To ask how seriously you take ks2 education if your dc isn't that bothered?

[ForAMinuteThere]

Dc in yr 4. Doesn't seem to give a crap about education. Generally good child, doesn't have a great deal of confidence and the odd issue but fairly straight down the line. August birthday so youngest in year.

Was flagged as being bright but not showing it at pretty much every meeting I've ever been to. Can't get them to care about it really. I am conscious pressure is making them resent it but try not to apply too much pressure. Obviously I want the best but do not expect them to be top of the class, frankly they don't have that potential anyway, I just want them to be the best that they can be.

We have done extra curricular stuff and in a funny way, games, online stuff, basic worksheets, books, all sorts. Never loads in one go or every day so they still get their fun and 'child time'.

How do you get them interested?! And see how serious it is to have a decent education?

You need to find out why they don't care.

At that age, so long as they are making reasonable progress and not badly behaved, I honestly wouldn't worry. There'll be plenty of time for the pressure to hit when they're in year 10. At primary school, they don't need to feel that their whole life depends on every homework or test or whatever. Relax.

Thank you both.

I've tried asking and working out why, I just don't know. I think confidence perhaps, that he feels rubbish so just doesn't think it's worth bothering. But he isn't rubbish and we are big into positive reinforcement.

I am just nervous to put too much pressure on as you say, and to relax a bit, but I know that high school is looming and sats, and it all goes so quickly!

Is your child a bit bored? I think I'd encourage them to follow an interest or passion rather than going over school stuff. Even if it a series of fads. Stop motion animation, painting, programming, gardening, sports/ dancing / youth theatre. What they will learn might be life skills of working through a project, getting to an end result. Or something you can't predict. So long as they are doing something constructive I wouldn't be too bothered about doing worksheets, unless there is a specific issue.

Facilitate their interests and the rest will follow.

(Small note, I would struggle if the only interest was gaming, but that’s me. And my friends brother never did anything but watch films, and now he is doing well in the film industry, so who can tell?)

I used to ask my dc to think about what they want as adults.

Do they want their own house, to be able to buy clothes that they like, eat whatever food they want? Do they want to have a car one day and to go out to the cinema, to theme parks, to restaurants? Did they want to be able to play sport or have computer consoles?

Then I would tell them that all adults have to work to buy these things that they want. Everyone works hard. No matter what job you do you will probably come home tired and in need of a rest. Some jobs pay £7 an hour, some pay £70 an hour. Which would they prefer?

Then you have to work it backwards to education. You need high levels of education for some jobs and less for others. How high do they feel they want to go? They need to keep on top of school work and not fall behind so that they can keep all these options within reach.

Each thing they learn now will help to build a foundation for the things they need to know later on. The more they practice, the easier it will be. For example, times tables are massively useful and something that your dc should be pretty good at by this age.

Each time you think something is not important enough to bother with you are closing a door of opportunity. The best plan is to keep all those doors open for as long as possible and only close them when you are sure you don't need them any more.

In similar situation and it’s frustrating to have an allegedly very ‘able’ child seemingly not that arsed. But we keep plugging along hoping something with click for him. In the meantime as long as he’s not behind, reads, gets enough exercise, does his music, we’ll not push it too much.

Plenty of bright kids aren’t academic and plenty of kids excel through sheer determination when their circumstances might have dictated otherwise. It all lays a foundation for the future.

I was reading a press article today about education. There are too many young people aiming to do degrees and too few jobs available afterwards. They're looking in some cases at lower wages than people who didn't go on to further education. There are apprenticeships, engineering, building, plumbing etc. as an alternative.

Some kids just mature later. He'll get there in his own good time

Sounds like his self-esteem is low - my DS is exactly the same despite really positive parenting. He's much more engaged now he has a decent teacher who is happy to adapt to pupil interest. Could it be the teacher?

Thanks all. Teacher this year is really encouraging actually, last year they weren't.

You are right single of course in that the degree etc isn't everything. I think what I'm concerned about is not the outcome ie great job etc, but that he just isn't fulfilling any potential.

Like someone said he might get there in his own time with maturity.

I think I will concentrate on what he enjoys to get confidence up and hope it flows over into other areas?

Eva thankfully gaming is a side interest - it's more sport and outdoors things he is into at the moment. Does enjoy a bit of fortnite though!

I think as long as he reaches secondary school with the ability to access the curriculum and not already behind he will be OK. I do think constantly pushing at this age can make children switch off. Yes, he does need to cope with things he finds difficult/boring sometimes, but not quite achieving his full potential is OK.

If he is sporty/outdoorsy I think it is fine to support/encourage that. Having a "thing" they are good at can really help confidence and ultimately give young people a direction/focus. It's the ones who don't have anything who often have more issues.

I was like this in school OP, I just didn’t bother. Underneath I was a complete perfectionist so I found things really overwhelming as I wanted to do everything perfect and would be annoyed and anxious if I wasn’t “the best” so it seemed easier just not to bother.

