You know when you wake up and it's going to be "one of those days"?
My house is messy, my family ate Kraft Mac & Cheese from a box for dinner last night, there is an email from my oldest son's Spanish teacher explaining that he isn't applying himself...
Yeah.
So, let's focus on one thing at a time. I need to get this house cleaned up and I think a crock pot dinner will be best to get me started (meatball subs?). But what to do about the Spanish grade?? His grade has been slipping since the marking period started 2 weeks ago and I just checked to find his average is now a 53%! He has already lost his phone and computer for the last 2 weeks - what else?
What do you do or take from your kids to show you really mean business? I need help from my wise readers because I'm at my wits end.
Help!
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Yikes. Sounds like a week around here. You might want to chat with the teacher about tutorials. And maybe some free time should be devoted to catching up - an nothing else. There's no easy answer - I went thru the wringer with the first one, and when he finally got graduated from high school I wanted to shout HALLELUYAH from the roof. The trick, I guess, is to find out what his internal motivation is. Maybe it's not the computer. We are having a motivation issue with our third kid regarding not progressing in Scouts. He has 13 days to rank up. It's gonna get tense up in here.
ReplyDeleteYes, you are right, he seems to be addicted to the computer until I take it away then he doesn't care!
DeleteI hate those days. Maybe there's something else going on with the class? I always got in trouble in Spanish class...took it for 3 years and all I can remember is the stuff that we weren't supposed to learn lol!
ReplyDeleteLike Spanish swear words?? Eh??
DeleteAre you sure it's just laziness, or does he really not understand the material? Maybe he needs help, but is too embarrassed to ask for it.
ReplyDeleteHis teacher just replied that he is messing around in class and not trying. He never looks at the material at home and always has an excuse.
DeleteThis is one of those moments were we'd have a heart to heart with our Kiddo about what's really going on and they confess they need help. We say something emotional and sweet and music plays and suddenly our kid is a whiz in Spanish. Since we're not living in a TV show, I have no clue. All I know is when I was slipping in school, it had absolutely nothing to do with school!
ReplyDeleteI think you're right, why CAN'T things work out like an after school special??? Do they still have those anymore?
DeleteWe do have re-runs of Full House.. Is that close enough?
DeletePerhaps if he is not willing to apply himself in his Spanish lessons, he could use that time to apply himself helping you keeping the house more tidy. It could be a win win situation for you Jennifer. Till he decides that being studious is better than cleaning house you have some free labor. heehee When he decides he should take his schoolwork more seriously then you have a student who is using his brains to make a good choice. It might work???
ReplyDeleteMaybe the teacher can move him away from his friends, so he doesn't have anything else to do but pay attention. Also, it sounds like he needs to do that homework at the kitchen table so you know that he's actually doing it instead of messing around. Honestly though, there's really nothing you can do to force him to do the work. It could just be a phase, and only failing a class will snap him out of it. The teenage years scare me.
ReplyDeleteTell me about it...
DeleteI guess, I would probably ask the teacher for extra work/assignments to work on at home. Then have him work on it somewhere where you can be over his shoulder making sure he's working on it. Until the work is done, or a certain amount of work is done, he can't do something or have something (when my husband was coaching basketball, a parent had asked that his child just sit on the bench to cheer and support his team, but not play because of something that had to do with school) And I totally know what you mean regarding the computer. My son can be completely addicted to his ipod touch, but if it gets taken away he just forgets about it and moves on. So frustrating!
ReplyDeleteWe had that with our oldest - finding the "button" that would turn him "on" to what he should be turned on too. Sometimes it was so obvious & other's it was a real struggle.
ReplyDelete