To let her fail her GCSEs

[Newpuppymummy]

My 15 year old (y11) is doing basically no revision. She’s laying about doing whatever she wants despite all my best efforts to motivate and help her.

I have offered to sit with her, help make a written plan is, help test her r on things and she’s just not interested and resists everything.

Part of me feels like I want this more than her. I don’t know whether my best option is just to leave her to it and learn the lesson that you have to put work into things to get good results. This goes against my normal parenting strategies but I am at a loss with her.

Let her fail.

I don't think motivating her with money is a good idea. It's essentially bribing her. She should WANT to succeed and be successful without money. If she did revise and did well...then you could reward her with money as a surprise.

My GCSEs were shocking by my schools (and parents standards) -- mostly Bs and Cs. My school even told me not to bother with university because I clearly couldn't be bothered to work and it would be a waste of money.

I was so embarrassed to have done so badly when I knew I wasn't an idiot. Embarrassed to have let my parents down. Embarrassed to have terrible results compared to my friends. Embarrassed to have been proved wrong. It gave me the kick up the a I needed. I ended up going to a UK Top 3 University to study law (after straight As at A Level).

GCSEs aren't everything and sometimes mucking them up motivates some people to do better at A level. You can still get into a good university without amazing GCSE results so she won't have ruined her life.

If doing badly at GCSE doesn't motivate her to do better at A level, then that's a good thing. If she needs you to motivate her, imagine what she'd be like at University without you around...

I was in your DD’s position a year ago. Very different obviously but can understand where she comes from. The only thing that gave me the kick up the arse to get on with it for the real thing was seeing those failed mock exams—didn’t revise, thought they’d be pointless etc. Obviously that was the one year they were important.

Hang in there, I know it’s hard

It’s 15 years since I was in this situation with DD. I went for the carrot and stick (aka bribery) in the form of cash for grades. Being a mercenary teen it helped. I also made a revision ‘advent calendar’ with a little reward at the end of each day . Just daft things like sweets, hair bobble, lip balm etc. I knew it was hard work for her and she had zero motivation combined with incredibly bright friends who would have got straight As with no work. The advent calendar was so she knew I was aware how difficult she was finding things and rewarding her efforts. These days the competition is fierce and I’d not leave her to balls it up. Back in the day resits and a late start to higher Ed or the job market was ok, now it’s not so forgiving.

NovemberR hold your nerve. My eldest royally messed up GCSEs but a few years later got a first at university and then a post grad qualification. They don't have to do it all at 16 and sometimes I think a year or two in a grotty job really makes them appreciate education.

Is she very clever so does not need to do much work? If not - will she have to repeat this year again? What are her career goals? The sooner she gets on with the work the sooner she will move on and be out of school - if that's what she wants. It's her life that may be messed up by no qualifications.

Is she usually like this or has the disruption to her education and continued uncertainty because of coronavirus made her like this?

I think my approach would be different dependent on this.

It’s a risk but I would let her fail. She will learn the hard way and you can say I told you so.

Social media is showing kids that you don’t need an education to fly in private jets, wear Chanel sneakers, rent slick pads, it’s all filtered to make life seem a walk in the park. So many will fall victim to it, particularly given how covid will reshape the world for better or worse.

Perhaps do a video message so you can show her in a few years if she is struggling to find decent work that you tried and she didn’t listen.

One thing I found useful was to explain that their friends who were all claiming to do no work were probably doing plenty and would be very pleased with themselves when they came out with good results. The penny dropped and they did realise that was true, it isn't seen as cool by many of them to admit how much work they are doing and they can influence others.