This carried on all through my teens and twenties until I finally gave myself a kick up the arse in my late twenties. If everyone is saying he’s bright could it be that he’s anxious underneath and finds the expectation to achieve overwhelming so he withdraws from even trying? Just a thought...

I’m in the same position DD is Y4 and it is a fight everytime to get her to read or do her homework or learn her times tables. I just try to get her interested where I can so do things like getting her to count money in shops or work out change or measure stuff and work out how much we need to add when cooking to try to help with Maths. For reading I take her to the library and let her choose books (which she doesn’t read) or we read a magazine together or we might play a game where you have to read the questions and answers off cards to help with reading. I don’t think you can force it you have to sneak the learning in.

DD though is possibly dyslexic and struggles to understand but then gets upset and embarrassed and doesn’t want to try if she gets it wrong.

Don't push. Not in year 4. Too young. He's doing fine. Sport and fortnite. Only when they start year 10 gcses's would this need addressing.

Thanks, it is reassuring to hear other opinions. Sport has been very good for him. He is definitely anxious so maybe there is an element of that, I don't know if there is a subconscious message going to him but on the surface we really are not trying to push for the best in class etc. Just that he tries. He has a sibling who doesn't have to make any effort to do well so I'm sure that doesn't help either, not that we compare them to each other to their faces. He can just see it.

I don't think it helps that I was massively pushed to be honest either- I am trying so hard not to do it to my Dc!

Only thing about this @oblomov18 ...
Only when they start year 10 gcses's would this need addressing.

... is that by that point if they're in the bottom sets etc, is there any climbing out of that? I always felt bottom sets at our school were given up on.

At your childs age they won't understand the importance of a good education but hopefully with some rules like you must listen in class, you must behave well at school and you must do your homework, when it comes to GCSEs you child will be in a good place. Your child will change a lot in the next few years, just let them know that you expect them to do their best. I think that's all you can do for now.

DS2 was like this. There were underlying reasons. turned out he has High Functioning Autism and was spending all his energy trying to fit in, (he wasn't popular and didn't know why) and studying socia behaviour. He was so focused on this he couldn't focus on his work (but was too young to articulate that this was what held him back, and no teacher noticed.
It wasn't until he switched to a much better school who spotted his SEN needs and gave him excellent upport for them, that he began to thrive. This was a gradual process but by GCSEs he was doing well, and now he's able to drop the subjects he hates, he is really thriving in 6th form and aiming high for uni.
I did what you do - just kept up games and music and stories etc, bought puzzle books and took him to exhibitions, museums and shows, just hoping some of it would stick. I think it did. Long term, all the extra stuff helped. Some children are very slow developers. Some hate school and thrive better 1-2-1. But you arer supporting him, and he will, gradually, get there. He needs to see the 'point' of learning. When he realises it has relevance to what he wants to do in life, he'll connect.

We do suspect there is potentially a similar issue there onestep. Not enough for a diagnosis though, but certainly some quirks. I'm glad to hear your son is doing well. I will continue with the approach of surrounding him with educational things (I don't mean bombarding) as you point out and hopefully certain things will peak his interest and encourage a love of learning!

Not enough for a diagnosis could be symptomatic of very high functioning autism. He could be masking so much that his energy for learning is blunted (because he's already hard at work learning how to behave 'normally' and to fit in.) It may be worth getting a test to help him.

Sports and outdoors is a good starting point. Does he do anything like Scouting? That would give him a broad range of practical experiences and general knowledge which would support school based learning. Do you get much opportunity to get out to different places, (libraries, museums, walk in the woods...)

Learning is about so much more than what happens in classrooms and on paper. Leaving to KS4 is a gamble. Some mature and find a purpose, if they are disinterested until then and nothing clicks, it's very late in the school system to catch up.

My DS is y3 and looks to be rather dyslexic and struggles to get much on paper, but we've always got out a lot and chatted about things so he has a great general knowledge. He goes for colourful books with diagrams and gets a lot from them even when he's struggled to access the text. Documentaries in the background on the TV, even if he's minecrafting he still picks snippets up. I've been honest with him about his strengths and things he finds tricky, and his confidence is good and he doesn't feel defined by his challenges such as reading ability. We're only just approaching the age for dyslexia testing (and I suspect there is more) but his teachers have been really good at understanding him. In y2, they did a reading stress test, and we've identified a colour of glasses and overlay that make a massive difference to his reading and writing as he struggles to track text on a page. In y1, he said the board was hard to see but nothing was flagged on the routine eye test I booked. Opticians and hearing check could be worth checking incase he is missing information and struggling to keep up. My auditory processing isn't great, and sometimes I end up shutting down as it's too hard to make sense of filtering noise.

Thanks one step, that is certainly interesting, and I never thought of it like that.

Anotherpidgey - yeah we are very much holidays include a cultural trip, documentaries on, etc. A teacher at the school did actually say you can tell that ypi do a lot of interwsting things with your children so something must be coming out at school at least. I didn't think of having documentaries on in the background but it's a good point.

To be honest looking back I learnt so much random knowledge from watching my parents programmes on tv!