am I a lazy parent or just protecting Ds's mental health?

[Essexhousehusbands]

DS doing his GSCEs next year. He's bright but dyslexic, hates writing and gets extra time in exams. Generally does well at school, gets good reports. Wants to go to uni and do maths.

He's happy, no issues, sees friends, doesn't go out drinking at the park till 1am, not bunking off school, no self harm, no social media......but playing A LOT of playstation and is NOT doing enough GSCE revision. My guess is that he will get 5/6/7s when with some effort he could get 7/8s.

I'm reminding him to revise, I am paying for a tutor on the subject he finds really tricky. I offer to help, we bought him all the GSCE revision books.

But.... I am not issuing threats to get more revision and I am not having arguments about it. I am not threatening to cut the wifi or take away the playstation. He can be quite explosive and likes a good shouty argument with doors slammed. He can happily watch the world burn, in a way that I can't.

So I justify the 'gentle' approach to revising by thinking that I don't want to jeopardise our relationship and damage his mental health. And that they are his exams and the school is keeping the pressure on.

But is that just me making excuses and really I should really start laying down the law and insisting on more revision?

ARGGHHHHHHHHHH ! Give it to me straight.

My one severely dyslexic DC used to revise by watching educational videos and lectures for GCSE and A levels. Reading takes a lot of effort for her, and listening is easier for her to take in and remember.

So consider his dyslexia when you show him how to revise.

I have a dyslexic ds who is studying Maths at university. I would add in extra tutor sessions and count those as studying if you can afford it.

One thing I really noticed was how poorly ds revised - dyslexics are often disorganised too in their approach to work so having a formal session is probably going to help him a lot more than leaving him to his own devices. There was no chance of me helping him as he point blank refused my help (he was one of those 'I want to do everything myself' types). But a tutor helped massively with this.

good luck!

For me the endless gaming is seperate to whether or not he chooses to revise. I have a son who would endlessly game given the chance - I think as an adult I have to push back at that while he is here and my responsibility!

I also think you are right that shouting matches are stressful and if you can avoid them that's a good thing. I failed my gcses because I was out raving (mid 90s!) and having a wild old time - I don't care at all now about my GCSE results although I did decide of my own volition to knuckle down at A -level

Yes mocks were last week, and they’ll be another lot after Feb half term.

The gaming - sooo the gaming machines are in shared spaces, and he does have down time on his phone.

OK so this is my plan:

take the tutoring into account and maybe add to that.
offer a tutor to help with revising.
suggest video revision.
looks at math degrees and good unis and see what they require.
try to talk revision plan.

he optionally removed tiktoc from his phone so he can restrict himself.

I think I am probably not quite doing enough yet but that arguments will be counterproductive.

You will just alienate him. You can try encouraging him, offer him resources etc. Ultimately he will just see it as nagging and ignore you. Also, bribery sometimes works eg £300 for a 9, £250 for an 8 etc.

I wouldn’t fall into the trap of allowing him to do things because you want to avoid making him angry, he will learn all he has to do to get his own way is shout enough.

Having dyslexia doesn’t mean he doesn’t need to or can’t revise either, my wife is dyslexic, she has a first class science degree, it takes her longer to read, but she can still revise.

Try to find a compromise with him because forced revision isn’t going to work, but he can’t be allowed to do endless amounts of gaming either just because you want to avoid a row.

Try to find a compromise with him because forced revision isn’t going to work, but he can’t be allowed to do endless amounts of gaming either just because you want to avoid a row.

LOL can I try again. I know this is true but would very like to avoid !

I would normally say he needs to feel the consequences of his actions but you should be aware that he might find it harder to coast than either you or he expect. What if he does his mocks and doesn't get the grades he needs? There is also an argument for him understanding that he won't get into university this way. All students need to study to do their a levels. A student who has an additional learning difficulty needs to study more. Is it a good idea for him to think that he doesn't need to work at home? I suspect not. You can be the easy going parent but maybe he also needs you to tell him the truth about the connection between study and results.

Apologies if I have missed it, but why have you come to the conclusion that pushing for more revision would damage his mental health?

As a parent sometimes we need to guide children to do things they might not naturally want to do, this is one of those occasions imo

Did he do mocks in oct? That gives you leverage for gentle reasoning. "I think you can do better x maybe we should consider lowering the x box allowance. "

Then review based on feb mocks.

I would remind him that poor effort equals poor results but that's it. Sometimes with kids, they have to experience the consequences before they shape up.

There's a difference between being gentle and being permissive.
It doesn't read like concerns about his mental health, more you don't want to deal with the outbursts from saying 'no'. Gentle parenting 100% involves adults holding boundaries and not letting children rule the roost.

The question I would encourage you to reflect on is why you're allowing a teenager's tantrums over his playtime to dictate your expectations and how you run your house?

There's a lot of young men who seem to put gaming on a pedestal and I'm sure they turn into the men we see on MN who opt out of family life because they need to play a game every evening or they'll lose their temper and get moody when their DP suggests adulting.