Can you tell us a bit more about what she is like and the state of her current predictions etc, and her likely ambitions?
YWNBU to back off revision pressure, purely for the reason that it's not having the desired effect anyway.
However, other tacks might be useful. Even being explicit and saying OK, you say you are on top of the work side, so I won't try to get involved in how you approach the exams; but this has been a tough year, and I care about you, so can we make a new years resolution to do one thing together every week, to give us a chance to think beyond the academics and think about what you need /want /could explore. Then when exams are over and that weight's lifted, you can start getting on with the next steps.'
I have done A LOT of careers exploration and signposting with my dc which has helped focus minds - but I'm lucky, they are receptive. Though dd2 does always fob off direct enquiries about revision, she is more likely to respond to a drip drip conversation with questions about what she thinks works well for her, what she thinks she would benefit from doing more of, which tend to elicit more action. And I try to never sound disappointed - any result is OK, it's what you do with it, so an unexpected E grade in a test might phase them but if we model that that is not a problem, put it in context and encourage them how to build on their progress, then it stops the fear of trying and failing and tends to result in more study.

15 not 5

I was a bit like this... I think in part because it all was so overwhelming - and I was never taught to break it up into more manageable parts/never taught how to revise. Then if my mum took over and created timetables etc, that didn't help the overwhelm - and made me want to rebel.

So, my advice, coming from a similar situation is

a) Empathise with her that this is all a bit much, tedious, and it has been a crap year, especially shit that mocks will count to more than we expect this year because of covid - sorry you can't wave a magic wand and make it go away...

b) think to the future with her - does she know what she wants to do yet? GCSEs might not mean much yet, but they open they door to future study, so if she has a plan, then she may be more motivated to study.

c) Recognise that GCSEs are a lot of work because they cover such a lot of topics - ask lots of open ended questions about what she is good at, what needs less work because she has a natural talent, or what she is struggling with.

d) "it must be hard to work out how to break it down" - guide her to be able to chunk it up - but DON'T do it for her. Point her to free resources online to help her (twinkl has a lot - free or £5 for one month) but don't find them for her unless she asks for your help.

Oh op I could have written this, my dd15 is exactly the same. It’s so sad to see my once motivated, eager to learn girl turn into an unmotivated, mopey zombie. I’ve tried all angles to help, but because everything is so uncertain she says she doesn’t even know what she’s working towards. Shes wary of revising large topics that then get whipped off the curriculum, which already happened to her history gcse. And that for her is a total demotivater. A waste of time so why bother.. it’s really hard to know what to do. I don’t want her to fail, she doesn’t deserve to fail after all the years of hard work just to lose her step at the summit.

Just remind her if she flunks her gcses she will have to re sit or get a rubbish job with crap pay and never have anything etc. I put this to my near 11 year old all the time.

I just dont understand giving them money. There is no way I will do that with mine. Utterly spoilt. they get a great, free education and have to be paid to even try? Horrible!

Leave her.

My Ds was like this with his maths GCSE.

He got a level 2 and it meant he couldn't do the A levels he wanted to do and had to change his plans for study (both routes would have got him where he wanted in the end, he just has his heart set on a levels instead of BTEC). He was gutted.

He had to retake this year and passed.

He was like it with them all, but luckily he's always just been naturally good at English, history et and got level 8 in those. But that's just pure luck.

To be fair, I was like this. Did hardly any revision, just wanted to go put with friends. I did pretty well in my exams considering.

I had this with my DS last year, literally drove myself mad trying to get him work. In the end backed off, to let him 'fail' his mocks. He did pretty badly in his mocks, was working his back side off afterwards and of course got hit with the non exam situation-he didn't do as well as he would've done IMHO. He is working so much harder this year for his A levels, it taught him a very tough lesson. Awful to watch them be such lazy buggers though, but think you have to let them get on with it.

I was like this. Something clicked in January & I realised that I didn't want to retake exams & delay leaving my home town by another year, so I just buckled down and revised. There were some subjects that I found came naturally, so I revised the others more so that I could pull them up to C grades.

As others have said, try to talk to her about long term goals (not just job/academic, but moving/travelling, possible college courses etc) & see these exams as a means to an end.

