To do my daughters GCSE course work?

[LolaLouise]

My daughter is adhd diagnosed, probable autism which she is still on a waiting list for years after the referral was submitted, she gets frustrated and gives up quickly, she tries, she really does, but sometimes gets overwhelmed and cant continue a task.

Her art GCSE course work is due in this week, she was very behind. I have spent all last weekend and this weekend helping her get it done. Up until now its been sitting and encouraging her, ive done some of the research whilst shes been doing the sketches needed, and then shes re-written it out, suggestions of sketches she could do, and cutting it all out so she can place everything into her book, helping her with layouts and ordering, but mostly just keeping her on track and focussed in 2 hour windows. There was one piece of art required for it to be done, she tried, for hours, yesterday to do it, but she got so frustrated and couldnt do it, its a portrait of a person. She ended up getting quite upset with the drawing and the looming deadline. This isnt the first time she has attempted it, shes been trying to draw it for weeks, but i put it to one side as she was hyperfixated on it, and in order to get everything else done, i took it off the table and said we would do that last. The sketch is needed as her final piece was based around this portrait, though her final piece was just shapes no details. The teacher has told her she absolutly must include this portrait in her project. Her final exam has already been sat so she cant just change the direction of the project now.

So ive drawn it, its not great, i can draw a bit but not even close to being skilled, but its better than what she was able to produce. She doesnt know ive drawn it last night. Ive started the shading to block out the main shadows, but it needs finishing, which she can do in the same way she has shaded all her other work, it looks vaguely like the person its supposed to be if you squint a little bit. We are going to try again today, ive even suggested to her tracing the facial structure today if we can figure a way to do it as we have no thin paper left to trace with, just really thick watercolour paper and card left. But it needs finishing today to hand in tomorrow. Then we can focus on her other much needed revision.

Her college plans do not include something even close to art related, its one drawing in amongst probably 100 others over the 2 years of project work, in the grand scheme of things i dont think it will make a difference to her grade, but her teacher has said it has to be included, so she is building it up to be the most important thing ever. I just want to help her, and ease some of her stress. Would you give her the drawing and help her finish it? Or is it too much help? Ive convinced myself if she does the shading then its no different to having traced the initial drawing, which is perfectly acceptable in her work, we just dont have the access to do that easily today. Do we try the tracing first and it that goes wrong then i just give her this one to shade over? theres a chance she has tried tracing in school on the lightboxes and they have been discarded already, as i know she traced other images.

How much help is too much, considering her SEN, but also that this is GCSE work?

Yes, supporting your child with SEN is intense and exhausting and when you're putting in so much effort it's easy to get to a point where you're so fixed on getting the child through this one exam right now that you cross a line and forget the longer term effect on her. Doing too much is making her dependent on you and unsure of her own abilities. Short term comfort, long term pain.

The most important thing you can do for DD is to let her submit all her own work and all the work she has done. That's even more important than pass or fail.

Have you ever dealt with autism/adhd in teenagers?

Yes 😀And in university students. Students whose parents do too much for them have a tough time later. It's a difficult balance and as a parent I wouldn't say I always got it right myself - it's easy to get caught up in our child's hyperfocus!

If she hasn't done a big drawing, well they'll have to mark the drawings she has done. As a pp has said she wont be the only one. And in my experience of marking just in handing in something - anything! - gets you a few marks. Maybe see if she'll put a couple of lines on a big piece of paper and tell her it'll do to hand in. And with any luck it'll get her over the hump and she'll do a bit more for herself. But if not, never mind.

Then as a parent rather than doing her work - something that you cannot facilitate life long - you should be teaching her regulation strategies instead. Helping her walk away etc.

This is enabling craziness. You are practically doing her work for her. The assessment is supposed to be of what your child can do, not her parent. You have micromanaged ALL of her coursework , and now even have her tracing your work to include as her final piece.
If she can’t do it, she can’t do it, and her grade will reflect that. It’s not the end of the world.
You continue like this and you’re going to end up doing her Y13 exams too. None of her achievements will feel like her own, and it’s catastrophic for self esteem.
Stop it. Please.

What she needs is reassurance that it doesn't matter. Because let's be honest, it really really doesn't matter. She could withdraw from the whole art gcse and it wouldn't make a jot of difference to her future.

You scrambling around to do as much of it for her, that you can plausibly get away with, is teaching her that 1) "this really, really matters! This is crucial! Panicking is justified!" 2) "You can't do it yourself because you have adhd, you poor thing, you need my help, you are helpless."

Teach her to shrug it off. You are doing the opposite, you're feeding her anxiety about it.

You aren’t helping.

OP, i know how pushy art teachers can be. I point blank TOLD my DD's Art Teacher when i was getting email after email about something DD was struggling with due to her ADHD that unless she actually wanted me to write it for her, it wasn't getting done, so they needed to pull their own fingers out and help her.

It may be the tack you need to take with her teacher.

Im not doing her bloody exams, and she had done atleast 40 pages prior to asking me to help her finish it off. Again, you do you, shes a kid, shes stressed, shes asking me to help,nothing has been done by me as she isnt using the one i drew, which in all honesty looking at it again this morning is shit, im not about to say no toddle off and do it yourself if you fail you fail your fault for not trying hard enough (or asking for help when you need it which is something i have encouraged) to my child.

