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Feeling like the worst parent ever


Whitestripe

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Some time ago, I started a "motivation in school" thread, but it seems to have been eaten by the Internet. 

Here's the scoop. I have a bright but apparently academically lazy 6th grader.  You may remember that he's disorganized. The first quarter of school this year was pretty good. Brought home papers and had us help him with homework. Great grades, high honor roll. Second quarter, we start seeing fewer and fewer papers, homework, tests, etc. We ask him every day "do you have homework? What are you working on?" Answers "I did it in study hall" and "Not much." We threaten no electronics and consequences if we don't start seeing some stuff and a trickle of papers come in. Enough to appease us, let's say. Second quarter report card comes. Grades are down, but still makes high honor roll, just barely. He gets lecture about best effort in school and how we are here to help and how he needs to get organized to have better study habits. He promises to do better. Third quarter, still not many papers/tests etc and even less communicative about school. DOES NOT BRING HOME mid-quarter progress report even though we ask for it. Look at it online a week late. Grades are in mid-80's. Emails go out to teachers. Several missing assignments. Kid is grounded Easter weekend. Loses electronics all weekend, and gets the lecture of the year. Brings home assignments to complete. Swears he'll get his shit together.

Third quarter report card comes home. Grades are better than mid-80's projected on the "lost" mid-quarter assessment (still gets honor roll) but are down from last quarter. Three of his teachers say "needs to come to class prepared" or "needs help with organization" Even after the lecture and the grounding over Easter. I make a surprise trip to school last Friday afternoon. His locker is knee deep with papers and not a single one are in ANY of his binders. He doesn't even have PENCILS in his locker. I was very calm and packed every single thing in his locker into his backpack or a canvas bag to go through at home. Half completed assignments. Forms that needed parents signature, tests with low grades, a research paper that he did entirely at school and never researched at home or showed us a rough draft of, a Middle East map project assignment paper that we never saw, but map quiz that he failed, which was in the locker, a "six paragraph original myth" assignment that we never even knew about. He had art last quarter and he never brought home the materials list (we had no idea he needed a sketch pad, drawing pencils, or large eraser) You name it. No wonder his teachers said he wasn't prepared. I was LIVID. Reduced him to tears with my lectures. Basically he's been lying to us about school for six months. Saturday morning the husband and I sat down with him and went through every single paper. We sorted them all and put them in the proper notebooks. He's lost one day of electronics for each infraction and he's currently up to 10. How in the hell was he able to pull off honor roll with this level of fucking off? What could he achieve if he tried just a little bit?

We are insisting that he write every single assignment down in his agenda and I said I'd be dropping by his locker once a week on random days. Yesterday (three days after this all went down) he didn't bring home his study guide or his notebook for his Southwest Asia unit test (he did bring home his textbook and said he knew what to study) We went right back to school to get it, and he still had papers that weren't filed and a math assignment that is due at the end of next week lying loose in his locker.   

I've emailed his teachers and they have immediately responded that they are willing to help. They all agreed to sign his agenda daily. The all say he's a smart kid who isn't working up to his potential. We've emailed the guidance counselor to see if there are underlying issues, He has friends at school.  I don't even know what to do. I feel like the worst parent on the planet for being so naive and letting him get away with this, and I really don't know how to fix it.  

TL; DR: My bright kid is fscking off in school and I don't know how to help him.

 
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I was about to post something similar to what Xray said.

Further, one possible thing to try is to sit him down and ask him to come up with a plan that he can use. The agenda list, the check list, etc., are all great tools. But it won't matter if he doesn't use them. So instead of imposing these tools on to him, try to come up with ways that work with his mind? Maybe an agenda list is not going to work for him, and maybe he needs a doodle pad with drawings representing each task? Maybe he needs numbers assigned so he can organize the information as grids of numbers? What obviously works for 90% of the human population may not work for the other 10%. It might not be an issue of laziness, but an issue of just not processing the information like we assume information should be processed.

Another attempt might to be to help him see the pay off in the end beyond a grade. Does he have a vocational aspiration? If so, maybe arrange for opportunities for him to meet with people with careers he wants, and see that to get from now to there, these school grades are important? Teenagers are not designed to think ahead and into the future, so this is often a big challenge for high school teachers to tackle. Yes, if you want to be a doctor, you really do need to be able to do this geometry question about triangles in 10th grade. As adults this seems obvious to us, but to a mind that is not fully connected yet this can be a big challenge.

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That sounds event for event like what I went through in the equivalent of middle/high school, and I am currently tutoring two of my much younger siblings twice a week, they are about the same age as your child and who display similar behaviour.