My son was like this and it was mainly anxiety (trust me, the poor Y11s KNOW that mocks can be their final grades as schools keep telling them over and over ), DS said: if every test is important, nothing is important

I allowed him to choose how much revision to do (he did none), he did ok in the mocks and now feels less overwhelmed

But it’s a bloody crap deal they have got!

Either way, keep talking to her

Things are already tough - why would you let your child create even more obstacles? It's all very well for people to say 'let them fail, they'll learn something from it' but the economy may still be tanked when they're trying to land a job, and getting average/below average grades will be used to filter people out.

It won't be possible to use the pandemic as an extenuating circumstance when everyone else in the same year will have the same thing.

I'm not usually pro parental interference, but the kids who sat exams last year and who are sitting exams this year really need all the support they can get.

I was bribed by my parents. It worked. I didn't take my exams seriously myself, but if my parents were prepared to pay me, there was no incentive for me to not try, so I got As all round. I'm really grateful they manipulated me that way - the grades I got opened doors for me, and I would have had to fight so much harder to get where I am without them.

I think the best way to respond to this varies so much for each individual. It really depends on your daughter's personality and you know that better than anyone. Is she likely to respond to harsh rules or will that just make her rebel more? Will she respond if you try to talk to her without nagging, but as an adult? How about her friends - are they revising? Could they have a study group together?

As other people have said there is usually a way. Teenagers are often rebelling against parental influence in one way or another so you have to find a way that makes her feel like an adult and gives her control, whilst helping her see how important this is.

Failing that... if she's a little immature for her age and needs some external motivation... a money reward or gift for doing well could have its place ;)

not everyone learns through revision, Im dyslexic (although not greatly obvious) and it doesn't help me at all as I cant take notes in class and struggle to read text books as such attempting to read large text blocks or bad note makes me MORE likely to make mistakes.

I memorise things in real time as I hear them and hated alway being penalised for not revising, at school some insisted I cheated because I didnt 'revise' but always passed but whats normal for some people isnt for all and that style of learning doesnt work with me.

@Elieza

I was offered money on a sliding scale for an A B or C grade. That helped me.

I didn’t earn much pocket money as my family werent rich so the offer of a few extra quid made me totally ramp up my studies as I’d never had much spare money and I knew they must be serious about me doing well or they wouldn’t have offered me the thing they didn’t have much of. So I tried to do them proud. Got four A a B and a C. Happy ending.

Some will say that’s a bad idea yada yada, but in future work (in a job) = reward (pay).

So I figure work (revision) = reward (cash).

So it’s not that different to the reality of life. If you can afford to offer that type of encouragement just now.

I was also encouraged to save some. Which I did after buying shoes and bits and bobs I wanted.

Bribery worked for me as a kid too. I once learnt a concerto movement in a week for a new pair of shoes.

But it would be called incentivisation or goal oriented learning now.

I remember I did this over the Christmas holidays before my GCSE's. Thought I'd be fine as I'm naturally academic and never struggled before. Did my mocks in January and got C's and D's and was mortified at myself. It gave me the kick I needed and I came out with A* and A's in everything. Let her fail her mocks and with any luck she'll realise.

I actually left both of my DS to it when it came to GCSEs. They had been working well, but really slackened off in the final year (play games, laying around etc). I decided that I was running myself ragged keep chasing them, offering help etc and it was causing arguments.

I sat them both down, told them that they needed to knuckle down and do their work if they wanted to achieve anything. I warned them that I would no longer be chasing them, if they wanted help they just had to ask and I would certainly do whatever I could to help. I told them that if I continued to push them I felt I was doing no favours as they'd have to learn to do it themselves for A Levels and at Uni anyway. Actually they did pretty well, although not as well as I thought they could have achieved if they had actually done some work. I think it's probably affected their chances as they didn't get grades they were capable of, nor did they get A Level grades they were capable of, hence one didn't get into a RG Uni. But I stopped stressing and made it their problem.