[Junior High School Entrance Exams] How Much Do Parents Really Know About the Difficulty of the World Their Children Are Facing?

It is by no means rare for any family to feel a sigh escape or frustration well up when looking at their child's test results or deviation scores as they take on the challenge of junior high school entrance exams.

Even if you know in your head that you should absolutely avoid taking your emotions out on your child, being confronted with those numbers can trigger a parent's own anxieties about the future, causing them to lose their composure.

However, before we scold or encourage our children, do we as parents truly grasp the 'difficulty of the problems' that our children are currently facing head-on?

'You keep complaining, but tell me, can you actually solve them?'

The exam questions in current junior high school entrance exams arevastly different from the level of entrance exams that the parent generation experienced.

There are almost no problems that can be solved by simple rote memorization or applying patterns. Elementary school students are taking on challenges of unimaginable difficulty that even adults would struggle to unravel without deep thought. First, parents themselves should take a good, long look at the textbooks and mock exam problems their children are working on.

When you ask yourself that, how many adults could confidently say they 'can solve them'? If they are difficult problems that you cannot solve yourself, or that you cannot immediately understand even after reading the explanations, then as a parent, you have no right to be angry at your child, asking 'Why can't you do this?' or saying 'Your grades are not good enough.'

If you want to have a say in the results, you need that level of resolve, andif you think from the child's perspective, they would be frustrated, thinking, 'You keep complaining, but tell me, can you (the parent) actually solve them?'.
I would think that, and I used to think that.
The starting point for everything is to first correctly recognize the fact that our children, who have only just passed the age of 10, are desperately facing such a harsh and towering wall.

A perspective that treats mock exam results as a 'health checkup'

If parents can understand the difficulty of the problems and regain a calm perspective, the way they perceive test results will also change.
Mock exam and test scores do not determine a child's value, nor do they evaluate a parent's upbringing. A strategic parent's approach is to treat them not as something to be happy or sad about, but as a 'health checkup' to identify current weaknesses.

A child's academic ability does not grow in a clean, upward slope in proportion to their effort.There is always a period of stagnation called a 'latent period' before newly acquired knowledge is integrated in the brain and demonstrated as actual ability. This current period where results are not coming as expected might be an important preparation period for a major leap to the next step.
Just by having the parent stand firm and show that they are not swayed by test numbers, the child can gain a sense of security that 'it is okay to fail.' That sense of security is exactly what generates the energy to move on to the next stage of learning.

Make the home a place to return to from the battle

What children want from their home is not instructions or management, buta place to unwind from intense tension.
The home should not be a place of evaluation, but a place that is protected no matter what happens.
No matter how bad the test results are, it is important not to change the atmosphere or temperature inside the house. Welcoming them with the usual dinner table, the usual conversation, and the usual smile. This is the best support that only a parent can provide.

Entrusting specific study guidance and strategy building to experts like cram schools is also one method. By focusing on rear-guard support—ensuring their needs for food, clothing, and shelter are met and organizing necessary information—parents can physically reduce unnecessary friction between parent and child.

To look directly at the child's effort hidden behind the numbers and to believe in their existence unconditionally.
As the number one running partner for a child fighting through a grueling exam, isn't that the role a parent should fulfill?