So grades came out. Evan is failing like 4 of his 6 classes. Luke is getting bad grades in 3 of his. Monday I had a loooooong talk with Luke to try and get him to understand that he must be proactive if he wants his grades to get better. I explained that obviously the status quo wasn’t working, but it was up to him to find a solution. Unfortunately he’s so overly tuned to ME & his high anxiety kicks in when he thinks he’s not living up to my expectations that these talks tend to turn into emotional meltdowns from him so much that when I walk away to try to end the conversation he lets loose with not so quiet sobs. 🙁 It’s difficult to get study techniques pounded into memory when he’s melted into a blob of “I’m stupid” whenever I mention his grades and I then spend hours doing emotional repair.
Trust me I tread a fine line of parenting with him, loading him with encouragement, love and praise while trying to get him to push himself into this alien concept called “studying” Trying to bolster his independence can be a challenge for someone so focused on me as his reason for existence.
When it came to Evan’s turn, gone was his usual sullen attitude. (And before you think I’m such a bad mother I reduced my oldest child to tears with mental abuse, the simple words, “Luke, you can do better” is all it took to trigger his high anxiety into tears & Evan is my sensitive-to-others boy so when he knows I’ve had a difficult time with Luke he puts aside his own teen BS… thank God!)
I told Evan I was done. I could take nothing else away to motivate him. I told him even when I offered rewards to motivate him he saw the effort to “try” too hard and whined how he’d never achieve the reward. I laid out the reality if he failed all his classes both semesters he’d be repeating 9th grade. I even threatened suggested the option of homeschooling him with the horror of “you think YOUR gym teacher is hard on you…haha!”
I gave him the same speech of “getting your grades up is your responsibility”. As I cannot force the teachers to teach him the way he learns (He’s getting an A in science because the teacher teaches the way Evan learns best but it is also a lazy teaching style of bubble tests.) And then he reminds me he asked for a system where if he did extra things he’d get the use of his laptop back… and I stop. As I realized he’d given me an out!
This is the key to parenting. When your kid gives you a way to get through to him, to connect to a solution he will accept you must drop all your ranting about behavior, about doing it YOUR way and find a way to incorporate the suggested idea into the parenting of the situation. I quickly agreed to the reward on the condition he give me “provable effort” in school. I advised him that getting his grades up was HIS responsibility and the best solution he could do would be to ask a teacher for make up work or extra assignments to bring up his grade.
And folks… Tuesday he told me he did just that. He walked up to his English teacher (my shy, conflict avoiding, sullen about hard work, heavy 14 year old) and asked her for extra work and she told him she’d give it to him today. So I gave him his laptop for 2 hours after all homework & chores (including him cooking dinner) were done. You should have seen him and Luke cooperating in cooking dinner. Tuesday night is Evan’s cook night and Luke pulled the Assist with Dinner chore stick that day. Evan did a good job being the supervisor to his older brother the subordinate without taking advantage and just telling Luke to do ALL the work.
Today will be the test on coming home with the work as I also instructed him to ask at least TWO more of his teachers today as it may take them time to come up with something to help. The real lesson I’m trying to get my son’s to learn is “take responsibility for your life.” It is the one thing they’ve really got no natural talent for!!
(ps… this was written almost two months ago. And Evan has worked to bring his grades up & is marginally successful. But he’s about to take his finals for the semester. This is a new concept he’s never had to deal with in Middle & Elementary school. I think he’s banking on it bailing him out of having to repeat a few classes. We shall see if it works for him or is his doom.)