Use these back-to-school questions to help your child or teen transition back to school smoothly. Stay informed and connected with their experiences and feelings.
Now that your kids are gearing up to go back to school, it is only natural to be curious about their plans for the year. But if you don’t know how to broach the subject properly, we’ve got you covered with these back-to-school questions. In this blog, we discuss specific questions for kids and teenagers that help you understand their goals better without overstepping any boundaries. We’ve even included some would-you-rather questions to help lighten the mood and turn this conversation into a game.
Back-To-School Questions For Teens
Most teens are notoriously difficult to question about their life outside of the home. But these age-appropriate back-to-school questions can help both you and your teenager open up and be honest about your plans for the year.
School Year
These back-to-school questions tackle how your teen plans to go through school as a whole. You can also ask how this year might differ from the last and whether it is a good or bad change.
- What are you most excited about for next year?
- Is there anything you’re hoping will be different next year?
Social Life
These back-to-school questions concern your teen’s social life, which forms a major part of school life. These questions can help your child reflect on who they would rather spend their time with if there are any people in particular that they might deem a bad influence, and their thoughts on making newer friends.
- Is there anyone you’re particularly looking forward to spending more time with next year?
- How do you think your friends are feeling about going back to school?
- Do you think there might be any disagreements within your friend group this year? How would you like to handle them?
- Are you mostly looking forward to hanging out with the same people this year, or are you open to meeting new friends?
Academics
These are back-to-school questions for students that help your child open up their academics. By asking them these questions in advance, they can seriously reflect on their own academic strengths and weaknesses. This will help them focus on making the necessary changes in order to succeed in the coming year.
- Which subjects do you think might be the toughest next year?
- Is there a subject you’re especially interested in learning more about next year?
- If you could pick any teacher for each subject, who would you choose and why?
- Is there anything about any subjects that makes you a little nervous?
- Do you have any specific goals for your grades or study habits this year?
- Do you have any goals for yourself, inside or outside school, this year? This can include music, sports, hobbies, health, or how you want to interact with others.
- What did you find worked well for you last year in terms of studying and staying organized?
- Do you have any guesses about how much homework there might be next year?
- Is there anything you’d like to do differently with homework this year?
- How can we handle any disagreements we might have about schoolwork or homework this year?
Health & Habits
These back-to-school questions focus on your teen’s personal health. These encourage your child to start important habits like regular sleeping hours, exercise, and self-care. You can also use this opportunity to talk about their food habits and how they have changed since the previous year.
- Are there any new habits you’d like to try this year to improve your sleep, exercise routine, or overall health?
- Are there any new lunch foods you’d like to try this year?
Support
These are important questions that help you and your child open up about previous struggles. They are an opportunity to correct your own faults and thus extend your support to your child through a new year.
- Did you want to talk about anything that happened at school last year but maybe felt uncomfortable bringing it up?
- Is there anything I can do to make it easier for you to talk to me about anything that’s on your mind?
- Is there anything I can do to make this a great year for you at school?
Back-To-School Questions For Middle Schoolers
These back-to-school questions for kids are a great way to feel where your kids are academically and emotionally while also helping your child build some awareness. These questions are undoubtedly simpler than those for teens, but they ask all the essential questions without overwhelming your child.
Self-Discovery
These back-to-school questions are a great way for children to reflect on their strengths and passions. You can use this information to support your child’s passions throughout the year.
- What are your passions and accomplishments?
- When do you shine the brightest?
- Who inspires you and why?
- What’s important for me to know about you? What haven’t I asked that you’d like to share?
Learning & Growth
These back-to-school questions help you understand your child’s progress in their education. It focuses more on your child’s critical understanding of learning and problem-solving skills than the grade they aim for. At the end of the day, that is what’s most important,
- How do you face challenges?
- What kind of support do you need from me to help you do your best this year?
- What does true understanding look like to you?
- What role should school play in your growth and development?
- How will you use the knowledge you gain this year?
- Do you have reading preferences? What do you think are your strengths as a reader?
Curiosity & Creativity
Curiosity and creativity are essential parts of childhood that must be constantly encouraged and tended to. These back-to-school questions for kids are a great way to learn what sparks your child’s creative interest. This helps you prepare yourself to support him by getting essential supplies or simply helping them out when they need a hand.
- What sparks your curiosity this year? What questions do you have?
- How can curiosity help you succeed this year?
- When does your creative side come alive? What might be behind that?
Back-To-School, Would You Rather Questions
Some of these questions can feel taxing, so if you want to lighten the mood, ask your kids this silly back-to-school would you rather questions. You can ask for these from either your kid or your teen – it’s goofy fun either way.
Would you rather…
- Skip recess for a week or skip homework for a week?
- A full day of your least favorite subject or skip your favorite subject for a whole week?
- Skip to school or hop to school?
- Wear clown shoes or a bald cap to school?
- Three school field trips or a week off school?
- Have a snake or a spider as your class pet?
- Have no tests or no homework all year long?
- Have a pyjama day or a crazy costume day?
- Have more art time or more gym time?
- Do a 10-minute speech in front of the whole school or do a clown act in the talent show.
- Learn in the woods for a day or inside on a hot day without air conditioning?
- Only wear black to school or only white?
- Be the smartest kid in the school or the best athlete?
- Go to school on the weekends or over summer break?
- Scooter to school or bike to school?
- Have a robot for your teacher or no teacher at all?
- Learn cursive to write or learn a new language?
- The textbooks be written backwards or in Pig Latin?
- Class party every month or a field trip every week?
- Play video games at recess or get to watch your favorite TV show?
- Start your school day with gym or Drama class?
- One best friend at school or many good friends?
- Be homecoming king/queen or the class president?
- Be a fish or a bird?
- Have an alligator or a shark for a pet? Why?
- Eat only pizza or ice cream for every meal?
- Sleep for a year or stay awake for a year?
- Jump in a pile of leaves or snowballs?
- Eat a worm or an ant?
- Be the only student in the class or have 100 classmates?
- Have wings or a tail?
While this back-to-school would-you-rather questions might not all be related to school, it is a great way to bond with your child before they get to school. They can also use these would you rather questions as icebreakers for new and old friends that they meet in school.
Final Thoughts
Asking specific questions about your child’s plans, goals, and passions is a great way to set expectations for the school year while also bonding with your child before they are completely absorbed in school work. These back-to-school questions for both kids and teens can prove most effective when trying to communicate with your child on the eve of back-to-school day.
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