Speaking from personal experience, I'd say that the problem can potentially be motivation, I know it was for me, the child does not feel like working/studying because he sees no point in it. He's currently not applying himself yet he still gets on the honour roll, why would he need to spend his precious time if all he gets from it is even better grades?

I think punitive measures here might have the potential to be counter-productive, and might lead the child to resent schoolwork even further, which could spell future disaster. Have you tried positive reinforcement? I know it might be seen as spoiling your child, but using the carrot rather than the stick to motivate children has had massive success on my side, to the point where after a while, my siblings started to decline the rewards I offered them for doing their schoolwork and studying properly, being satisfied with having spent time with a family member.

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We haven't considered ADHD because he's not unfocused in other areas. (He'll go to a Magic:The Gathering tournament with his father, place and stay focused all day)  He seems like a pretty normal kid, but he's got a pediatrician appointment coming up, so I will ask about it then. He's not disruptive in class (except, apparently band and he sits first chair so I have no clue what's up with that). He wears glasses and I've made an appt to get his script checked.

As for rewards, his grandmother had a whole box of Magic cards riding on straight A's all year, and that's gone. 

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Boy, does this sound familiar. But, well, I'm a lot further down this road.

Without getting into the details of my own situation (but if you feel those might help, feel free to PM me), I would offer a couple of thoughts:

I know there have to be consequences and totally endorse the 'no-electronics' thing, but there will be a point where they stop working or worse, become unworkable. Set a cap on those, don't just keep increasing them and expect them to eventually work if you pile them deep enough.

The lectures too. It's natural to want to express how frustrated and disappointed you are, but the more you reduce him to tears about this, the harder it is for him to open up about anything that might be going on that's contributing to this. If you think he's old enough to know better, he probably does. He's probably doing this despite that. And he probably feels bad about it. Making him feel worse won't do much good and can do harm. I learned that the hard way.

I agree about getting him checked for ADHD or other things that might be underlying this - ASD, dyslexia, physical problems, etc. But remember those just help him (and you) to understand what's wrong, and how to cope: they aren't going to be a magic answer to fix things.

Also, I'm not sure they're where you should start. There's a risk of just giving the problem a label. Talk to your pediatrician, but work with the school more too. And talk to him more first. He likely doesn't really understand what's going on in his head right now, but maybe he can give you some clues.

Remember that bright kids have great coping strategies so it's entirely possible that he has something like ADHD but doesn't appear to fit the classic profile because he 'works around' some of the symptoms.

Also remember that sometimes kids' development is not a straight line. Sometimes it slows down or stops, or their intellectual development outstrips their emotional development for a bit, or some other bump in the road comes up. It might be that his academic progress is going to take a hit for a year or two. Don't panic. He's bright. He'll catch up.

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23 minutes ago, Whitestripe said:

As for rewards, his grandmother had a whole box of Magic cards riding on straight A's all year, and that's gone. 

I was more talking about smaller immediate rewards rather than one promised in the long run. Instant gratification goes a long way to motivate the child, he might see the long term reward as too intangible and demanding, and potentially too easily lost.

If his thing is Magic: the Gathering, I'd suggest offering him a booster packs instead of a whole box for instance, offering him one for each exam with a grade over 90 would him feel like he acquired something, like he made concrete, irreversible progress.

You can still keep a bigger prize as an extra end of the year bonus, though it might end up being a bit more expensive in the long run.

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When I was a kid I never wanted to disappoint my parents by getting bad grades on anything.  I think it was about 3rd grade, any bad grade I got I hid in a box that I kept at school.  At the end of the school year I took this box of shame home and hid it in the basement.  I don't know why it never occurred to me to just throw it away immediately, or throw the bad papers away as I went.  Eventually I did realize the need to destroy the evidence and trashed all of it during a spring cleaning of the basement.  My parents still don't know about all those bad grades I got in 3rd grade.  :devil:

Anyway, like your son my grades always averaged out enough to get me on the honor roll.  I just didn't want to involve my parents in knowing about the bad ones.  I was also incredibly disorganized, and still am to an extent, but I manage to get things done and always feel that I have a handle on the situation despite not being organized in a way that others might like me to be.  I don't have ADHD, for the record.  It could be that your son simply flies by the seat of his pants, like I do.  

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We have a slightly similar situation with our son, although nowhere near as bad.  He's in 3rd grade, he's very, very bright but not as organized as we would like.  He procrastinates on long projects and he looks for any distraction from homework.  At the worst point last year, he was hoarding some unfinished work in his desk.  He is pretty conscientious but playing, reading for pleasure or chatting with friends are much more appealing than homework.  I worry that each year he gets older, our direct influence to make him do his work will wane.  He needs to grow into his own sense of responsibility.

