Welcome!

Welcome to Mentally Fit Kid, your friend and partner in supporting parents and students on their journey to not just survive middle school, but thrive in it! We all know that middle school can be a challenging time, full of academic adjustments, social pressures, and LOTS of emotions! And let’s be honest; most of us would like to completely forget our middle school years! In this 21st century digital age, our kids have to adjust to middle school AND navigate the online world and social media. To say the pressures our kids now face have increased dramatically since we were in middle school, is an understatement! That’s the bad news, but the good news is that you don’t have to figure it out all on your own!

We all know the proverb that it “takes a village to raise a child;” well, that’s never been more true than it is today. Let’s create a community where we support each other, share ideas, provide tools and resources, and communicate with each other as we help our kids navigate these years. Let’s explore ways to take them from “I’m just trying to survive middle school” to “I’m ready to thrive in middle school!” If you’d love to see that happen for your child, then Mentally Fit Kid is for you!

A Little Bit About Me

My name is Naomi Galvan, and I’m a wife, Mom, a Mimi, a dog Mom to Jaxon, and a middle school counselor. We have a large, blended family so I’ve raised and successfully gotten 6 kids of our own through the middle school years! I’ll be honest with you; a couple of our kids thrived, but with the others, it was more like, “let’s just survive middle school”! In both scenarios, we learned some valuable lessons.

While serving as a school counselor, I’ve supported nearly 4,000 middle school students and their parents. I have led my counseling team to earn all three state awards for excellence in school counseling programs. We have also earned the national award for our program. I have spoken and presented at our state school counseling conference as well as our national conference. I’ve written and published an article about School Connectedness in the national counseling magazine. I tell you this to say that I’ve learned a few things in my career and I’m ready to share it with you!

What We Do

At Mentally Fit Kid, our mission is to support middle school parents to help their kids succeed academically, socially, and emotionally. We place a strong emphasis on mental fitness because we believe that a healthy mind is the key to overall success. Mental fitness is what will help your child most when the middle school challenges inevitably come.

We hope to create a safe space for middle school-minded people to communicate, offer encouragement, provides resources, and share tips and strategies to help our kids manage these tough years. We won’t pretend to have all of the answers, but together, we can navigate the middle school challenges for the benefit of our children.

Academic Support

Middle school is a critical time for academic development. It is during these years when students begin to face more complex subjects, abstract concepts, and heavier workloads. And let me tell you, this adjustment usually comes as a shock to the incoming 6th graders. Their school schedules, class rigor, larger building, and getting to know multiple teachers and their expectations are just a few of the changes they will face. Successfully making these adjustments is important not just to their grades, but to the development of their young brains.

While our brains do not finish developing and maturing until the mid-to-late 20s, the adolescent and teen years are about fine-tuning how the brain works. Because of this, taking on challenges like tough classes and creative activities like learning music or art can strengthen brain circuits and help it mature in healthy ways. These are the years when it’s extra important to encourage your middle schooler to challenge themselves! Exercising the brain academically and creatively will pay big dividends for them in the future.

Social Success

I bet that you clearly remember the social dynamics of middle school (oh, the drama!). Trying to make friends. Figuring out where you fit in. Dealing with kids that don’t like you. And who do I sit with at lunch?? That part of middle school is certainly one of the biggest challenges for kids and is usually the one that causes them the most anxiety. The majority of the time when students come to my office upset, it’s almost always connected to a social conflict. Making new friends, dealing with peer pressure, and beginning to discover who they are was already overwhelming. Having to handle all of that in this digital age with online and social media pressures, can sometimes feel like too much.

What we hope to do through Mentally Fit Kid is to provide resources and a safe space to share your concerns and situations. Let’s work together to help your middle schooler build strong, healthy relationships and develop the social skills that will benefit them for a lifetime.

Emotional Well-being

Emotional well-being is at the heart of everything we do. Yes, middle school can be a roller-coaster of emotions, and we’re here to help support students and parents navigate these challenging ups and downs. By encouraging the use of mindfulness exercises, stress management techniques, and discussing ways to build resilience, we hope to help students feel confident and capable of handling whatever comes their way.

Building a Community

One of our core goals at Mentally Fit Kid is to create a supportive community of parents and students. By working together, supporting and cheering one another on, we can work toward thriving in middle school and making enjoyable, not just surviving it.

Join Us!

So, what are you waiting for? Sign up below to join the Mentally Fit Kid community! Whether you’re a parent looking for resources to help your child, an educator seeking new strategies to support your students, or a student trying to make the most of your middle school years, we’re here for you. Together, we can work toward helping our middle school students not only survive these years but thrive in them!

Welcome to Mentally Fit Kid – let’s flip the script on middle school and work toward making these years positive, healthy, and empowering for our kids!

And speaking of “flipping the script,” click here to grab your free copy of “Flipping the Script on Middle School!” This is our way of saying “thanks for being here” and trying to help support your child through these tough, but very important years.

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