Really can’t see the point of this thread. You’ve decided exactly what you’re going to do and are justifying going beyond support and actually doing tasks/ parts of tasks for her. Presumably you’re also going to encourage her to sign the document confirming the work is entirely her own.

cool. Your decision. I preferred to support not do the work for my Neuro divergent child. I feel it’s preferable to model honesty and to foster resilience and acceptance, not easy with a child who gets overwhelmed and has meltdowns but better to learn this lesson in a safe environment at home, with a loving parent, than when they’re out in the big wide world of university or work.

But as I say, if you’ve decided what you’re going to do for your daughter’s work, there’s little point in continuing the thread

How? I literally said on like page one the posters were right and havent given her the sketch to use

no toddle off and do it yourself if you fail you fail your fault for not trying hard enough

She's not going to fail if she doesn't do this one drawing...!

I can see why she's catastrophising though when you have that attitude

You have already decided that it is OK to do this bit for her.
I'm not sure why you asked

i already agreed NOT TO GIVE HER TO SODDING SKETCH

The exam is part of the mark. Not the entire mark.

Just give it to her @LolaLouise . It's a bloody drawing. I have done plenty for my children and most parents I know have as well. I did most of my younger brother's work and he's a doctor today. He had MH problems when younger so I helped him out. Obviously he's bright and has worked his butt of since med school.

I think you should give her the sketch.
But make it clear it is a one off , she may very well be struggling and in need of your help.

Blimey - you really don’t need to stress out so much. It’s one little sketch, just give it to her. Everybody cheats in these exams. I know people whose parents have literally made their puppets/model houses etc. for inclusion in coursework. I know people who’ve rewritten university level essays for their kids! It’s not right, but everyone’s at it I promise you.

Blimey. Students can get a GCSE in English Lit without being able to read the book??

But you said more recently you drew a grid over your own sketch for her to copy. And if she doesn't want that, you will let her trace your sketch.

That isn't making her own art.

It's not about whether it's "cheating". It's about crushing her self esteem. She knows you think she is helpless due to her adhd.

But actually, some of the most successful people have adhd. She's not helpless.

I think the grid idea is the best method for her. Give her 2 hours to work on the drawing, no restarting the drawing every time it doesn’t look right. Then whatever is completed in that time is what she submits. If it doesn’t look accurate, who cares. You’ve already said it’s one drawing amongst many, it won’t impact her score that much and she doesn’t want to do anything related to art in college anyway. It’s not that important, just a tick boxing exercise. Then once it’s done, head out and do something fun, take her mind off it.
Like others have said, submitting your drawing is cheating. I understand wanting to take the stress away from her, but if my mum did that for me after I had done many attempts already, it would reaffirm that they don’t think my work is good enough.

I wouldn’t. As she goes to higher level education the deadlines and coursework load is only going to increase and GCSE’s help prepare you for pushing through when you’re not motivated and finding the tasks difficult. It’s setting her up to rely on you to help out. Missing a piece isn’t going to be the end of the world if she can’t manage it herself.

Far fom it. There is a huge difference between feeling worried and an anxiety disorder. My older DS has struggled with anxiety for years, and has self-harmed himself. Unless you live with some who harms himself so hard, there is blood on the wall, please don't give me a spiel about everyone having some level of anxiety.

Hang on - art teachers on this post have suggested light boxes, methods of tracing, etc etc. I gave her this with a grid, if that doesnt work, to get tracing paper to trace it off a screen, i didnt say trace the sketch i had done. But even so, even if i had, how is tracing off a screen of the photo NOT cheating, but traciing of a shit sktech i have done cheating? either way its tracing, which is either considered ok, or not. It cant be both.

No. Don’t submit it.

put the original portrait - copy of the artwork or the photograph of the portrait in the coursework.

AND all the failed attempts. Get her to write a few sentences on why these failed - even lack of skill OR confidence , and what worked as the absolute minimum. Being able to analyse her work is important.

if you have time

get her to focus on drawing parts of the portrait eg
-eyes
-nose
-chin
as separate 5/10 min exercises this will help her focus and cut the time she’s in ‘overwhelm’ with it. Serious. Time it. Don’t Labour over this. The quicker the better IME

brief explanation for her to write she was struggling with the overall portrait and broke it down to remove fear/overwhelm/focus on strengths or weaknesses whatever fits for her.

from those mini exercises assemble the portrait. Just get her to copy the sketches she’s done.

submit the whole lot.
fingers crossed

I have actually said that to DD a couple of times.

It's not that you're helping that is getting people's backs up, its the kind of help you're giving.

I get it, she has ADHD/ASD.. so does my DD.. so do i.. and honestly, from my perspective, 'help' sometimes has to be 'no i'm not doing it for you' because they do need to learn to do it themselves, teaching them that you'll always dive in last minute to save the day, fails to teach them that there are consequences for not pulling their fingers out.

There is also teaching them that sometimes work you CANNOT do, doesn't get done, and that it isn't the end of the world.

As i said, in this instance the help she needs is your support and guidance, not doing it for her. ONE drawing missing from her coursework is not going to make/break her passing 4/5 in this instance.

I know where you are at. I have a similar dd here stressing over an art project.

Some suggestions...
There are some art programs online that she can scan the image and change it to a line drawing/sketch/ etc... she will likely know of them. If a sketch is what's demanded could she use one of these? It's clearly computer generated but a sketch.

Put a grid over the image and use a transformations technique (she'll use it in maths) to get an outline.

If yours is just an outline to get her started I'd give it her she can use it, copy it, whatever it's not ideal but her other revision is more important at this point.