There grades he is likely to get are fine and will take him on to next stage of his education. As parents we often feel a bit frustrated when we know they can do better. My dgsgot a couple of 8switj the rest being 7s 6s and A5. His school was happy to accept him for A levels. The only problem is that he likes to work and get paid. He has a retail job which was supposed to be a few hours a week but he will take any shift hesgiven. Both Saturday and Sunday as well as twilight shifts in the week and his school work has gone right off and he's talking of leaving the course. It's so hard to know what to do. Just as you can't stop the gaming op my Dd finds she can't stop. The amount of retail work. We have pointed out the long term consequences of giving up A levels for a minimum wage job but to no avail Sadly ...or maybe not sadly 🤔 you can't put an old head on young shoulders but it's hard to watch them potentially throwing their chances away. Your fs is younger op so will probably do a bit of maturing over next few years. At the moment we don't see this happening with dgs.

@shiningstar2 have you considered asking their employer to stop offering them shifts? Saying it affects their education?

Or can you afford to pay them some of what they would earn in the extra shifts to stay home and study instead? Not ideal but maybe the only way forward? And consider explaining that if they stop studying and start earning, you would expect them to pay rent etc and to work out how much money they'll actually have left which may not be much?

The shop really like him as he is reliable and really hard working at work. We think they are encouraging him to pack school in and come and work for them. Manager saying he's DD one well enough without A levels ext. We all discussed your suguestion of going in and asking them not to give him so many shifts but the manager is really friendly with him and we can't be sure he wouldn't tell dgs. If that happened Ww3 would really break out at home. Let's face it ...he comes of age in February. Legally a man ...though not very mature. He would be furious if he found out his mum or dad had done this
Financially not possible to provide more for him. His mother is sole provider for the household and his grandad and I are already paying for weekly maths tuition which we will keep up as long as he is prepared to do it. He isn't doing much other work but if we stop that it's like us saying . Ok you are leaving the course and that idea is definitely not coming from us. His parents have already talked long and often about the foolishness of giving up A levels for a minimum wage job and have also done the pointing out if he's not in education he will have to pay board ...all to no avail 😱 the truth is that even if we had the money to finance the job .. which we don't ...he has discovered he likes work better than study so don't think he would give up the shifts. His grandad and I are in his house as we speak this morning waiting for him to get up and go to school. Says he doesn't have to be in until 3rd lesson ...though the school is saying that if he doesn't get his act together by Christmas he will have to leave the course ...hense us being here to support him getting in. He has a lot of support. If he stays on after Christmas his grandad and I might make a sacrifice and stretch to paying for a shift or two but we are pensioners and it will be very tight for us. Also he has a lovely 15 year old sister and we are definitely committed to helping her with tuition ext if necessary. She is really well behaved ...as he was until end of GCSE and we are determined she will not lose out because at the moment we are concentrating on him. We are realistic as well as committed. We have told him that when dgd gets into year 11 he will have had his chances and it is her turn now.. All good ideas @PollyPut but we have considered them all and more beside 😭

My parents used to try to make me revise but I'd just nap on my school books. You can only encourage him, threats won't work and the onus is on him whether he does it or not, you can't force him.

I don’t think you are doing him any favours by not setting limits on gaming.

If he’s not a say a fortnight out from mocks then just encourage him to be really up to date with his general work, and help him to make sure it’s organised and ready for him to revise from. So everything dated and filed in date order, all headings in place, any missing notes caught up on, all marking up to date, everything handed in on time. Check he has access to the syllabus for each subject and also to past papers, and knows how to use these.

Then start to make the plan together for revision now. I think that more than a few weeks out from any exam is just too far in advance. Addressing the syllabus itself is more important right now than revision.

This can actually take some pressure off as ‘revision’ can seem a massive, mind-blowing and nebulous task.

Then once this is done, also talk together about how gaming and other school/life activities can fit around the general schoolwork and revision.

I would put some boundaries in around screen time. If he's used to unlimited then reducing to an hour or two would make a big difference, or you could not restrict it but make it dependent on doing his homework etc. first?

Sometime poor mock results can be the best thing , to give him a wake up call

I am quite strict but surely if he has a year and a half to go you are fine to cut him some slack. I feel sorry for children these days with all this pressure to work work work. Many moons ago I worked hard from Easter before GCSEs in the summer and back then that was enough to get top grades. Not looking forward to exam stage.

Agh, I misunderstood, by next year you meant next calendar year not next school year. However my thoughts are still the same. As others say if mocks aren't as good as he was hoping it may be the spur he needs to make him revise later in the year.

I was going to suggest Ross Greene approach too. Don't expect it to work perfectly first time. You may need to have a couple of conversations until he gets it.

I would echo what others have said about gaming- he won't thank you as an adult if he is limited in his prospects and blames his parents for not offering more guidance on making sensible choices. I have a 15.5 year old DS and at the start of year 11 his attitude shifted. My son loves going out, hanging out with friends, parties, in the summer term it was abandonment of studies for the beach but this affected his grades and he acted upon it this term. He is naturally bright, top grade predictions but can be complacent like in the summer. He plays FIFA online but I'm lucky as he likes reading. He also is fairly political and has deleted TikTok as thought it was brain rotting. I think whats helped is seeing where he wants to go so he is een to study Economics at LSE and Maths A level so is motivated by these goals. I think that is tjje key but yes his distraction is socialising which is the world Cup at friend's houses at the moment retty much every night after school for the 4pm matches or park to play football. This is ok as long as he knuckles down after Christmas.

Plus he has a cousin in the same year at one of the top independent schools, he is incredibly competitive and determined to beat or match his grades via the state comprehensive!