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?

@Christmasmorale that's interesting so what would help you then

I think it’s more the lesson that you’re teaching her here, it’s great to support and assist her, encouraging her and helping her to focus is a massive help but doing the work for her shows she can give up and let someone else do it.

Personally I wouldn’t do it but would use whatever she produces today to be the final piece.

Another one coming to say, don't do it. You are doing your daughter no favours by helping by cheating. This could affect her future studies and she could end up being placed at the wrong level for her skills. Help her in other ways by encouraging her to do her best, how to manage emotions when our best doesn't meet a required level, organisation skills, coping strategies when under pressure.

Tracy Emin would be happy with the art from the rubbish bin. It’s art - isn’t it?

My friend at school’s dad did her coursework. All her coursework.

They never got caught. He got her into university and did all her coursework there. But she failed all her exams.

she hasn’t been able to hold down a job as an adult. Her dad is very, very involved in her life (she is in her forties). He does her application forms, get her the interview and sometimes the job. But she can’t cope with not having him there to take all the decisions for her. She was never able to fully manage independence. It’s a weird relationship.

What rest of cheating? I wrote out some time lines that literally came up top on a google search on post it notes so she could write them on to the pages needed, whilst she was doing teh sketches neded. If i left her to it alone she wouldnt have finished the work, but i havent done anything for her until last night, which she doesnt even know about. Her work is all her own at the minute. And as i suspeced, giving her this outline for her to finish is toomuch help, ive already said i wont give it and look for an alternative way of helping her finish.

Its really hard to see your child, who tries her absolute best, get so upset and frustrated over something so minor though, all i want to do is help her and take away some of the stress as its not just one subject, she has the other 8 she needs to start focussing on too. And i kow her, she will not focus on anything else with this drawing not completed.

Rather than realistic portrait can she not look at something more abstract? Or I would get her to do a series of sketches/drawings focused on features of this persons face.

To keep her focussed on the piece couldn't you both do it individually and she submits her piece? Perhaps both of you doing the same task would be less fraught and somewhat enjoyable as you could encourage each other.

There are many step by step tutorials online. Would this help? It would break it down for her. Agree with previous posters, it’s best if it’s her own work.

She has other abstract images, and pop art style, etc included. Which is why i dont think this realistic drawing is essential, but she wont have it, the teachers word is gospel in this situation.

Crazy. Talk about setting her up to fail.

All her college options are science/maths based. Her art result is no way going to effect her future, she only picked it as she didnt want to do the others in the option block, though she has ended up enjoying it until now.

There’s a lot of people who are talking about letting their kid learn about consequences and letting them fail, but I don’t think they realize that a lot of adhd kids start off assuming that they will fail, because they are so used to falling. So the only thing they learn by failing again is that it was pointless to even try in the first place.
I have taken my daughter out of mainstream school and put her in a vocational college doing something fun and low impact just so she gets used to what it feels like to not fail.

Ill have a look for some guides or methods to learn to draw faces if we cant figure out the tracing, thank you.

You don't need to trace!!!! Google graphite transfer

You’ve crossed the line with the amount of support. I’m well aware how hard it is but this isn’t helping.

If i left her to it alone she wouldnt have finished the work, but i havent done anything for her until last night, which she doesnt even know about. Her work is all her own at the minute

Start by believing in her first. Have faith in her ability to work it out for herself. And if she fails, then you can talk through what went wrong for next time.

As someone with ADHD, my parents’ belief in my ability and their lack of interference in my studies, except when I reached out for help (usually at 11 night before an exam), was the best thing they did for me during my GCSEs and a levels. They never told me off for leaving things so last minute (as they knew what I was like), but gave me encouragement and focus to what I could get done in the time I had left.

I can see why but I think you've got completely lost in the detail and need to take a break from helping her and think about the bigger picture. You doing her work is absolutely pointless. So is micromanaging it all for her. She'll lose confidence this way.

I can’t believe you’ve been helping her as much as you have tbh. When she wakes up it should be totally up to her whether she does this portrait or not, and how she goes about it. Even your “encouragement” and advice around tracing options are too much help. These are the skills we learn as young people going through the education system, as much as the subject knowledge itself. She’s going to be totally useless in a work environment if she’s being hand held to this extent. Maybe you need to be less perfectionist and she won’t get so anxious about things. Judging her portrait as less good than the one you did. Let her be a bit crap and fail in this subject and let that be ok.

Why can’t she do that? You’re still interfering. Let her work out what she needs to get this finishing.

The image she has is on a screen, we dont have a printer, i need to get it off the screen first, but the paper i have is too thick to see even with the brightness/contrast turned up. Im going to see if she will go to town and grab some stuff first, as i cannot walk properly at the minute, which is a whole differenty thread, but me taking her isnt an option. If that fails, i can ask her to see if any of her local friends have any trace paper or a printer and wouldnt mind printing it off for her.

It must be really hard when you just want to help your child op. You wont be around for ever though, and she needs to do things herself, please dont teach her that cheating is the way to achieve things.

Art GCSE isn’t just about your artistic skill, it’s about your ability to reflect on you work and to use it to plan your direction. It won’t matter if the portrait she’s drawn is awful, it may even gain her marks if she includes a reflection to say she knows that her portrait isn’t realistic in the way that the original is and that she has decided to go down the abstract route but keep some of the key aspects of the portrait such as colours, ratios or shapes.

Also if she’s struggling to draw the portrait has she tried the method where you draw a grid over the original and then break drawing the picture down into those individual squares? She’d just need a ruler and a light pencil so may be easier than tracing if you have no suitable paper. Breaking the photo into squares and focusing on copying each section as a stand alone area can help with getting ratios and proportions right, if she can’t get her face to look realistic that might be why? It can also help to turn the original upside down and copy it that way as the brain is then less likely to try and draw based on what it thinks a face looks like, rather than what it can see, and more likely to draw what is actually there. I have adhd and both of those techniques helped me when I did my art gcse.

So much ‘I’ and ‘we’ in this. It’s not your coursework it’s your daughters!! Just back off, you must be completely stressing her out at the minute. I’m stressed for her - you seem to be making this really hard and adding levels of complexity that she may not have added herself to the project if you hadn’t got so involved.

Its becausing of cheating that many GCSEs have no coursework now and many students with SEN have extra stress in more exams.