I don't know your son at all, but my approach so far with my son has been:

- I don't want to label it as ADHD and try to medicate it.  It is much, much more likely that a smart kid lacks motivation and/or feels bored rather than any cognitive problem.  He has no problem focusing on something he enjoys or finds engaging.

- I try not to set expectations too high.  I'm sure I was not 100% engaged in my homework at his age and I'm still a procrastinator.

- My son won't have the same environmental motivation as I did.  I grew up in a world with anxiety about unemployment and limited access to a professional career and lifestyle.  An upper middle class upbringing does not carry the same anxiety about needing to succeed.  That's both a good and bad thing.

- We limit screen time.  Screen time on school nights is very restricted (Minecraft only, no more than 20 mins, and only if earned by early homework completion), and limited on weekends.  No open access to screen entertainment lowers the opportunity cost (in his mind) of homework and encourages imaginative play and reading instead, which help cognitive focus.

- We continually reinforce expectations of high achievement and nurture his sense of competition & pride in achievement.  We try to link necessary drudge homework to long term success and freedom to have a creative career, and contrast that with a drudge life/career from under-performing at school.

- My wife sets a process for monitoring his homework and project completion.  The emphasis is on his responsibility to ensure things are done.
 

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TL; DR: My bright kid is fscking off in school and I don't know how to help him.

We had the same problem with our oldest, and kind of the same problem with our next oldest. What we found for us was that the problem was simply school was a major demotivator for them. Not classwork, not grades, not assignments - though often these were super boring - but school. Social anxiety was killing her, literally. 

The solution for us that worked amazingly well in some ways was to have our oldest go to online schools. Giving her the power to set her schedule and do things as she wanted to worked absolute wonders. Her grades and assignments turned in went way, way up, she studied more and asked for more help, she got better organized and able to do more of this on her own. It's been the case in college too (she takes mostly online classes) and this helped a ton. 

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2 hours ago, Xray the Enforcer said:

Have you had him tested for ADHD? This type of forgetfulness is 1) not usual and 2) is very typical of everyone I've ever known who has been afflicted by an attention-deficit disorder. 

Same anecdote here.  We had to get really granular with homework planners with our ADD kids.  I am talking about hourly reminders; daily emails to the teachers; stapling notes in their notebooks or taping them to the from of their folders.  It was a hard slog for a while, but it took eventually.  Now it is a habit for them, and it just happens.

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Have more kids - preferably four.  I promise you will not feel like the world's worst parent then - there won't be time for it.  The kids will be considered well cared for if they leave the house with their clothes on, let alone homework done.

Seriously, though, I like Isk's post above.  The part about **his** responsibility to ensure things are done is particularly apt.  And all you can do is give him the tools he needs to get through life.  It's up to him to use them. 

As a child, I was the classic "underachiever."  It got so I began thinking that I was so smart in "theory," that it translated to reality.  I didn't really need to finish all those boring assignments if I could ace a test without doing them, right?  RIGHT??   Besides, school was just about the most boring thing in my young life.  It was a necessary evil, I guessed, but I didn't really believe it.  

Does he take any pleasure in good grades? or is it something he does because he **has** to to get his parents off his case?   People will DO what they take pride and/or pleasure in.  If they don't get either out of the exercise, it's going to be a looooong battle with no winners. 

This may be a good place to remind you of something with an excerpt from Gibran's well-worn but excellent words on children:

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday
.

 

Good luck!  :) 

 

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I don't know about the US middle school system, but when I was in 6th grade (11-12 years old, in 1980s Germany) there would hardly ever be longer assignments. Homework was due at most a week from the date given, so everything was fairly tightly monitored by both parents and teachers (and it was usually fairly short exercises, the most involved stuff were typically art projects...). Every graded quiz or test had to be countersigned by a parent.

So I, maybe naively, think that planning and organizing such stuff by oneself is not something that can realistically expected by an 11 year old. He is perfectly entitled to get help with that! So make him show his assignments etc. at least every week or better twice a week and discuss when they are due and check before the date again. Sure, he needs to learn to get organized. But there are several years left for that and there seems nothing wrong with teaching him the basics by helping and tightly monitoring him.

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I was an academically lazy bright kid with organizational problems.  It might not work in your situation, but what my parents did was:

1. Tie a reward to report card grades.  They adjusted for when we lived in trimesters vs 9 weeks, but basically they set a value on an A and a B (I think a report card 9 weeks A in high school was $20, although it was less in middle school). Added to that, an A was a free night off homework/study time (point 2). A B was $10.  A C average at any point was grounding, even if I only had one test (lost the privilege to drive to school for 1 month for an 82 test, which was a C on the grading scale there).  

