We made homework the priority when he was in elementary school, but by middle school we felt it was important for him to start making sure on his own to get his work done, without mommy and daddy constantly asking about it, checking it, etc. Obviously, that didn’t work so we had to get more involved, which didn’t work either. He would actually do homework and not turn it in!
We had the same problem in elementary school with him showing his work on math tests. No matter how many times we emphasized he needed to show his work so he would at least get partial credit if he got the answer wrong, he just wouldn’t do it. Made me want to tear my hair out.
Just two thoughts, We tried to give very few opinions about our son’s grades. Instead we asked questions…
Such as "what do you think about these grades? Are there some you are especially pleased with? Others that surprised or disappointed you? Have you though about how you might approach things differently? What you plan to keep the same? Would you like our help or advice?
Secondly, the person(s) doing homework or study dominated the household. No-one watched t.v., for example, if anyone still had work to do.
Obviously, these strategies aren’t quick fixes. However, we tried to make sure it was his decisions, his grades, and we were the consultants.
In addition, we were fortunate that he had bright, motivated friends. I’m sure that helped a lot.
I never really had to restrict tv, since my kids usually found stuff that was more interesting to them.
For the most part when they were not doing homework they were doing crafts, cooking, building stuff, reading for pleasure, playing outside, visiting neighbors, hanging out with helpers who came in for their autistic brother, etc. In high school, they were busy with EC’s. Friday afternoons the kids sometimes hung out together with friends, an advantage of a neighborhood school.
Silly me, I thought it was a good thing to be able to be alone with some unstructured time to decompress. Even the private schools that offer late dismissal to accommodate working parents seem to allow an hour or two at the end of the school day.
I cared about grades, because they ideally gave me an indication of how well my kids were learning the material and meeting expectations. I wanted to know why they were getting a low grade -a kid who isn’t doing or handing in homework but still does well on exams is in a different position from one who is doing all of this and still struggling to pass exams. I would not have been pleased to find out that my kid was getting low grades because they were competing with other parents, or because teaching was poor and everyone else was getting tutored.
“I would not have been pleased to find out that my kid was getting low grades because they were competing with other parents, or because teaching was poor and everyone else was getting tutored.”
Why? It is a responsibility of a parent to help when kid has asked. We did not interfere, but when we were asked, we would drop anything that we were doing and help. Every parent can help. “I do not remember” is not an excuse. Most kids do not use their own textbooks efficiently. Willing parent will find all the answers in the kid’s own textbook or if lazy to do so, the Google is beyond perfect, it has absolutely everything, definitely all answers to possible HS kid questions. Doing homework well in our house meant to have it done correctly. We could not write her papers, could not help with Spanish, but if D. asked a question about math, physics, history, we were there to help. She even called my H. few times with the Physics questions from college. “Poor teaching” is not an excuse. I believe that parents’ help makes a big difference and it shows that a parent truly cares.
We were similar to @jasmom in our approach.What we found was sometimes the child just may not know what to do or how to do it. Take organization or time management. Your child may not have hit on a good organization system and is just using someone’s system (which isn’t working). When D was having problems organizing her work at home, I worked with her to try different systems. What did not work was suggesting my own system or using some “packaged” solution. Eventually, after about five iterations, D hit upon one she liked - she was able then to work more efficiently and keep track of what was due when. (fwiw, her system made no sense to me but that wasn’t important).
When she needed academic help during the latter half of ninth grade, we got her a tutor. One unintended benefit was the tutor taught her what high school teachers expected in homework, projects and exams; and, also how to parse her time and work to get projects done well and on time. In other words, he taught her skills she didn’t know she needed to be a good student. It wasn’t enough to just say “do better”, “study”, “do your homework early”, “no electronics until your homework is done”. She needed to be taught skills specific to her needs and goals.
One area where I’ve seen boys (and my daughter) stymied is breaking down a big project into smaller, more manageable tasks. The end result is they don’t do any of it until they are forced by time or parents and then the outcome is pretty ugly. It may be worth the time and money to hire a tutor to work on that, if you think it’s an issue and you don’t think your child is hearing / listening to you.
The child’s social group does matter. D’s friends changed gradually through high school. By the time she was a junior, her friends were not the highest achievers (she found them insufferable) but the next tier or two down (still in honor or AP but not the tippy top). They were a much better influence than her early friends (kids who didn’t do homework). Class choices also matter. D took a regular class for exactly one day. Afterwards, she went immediately to her guidance counselor and demanded to be placed in whatever honors-level class during that same period. She wasn’t going to stay in the regular-level class.
Last, maturity counts. D was a much better student her junior and senior years than during her first two years of high school. As much as I would have loved her to have done better during her freshman and sophomore years, I think she needed to go through all that pain and growth to reach her place later on. I’m not advocating parental indifference or the “sink or swim” method; I’m saying sometimes the path isn’t so obvious and it can be painful.
@jasmom That’s generally my approach. Trying to tease out the feelings around school work and let him take ownership of the pieces, offer help if need. He got back 100% on his bio project today and I had nothing to do with that work other than talk a bit about where he was with it and how it was going etc. So I know he can do it.
@patertrium - So how did the semester turn out for your son? I tried to tell my son that he needed to have a cushion in his classes going into finals week But he just didn’t seem to understand UNTIL the week before finals. He had a flat 90 in one of his classes which meant he had to get at least a 90 on the final in order to get an A. Why did he have a 90? Because he didn’t always turn in his homework. Ugh! Did he end up with an A? Yes but while I am glad that he was able to get all A’s this semester in a way I’m not happy because I don’t think he has really learned that you need to do more than “just” enough and now we have just kicked the can down the road until next semester…
@MichiganGeorgia Thanks for asking. Five A’s and two B’s. The A’s were mostly A- and the B’s B+ but in CA an A is an A is an A for UC and Cal State. He came on strong in the final weeks including a 98 on the bio final. Alas he came to an 89.65 and no teacher round up - so B+ for bio. But I was proud that he buckled down and did his best. My sense is he’s growing and maturing gradually.