Reply to Managing 2e kid (ADHD+highly intelligent) in MCPS high school

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[quote=Anonymous]I have this kid at WJ in the apex program (which is being phased out) and on track to have about 12-14 APs by graduation.

My kid very much wants to take all the hardest classes.  I think he would do worse in the wasy classes to be honest.  His biggest problem academically is that he just doesn’t do any busy work or assignments he considers dumb.

First, I think manage your expectations.  Lots r kids at WJ will get straight As.  Your kid will not and if you can’t accept this it will be rough for you. A lot of the grade actually depends on organization and the ability to track and turn in a lot of pointless assignments.  Most kids use that to pull up their grades.  A lot of them are using ChatGPT for those types of assignments  — mine would rather take the B than do something he doesn’t feel is productive, but YMMV.

The teachers vary greatly in their ability to accommodate kids like this or help them.  Don’t expect a ton of help but most teachers will honor very specific accommodations (not the general ones they often put into 504s).  There are a lot of great teachers that want to do what they can but they are very overloaded.  There are a handful of very bad teachers.  You have basically no ability to pick your teachers and most courses are taught by many teachers (with the exception of some specialty APs where you can basically predict your teacher with the class).

You need to get familiar with parentvue (aka synergy aka Gradebook) and canvas—you need to check both at least daily until he is to the point where he reliably tracks this stuff himself.  You need to go to back to school night and take notes because not every teacher uses canvas calendar and they often don’t upload to synergy until way after th deadline so you won’t know he didn’t turn it in until it’s too late.

I would also take some of that money you were spending on private school and put it towards and executive function coach.  It’s really hard to do that as a parent but they will help keep him organized and teach him skills for how to manage assignments and study.  My kid never needed math or reading help but organization help he needs in spades.

You’ll need to teach him to advocate for himself with teachers and if he’s out sick you need to make sure he knows when the makeups are and affirmatively is reaching out to teachers.  Most teachers are available during lunch to help students (which is amazing) and really want kids to take advantage of that if they are struggling.  [/quote]

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