself.

To be honest, the resources available for teachers online are much more plentiful than those made available for parents. So let’s look at some of them.

The teacher organizations

Each of the subject areas has an organization whose job it is to help teachers become more effective. They make a variety of resources available to members and visitors alike, usually split up by grade level. Poke around and you’ll find plenty of valuable help. They are:

• National Council of Teachers of English
• National Council of Teachers of Math
• National Science Teachers Association
• National Council for the Social Studies

Pinterest

Teachers love Pinterest almost as much as party planners. It’s quickly becoming the most popular way for them to trade lesson ideas and resources. But no one ever said you couldn’t go there as well.

Every subject area tends to have well-regarded master teachers whose boards are treasure troves of information. Simply keep clicking the pins until they start leading to the same place, then bookmark that board and keep checking in.

Company websites

As a form of outreach, the companies who wish to do business with schools and teachers often litter their websites with lesson plans and other goodies that help teachers better use their products.

Take a look at whoever printed the textbook in question, then visit their website. Chances are they have a page devoted specifically to that book that is full of supplemental materials, including videos and graphic organizers.

Key search terms

Changing a research trip on Google from a generalized overview of the topic into a focused, teacher-appropriate study is as simple as adding a few phrases:

• “Lesson plan” leads to websites that usually have far more than just lesson plans
• Same goes with “teacher resources” or “quizzes”
• “Student activities”
• “.pdf” will get you hard information. It eliminates a lot of blogs and heresay material

How much is too much?

The days of progress reports and report cards are over. Some apps have come online that better facilitate the flow of information between teachers and parents. It’s now possible for parents to receive up-to-the-minute information about their child’s progress and behavior, as well as communicate with the teacher. If you like the idea of one or all of these, ask your child’s teacher.

Class Dojo

Class Dojo started as a way for teachers to keep track of their classroom management success. Did Johnny stay in his seat during the video? Give him a point. Did he give someone a wet willy while waiting in the lunch line? Knock him down one. Its goal was to take something fairly ambiguous and subjective—classroom behavior—and analyze it.

Then they opened it up to parents. They can now check the website or app to their hearts’ content, depending on how committed the teacher is to updating the data. My daughter’s teacher, for example, carries Class Dojo on her iPad and updates it constantly. Frankly, it makes me a little nervous. That being said, if your child needs a little more monitoring than average (perhaps for a learning disability), it can really be a useful tool.

Remind

The majority of the millennial generation prefers to receive their information electronically, particularly via text. Calls home every night from teachers tend to be sent to voicemail and then ignored.

Remind is a private texting service that assigns the teacher a unique private phone number. Parents subscribe to the teacher’s Remind list with their own numbers, then they can receive blanket or personalized texts from the teacher while still having their private numbers protected. Messages can be anything from “School pictures tomorrow” to “Johnny had a bad day today…”

Edmodo

Your child’s teacher might already use Edmodo for many of their classroom activities, like keeping calendars and collaborating with students and colleagues. What you don’t know is that you can also have a parent account so you can participate in some of these activities—or just keep up with what’s going on. Grades, assignments, and calendars are all available, as is secure messaging between parents and teachers.

How much is too much?

Of course, this opens up questions about information overload. Helicopter parents can basically upgrade to rocket fuel. Even casual parents can find themselves bringing up the app or website more frequently that they should. Then, how many things do you bring up to your child when they get home from school? Not every transgression requires a response.