How to discipline 10 year old who always comes home late

[Anonymous]

My ten year old could more often than not check his watch and come home on time. He despises being in trouble, though. Not all kids are bothered by it. (Which works in our favor, thankfully)

For now, OP I would say no playing if there is something else on the go. So today he could have played after his hair cut. Get him a watch with a timer and teach him how to use it, then let him play when there is nothing specific to come home for. If he misses a meal.. then he misses it.

I don't think 10 is too young to learn to come home on time if you expect it of them. If he's truly not ready yet then I think having the mom of the friend send him home is a good solution. Or, just go pick him up.

[Anonymous]

^ ^ If you don't have time to pick him up then he can't go play right then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 10 yr old son is never home on time. For instance, he went to play at friends down the street- I told him be home by 12:30 to eat lunch and get to 1:30 hair cut... Finally at 1, i drive around to friends to find him. We bought him watch,etc. I get so frustrated. I told him from now on if we have any activity planned, he can't play those days because he can't be responsible and come home on time. I'm also thinking instead of saying for every 5 or 10 minutes he's late, he's grounded 1 hour.
Any thoughts or help on how to get him to be responsible?

He misses lunch, haircut, or whatever else was planned during the time he didn't come home.

No. You never use food as a punishment if you want to raise an emotionally healthy child.

Grounding is far more healthy and effective.

[Anonymous]

Oh hell. At 10, missing the meal you weren't home to eat is a great incentive to get home.

[Anonymous]

My 10 year old with ADHD would NOT know how time has gone back, and would NOT think of checking his watch.

I'm not sure what is developmentally appropriate for 10 year olds without ADHD, but I doubt that all of them are able to be punctual!

At that age, I would fetch him from the friend's house myself, at the right time.

[Anonymous]

"gone by", not "gone back"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I guess my 9 1/2 year-old is in the minority here but he never comes home late. He has a watch and uses it. i would be more than pissed at him if he were late like your son.

Your son is not that exceptional. The difference is that you found a system that works for your son and OP hasn't. The watch doesn't work for my son, but we have a system that does and he's never been late either. The point is that we have to teach our kids before we can just expect them to be successful.

+1000

I think OP needs to talk with her son and figure out what's going on for him that he loses track of time. Some people are more time-conscious than others. It's like any skill/talent. I can tell what time it is without a clock fairly accurately. DH is like OP's son. Can't really tell the difference between 30 minutes and an hour. When he gets lost in something, he truly gets lost. As his best man said at our wedding, "X (DH) never made it anywhere on time before Y (me)."

[Anonymous]

At 10 I was taking the public bus in DC and had to be aware of the time to the minute to make my transfer. I can't believe how many parents are saying keeping track of time is too much to ask. I'm so incredibly worried about this generation. I went to a pool party yesterday and several parents commented on how "confident in the water" my kids were. Um, they are 6 and 7 and have been swimming like that for 4 years. The expectations seem pretty low nowadays as to most skills. I'm not looking forward to supervising these kids at work in 15 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At 10 I was taking the public bus in DC and had to be aware of the time to the minute to make my transfer. I can't believe how many parents are saying keeping track of time is too much to ask. I'm so incredibly worried about this generation. I went to a pool party yesterday and several parents commented on how "confident in the water" my kids were. Um, they are 6 and 7 and have been swimming like that for 4 years. The expectations seem pretty low nowadays as to most skills. I'm not looking forward to supervising these kids at work in 15 years.

Exactly. I prefer to raise children who will be competent by the teen years, so that if for some reason they don't have an adult handy (and most won't when it's actually needed), they can handle whatever situation it is. I certainly want them to be able to stand on their own by 18!