How do I help my 13y/o son care about his grades?
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Anonymous
| Does he play a sport? Often grades need to be kept up as a criteria to play. That is usually motivating for student athletes and it makes them focis more on time management. |
Anonymous
| I am the 15.27 poster. I'm believe kids need to learn how to study. This is a turning point for your child because once in high school, good grades are important. At this point, your son probably thinks that only the smart kids get good grades. Wrong! The kids with good grades are putting in the study time. Either study with him and/or hire a tutor and REWARD his achievements. |
Anonymous
| The learning how to study has been the most difficult part. He is working with a tutor for that but so far I'm not seeing any improvement. I quiz him the night before and he knows the answers, the next day on the test its like he never saw the info before. We know his working memory is poor but he can retain information of things he is interested in. thanks for all the suggestions. Keep them coming. If they don't work for us they may help someone else. I guess my struggle is I was self motivated as where my siblings and husband so this is a new dynamic for me. |
Anonymous
You might want to move away from focusing on grades, and instead focus on learning, improvement, and the discreet behaviors that will help him learn and improve (and be organized, etc.). ?? I have no expertise in this area, well, maybe a little...  What I mean is that if he's struggling to get an A or B in math, don't focus on the A or B. Focus on identifying what he can do well (note and celebrate!), what he can do with help (celebrate and strategize!), and what he has a much harder time doing and understanding (tutor? focus on incremental improvement?).
You can monitor this day by day, and even engage in more regular conversations with his teachers, maybe? Helping him identify his progress (not just attaining the "A") might also promote the kind of motivation that will serve him well for the rest of his life? Finally--is he getting the kind of support he REALLY needs in school? For example, it seems to me that IEPs often identify "more time" as the primary accommodation. Well, just providing more time for strategies and instruction that doesn't work well in the first place can just breed frustration and boredom and disengagement. So ask yourself: Is your child getting the kind of supports that he REALLY needs? |
Anonymous
If he lacks intrinsic motivation, and you think he really CAN do it, then offer some exceedingly enticing extrinsic motivation. In our case, TV time and computer time are coveted activities, so our daughter has to earn them. We say she can earn AS MUCH TV, movie, and computer time as she wants, and it's never take away (though sometimes it is postponed, e.g., if it's too late to start a movie, she can bank it later for the appropriate time). This doesn't lead to endless TV watching... in fact, she's got a very balanced life. Because I know what her assignments are, and I have a sense for what is harder versus easier for her, I value each chunk accordingly. That is, an easy assignment that takes only a few minutes earns her 15 minutes. A harder assignment might be 30 minutes, or else chunked into 15 minute segments so she can do each portion over the course of a week or whatever. Good communication with the teacher (sometimes in advance, sometimes with notes on the homework wrt what she could do independently, what was moderately or more difficult and why) helps the whole thing move along. We do focus on PERSISTANCE in the face of challenge; using good STRATEGIES; articulating what she knows AND doesn't know (metacognition); and IMPROVEMENT. We have a little three-ring binder where we keep key artifacts and we look back at it from time to time to note how much she's improved. "Remember when you had a hard time with X? Well, now you can do X with NO HELP and you're making good progress with Y!" The conversation has moved from what she's lacking and not good at, to what she knows, has gained, and strategies for getting help with and learning more about harder material. This might work for you, too. It's not perfect, but, WOW, our relationship with our daughter AND her productivity and motivation has really changed for the better!
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Anonymous
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OP - also if there is a DH, then he, too, should be a part of the equation. So often in these forums it is all about that DM is doing and little mention of DD!! Maybe Dad quizzing him or taking on at least one subject will help show DS that both of you have expectations of him and are willing to spend time helping and also holding him accountable for lack of effort, too. |
Anonymous
It worked for my brother who couldn't have cared less about his grades. Just think of it as his paycheck for a job well done. |
Anonymous
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In response to how to get him to care about his grades, what about:
- exploring any career aspirations he may have, with an emphasis on what sort of education he needs in order to enter the field. If his desired career or category of careers requires a college degree, take a look at a few universities he may be interested in and show him what courses, grades, and test scores they require for admission. Try to get him to make that his goal. - tying his grades to his privileges or ability to have a social life. Decide what you think is reasonable for grades he could be getting with what you consider an appropriate level of effort, and if he doesn't reach that then he obviously needs to spend more time on schoolwork and less time on secondary priorities. - Like other posters mentioned, monetary incentives. How many of us who are employed would be motivated to put in as much time and effort at our jobs as we currently do if they were volunteer positions with no paycheck? - This probably won't work until he's in high school (next year?), but we told our girls that a condition of being allowed to get their learner's permits at the correct age was a cumulative high school GPA at or above the level required for our car insurance's good student discount, and continued permission to use the car was tied to acceptable grades Unfortunately I have no advice for how to help him achieve better grades; it sounds like some of the suggestions from PPs may be helpful. |
Anonymous
Poverty may not be solely tied to being lazy and/or stupid but it definitely is tied to lack of an education. I share OP's concerns and look forward to hearing more positive responses. |
Anonymous
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Hey, everyone likes positive feedback and praise. However, there is something about HW that he detests. So why not figure out what that is and address it?
1. It's hard for him and it makes him feel stupid. [Address his learning challenge--don't tie it to grades, rather to improvement] 2. It takes too much time--he could be doing other more enjoyable things. [Address what he'll allowed to do if he does XYZ homework--I would not tie it to report card grades--too distal. Tie it to more proximal stuff, e.g., homework done by due date, asking questions, etc.] 3. His peer group thinks doing homework is for geeks and losers. [Address that--social time with his friends depends on him getting things done on time at an acceptable level of quality.] 4. Homework assignments and tests actually are boring and of low quality. [Address that, and ask the teacher if you/he can "gussy" it up.] Other? |
Anonymous
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Is your son involved in anything that he's passionate about? Like sports, music, art, etc? Maybe his lack of motivation and drive in school is tied to a lack of motivatio nand drive across the board. I've seen kids really come alive when they find that thing they really love to do.
#Livn'ItUpInCO |
Anonymous
This is the same problem we have with our 10th grade DC. I imagine it must be disheartening for a kid to study, be quizzed the night before and know the answers, yet draw blanks and get D's and E's on the test. No wonder they lose motivation and act like they don't care! We are having our DC tested and maybe it will show working memory problems, or problems with executive function? Anyway, no advice to give here since your son has already been evaluated and has accomodations. Just wanted to say you're not alone in this issue. I will say also that in time both of our kids will mature and may care a lot more about achievement. Not everyone develops on the same time schedule. Good luck, OP. |
Anonymous
| If I got all A's I got $500 each report card. Guess who always got straight A's and I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed. |
Anonymous
This wouldn't work for many kids with LDs. They would study, try their best and still get subpar grades. Then what do you do? Agree that this approach could work for some non-motivated kids, however. |
Anonymous
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My thirteen year old daughter could care less about her grades. Setting a bar for A's has no meaning to her other than it is hard. You have to ladder it, a semester of C's and then B's
Also the real issue is not his grades it is that he is not learning the content, let the other go, figure out how to get the learning in place. |