to expect an 11 year old to be able to

[Notmyidea]

Tell the difference between doing homework and faffing about getting drinks, sharpening pencils etc, etc etc

Mine is struggling with the concept and tries to convince herself she's been working for hours, when it's more like 20 minutes.

One of the fab teachers at school says this a fair bit "the evidence of having done the work is what is on the paper"

I like that one, thanks:)

It's all delaying tactics.....

I'm 39 and still struggle with this.

If you can help her over the self-sabotage at this age you'll be doing her a huge favour in life

I need someone to help with the concept of 'cleaning the house' with 'hiding the mess'

YABU - I do this all the time :)

however - procrastination is the theif of time, or at least it used to be, now its mumsnet

I know several people, including a CEO, a very senior nurse and one of my DC, who are still like this as highly paid adults!!
Any excuse rather than knuckle down to doing the strategic review/evaluation ....whatever. They are all last minute merchants, and have been since school days.

It used to drive me to distraction, but in the end I had to accept (in DC case) that it was just the way the brain and motivation worked....and the aforementioned friends were clearly not held back by it, so I just tried not to worry but turned nagging into an art form

Doing back handsprings on the trampoline is very clever, but it doesn't constitute German HW, nor do cartwheels across the lawn, or watching amusing video blogs on Utube,
DD2 does not like German.

And I´m like it as a totally unpaid SAHM

I'm only on mumsnet because I should be getting some reports typed up.

DSS (14) frequently likes to moan to me when I get home from work that he had to do an hour of work, most of which involve faffing. When I've just come back from a 12 hour day I usually offer to swap.

I agree with LEM - procrastination used to be the thief of time, now it's MN

If you can get it through to him now then you will be doing him a HUGE favour further down the line - but, good luck with that!