By Rosemary Daniels| Correspondent

Getting back to school means a return to the routines which children gleefully abandoned in June. While giving up your routine can be relaxing, it can make for a tough transition come fall. To help ready students for the re-entry process, parents should view the preparation for school in terms of body, mind, and soul.

Over the summer months, children’s sleep schedules change dramatically. Many families start to impose earlier wake-up and bedtimes one or two weeks in advance, so that the 6:30 a.m.

alarm is less of a shock. “Adjusting to that early morning wake-up is the hardest for the kids and for me,” says Marybeth Kwapniewski, a mother of two young children at St. Leo the Great, Lincroft. High-school and college athletes begin their preparation process a month or more before school even starts. Serious programs may have “two-a-day” or “three-a-day” practices, so that the teams are ready for their challenging schedules. Parents need to make sure their athletes are well-rested and well-hydrated to avoid injury.

Starting in middle school, most students have reading and math assignments that must be completed over the summer. In many instances, reports are required as well. For some students, these assignments are already finished, stapled, and sitting on their desk. In most cases, students tend to use the end of August as a time to wrap up their work, keeping the most important assignments until last, so that the information is fresh in their minds in the first weeks of school. It’s helpful to do an inventory of outstanding items with your student now, so that no one is struggling to complete assignments the night before school starts.

For many, the summer means a different pace to the spiritual life, as well.

Religious education programs are usually completed at the end of May, and many parishes do not have enough volunteers in the summer to run their children’s liturgy program. Summer weekends often find families away from home and celebrating Masses at different times and in different places.

Without a routine, it is a challenge for many families to keep the focus on spiritual life during this time.

The return to school is an opportunity for families to re-commit to spiritual growth. Talk to your children about how they would like to participate in their parish community this year.

Would they like to be altar servers?

Might your high schooler be interested in being a lector or extraordinary minister of holy Communion?

Your parish CYO is always looking for active members. Or perhaps they would like to participate in parish community service programs? Having these conversations with your children demonstrates how important your faith is to you, and is likely to increase their commitment to their faith.

In the U.S., retailers expect families to spend almost $73 billion to equip their children for school. It’s important to look at spiritual preparation as the most important investment we make in our children.

Rosemary Daniels is a freelance writer, parishioner of St. Leo the Great, Lincroft, and a mother of four children: a college senior, a college freshman, a high school sophomore and an eighth grader.