2. Regardless of what was going on, I had to spend 2 hours a day at home doing homework and study.  It backfired my senior year a little when I had a study hall, so I basically did nothing in that period so I'd have something to do at home, but the number of missed assignments dropped drastically.  

3. Constant monitoring of the online grading system.  If I missed anything, they knew about it quickly.  I had a 100 average in Biology, missed a simply forgotten homework assignment, and got a zero on it, so I got lectured on the missing assignment that was so immaterial to my overall grade it didn't even round to 99. (I wouldn't recommend this level of micromanagement, but just telling you what they did. Remember he's a kid and give him a little break if he's already doing great)

4. For my ADHD brother, they required the signed agenda everyday.  It helped him not miss things he was just forgetting anyway.  

Basically, that produced near straight A's in 3 kids in high school, and the study habits that put me on a 3.7 undergrad and 3.9 graduate Accounting GPAs, the middle brother with a 3.7 genetics GPA and acceptance into MD Anderson's PhD program to study Cancer biology (with ADHD), and a baby brother with a 3.7 undergrad mechanical engineering GPA (about to graduate) who was accepted easily into a master's engineering program at the same school.  We're working with good genes on that front, but their process seemed to work. Compared to family members with less direction (mom's side), we're far and away the top academic performers.  Dad's side of the family is to young to compare (although I think they're going to kick our ass), but they have the same type of structured set-up as my dad implemented.  

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Thanks all.  Isk: we don't allow much screen time during the week and in theory, homework needs to be completed before games. However, we were not aware of the homework. 

Jo: here, middle school begins in 6th grade and the school really emphasizes independence. My daughter, who is two years behind in 4th grade, has lots of stuff to be signed.

Anyway, I got an email from the guidance counselor today. (She knows Henry quite well since he's in a club that she advises) She doesn't think there are underlying issues, but says that organization does not come naturally to some kids and she sees plenty who fall off the rails at the end of the year. We're working on a plan.

Today, Henry brought home a slew of papers, but no binder to put them in. He volunteered to go back to school and get the binder.  Baby steps.

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I was the poster child for underachieving. Sometimes I am amazed, looking back,  at how I managed to actually get through school. I do have issues with focusing but I think  a prodigious memory saved my ass. Repetition is the way to go. Try not to punish him too much as he may just give up  then. The music class was me too, except I was tossed out of it for alleged  bad behaviour. I just did not get music.  

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Another under-achiever here. School was not a challenge for me at all. And if something was boring to me, if I felt condescended to or if I didn't like my teacher for whatever reason, I just would NOT do the work. And still got honours. As I got older, I started acting out in class and was always in trouble. I made it all the way through high school, graduated with an Advanced Diploma with the shitty attitude of 'fuck you, you can't make me'. It caught up to me in college though.

So it could be that your bright child is bored and frustrated.

You are not a bad parent, stop it. :tantrum:

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9 hours ago, Whitestripe said:

We haven't considered ADHD because he's not unfocused in other areas. (He'll go to a Magic:The Gathering tournament with his father, place and stay focused all day)  He seems like a pretty normal kid, but he's got a pediatrician appointment coming up, so I will ask about it then. He's not disruptive in class (except, apparently band and he sits first chair so I have no clue what's up with that). He wears glasses and I've made an appt to get his script checked.

As for rewards, his grandmother had a whole box of Magic cards riding on straight A's all year, and that's gone. 

Honestly you could be describing me as a high school kid (or for that matter now much of the time). Adhd isn't as simple as can never focus on anything and it's pretty normal for a issues with maintaining focus on things that aren't engaging to be paired with an equally strong ability to hyperfocus on those that aren't.

I pretty much accept now that for every hour I plan to spend on research I'm likely to lose two while sidetracked by related interesting issues and oops I just spent the day researching something I can't use at all and I was so caught up in it I didn't notice I haven't eaten until it's reached the  point that I feel like I'm going to faint. 

I'm not saying that's definitely whats going on with him, just don't rule it out on that basis.

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We haven't considered ADHD because he's not unfocused in other areas. (He'll go to a Magic:The Gathering tournament with his father, place and stay focused all day)  He seems like a pretty normal kid, but he's got a pediatrician appointment coming up, so I will ask about it then. He's not disruptive in class (except, apparently band and he sits first chair so I have no clue what's up with that). 

This actually a symptom of ADHD, it's called hyper focus. I wish I'd known it as a kid because my ability to zone out and read for hours convinced me I didn't have it and I stopped taking  my medicine. Ask the doctor about it contrary to popular belief it's not whishy washy random diagnosis there is an actual chemical test for it.

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