To stop doing homework with stepdaughter?

[EllaVader]

I’m 50, DH is too and SD is 10 and in year 5. We’ve been together 5 years. As I have two grown up daughters who did very well academically, used to be a primary teacher, and DH is Finnish and went through a completely different school system in which he specialised in a trade rather than academia, I’ve always done homework with her.

This used to be a fun bonding experience years ago. However now the hormones are kicking in, the work is harder, and she’s giving me a lot of sass and dragging everything out. We have her EOWE and her mum doesn’t believe in homework so she does nothing there and is a consequence, not meeting expectations. She’s in regular trouble for poor discipline at school, and is on track to fail her SATS next year unless she knuckles down, which she’s refusing to. I work a stressful job and spent four hours of my weekend trying to coax her through what should have taken an hour.

AIBU to say this isn’t my responsibility anymore?

Sounds like she's crying out for her father to spend more time with her.

If you can continue to be a positive and consistent influence in her life, and help improve her educational outcomes, I think it’s worth it to keep trying.

Is it a focus issue? Is there something else going on? I ask because I used to get frustrated with DD16 when she was around year 5, two years it took me to work out she had AuDHD….girls often present differently than boys.

This. Just stop. It is admirable that you want you mr SD to have the same experiences as your own DDs. But it’s not working.

Step back and simply tell your SD “If you need help with your homework, just let me know. I’m happy to help you but only if you want me to”.

I'm very academically focused and identify with your worries - but she's your SD and you only see her EOW. I would worry that focusing on homework (when her parents don't) might drive a wedge between you, especially at this age. Focus on having fun and a good relationship, that's my advice.That will also support her more through adolescence and beyond.

I've said YANBU to not do the homework but making the poor girl do 4 hours of homework at the weekend is fairly awful. Does she have ADHD? My ds is bright and academic and scored highly in SATS (though that's for the schools benefit, not his) but will stonewall and take ages to do work if he doesn't want to do it.

Both my ds are in selective grammar school and they aren't as studious or as hard working as I was at the same age. I try not to let it get me down.

On the career front I think you are putting too much store in academics to get you anywhere in today's workplace. Practical skills that AI can't do will take precedence.

I don't agree with this. SD could find it useful but OP has tried so she's not wrong to stand back and hopefully this stage will pass.

Leave her to dh. He can deal with the inevitable school meetings when she is doing badly..

Sadly for the child her mother doesn't care about this so let the mother bear the consequences. When the child takes her mother's negligent attitude into High School and she is anticipating poor results with no decent career prospects, maybe her mother will take her responsibilities as a parent seriously. More likely she will try to off-load it onto others.

Stop doing homework. It’s not needed and she knows it’s ‘homework’ so will refuse.

If you want to help her, you need to trick her into learning/experiencing things. Take her to exhibitions. The new ‘maths museum’ thing in London (and just let her look around rather than try to ‘teach’ her anything). Watch documentaries like walking with dinosaurs or inside planet Earth. Put together models of ships. go to the space museum near Leicester. Measure out baking ingredients together - let her find new recipes to try.

nb. Clearly some of these ideas depend on where you live and transport.

But stay away from the homework.

Maybe she wants her mother to care more about her as she is with her the majority of the time.

These are nice ideas, but the child would probably rather do them with her father, who she's there to visit and who seemingly isn't bothered, sadly.

I believe you mean well but you do seem to have written her off, she's not even at high school yet and you're talking about her not having the same opportunities or career as your own daughters, that's madness. So much could change over the coming years.

Just focus on having a good relationship with her so you can help her when she's ready to accept it.

Sure, Finnish education system is different but subjects are not different between countries. If he went to trades school from 16-18yo, he should still he able to handle 10yo homework if he wanted. So basically the child's parents don't care. If they don't care and she's giving attitude, there is no reason for you to step up.

What does her father say? Why is he not getting down in the trenches on homework?

She isn't genetically linked to your daughters and you say your husband wasn't academic, so sounds like she is more like him. Homework won't determine her ability in life, especially when she spends 5 hours in school classes every day. Hand all of this over to your husband, who seems to be making excuses.

What is "failing" SATS anyway?

You're within your rights to say no, of course. It is literally not your job. But you could have a hugely positive influence on her life by sticking with it, by being the adult who shows up for her. Tweens are tricky, teens are trickier, and often helping them out requires battling through some resistance and sass.

I am a bit on the fence though given it's only SATS and she is still at primary school. They do enough endless sats papers in school, they shouldn't need endless homework on top. There is an argument for easing off a bit for now, and stepping up again once she is at secondary school instead. Having an adult who is interested in her doing well and believes in her can really influence what she becomes capable of, and ultimately what choices she has available later on.

Her mother is a bloody ungrateful chancer. Not your monkeys not your circus. Use your weekends as you time.

I voted YABU because you don't stop doing the right thing when it comes to parenting because it's hard, and I don't think it's right to adopt the stance that her bio mum doesn't give af about homework, you only have her every other weekend, so why should you?

The girl is struggling at school, she's getting into trouble, you used to be a teacher and your husband's academic background and current experience mean that you are infinitely better qualified to help her than he is, and you're clearly better placed than her bio mum by virtue of actually caring.

One of the grown adults in her life has to care enough about this child's future to invest in it.

I wouldn't be happy about doing it, it sounds like a total ballache - but if not you, then who? She's a kid.

Your husband needs to be doing everything he can to improve her attitude towards it and get it down to a manageable number of hours.

I'm with her mum btw in that homework at primary is a soul-destroying waste of time. Still did it with my son though, because he's not one of life's academically gifted souls that will just fly through regardless. He actually needed the extra input.

Even if your husband is from Finland and went to a trade school, he can still help his 10-year old daughter with her homework.

I would leave it up to her parents tbh - they don't seem to be bothered, so there's no need or point in you to tying yourself in knots trying to instil your beliefs and values into her. If you don't stop it now, things will only get harder once she's in yr7 and homework is compulsory. Let her dad parent her, when it goes to crap in a couple of years, her parents will have to fix it. Perhaps she just isn't academic, so forcing her to be like your daughters is not going to help you to bond - it will be the opposite in fact.

And in the middle of this is a child that suffers and doesn't reach its full potential.

I am the daughter of a step-dad, and my husband is step-dad to my son.

None of my parents were great, but my step-dad is definitely the best of a bad bunch, the one that I have the most positive memories of and definitely the one that did most with me.

If my husband was better able to help my son with something and just didn't because it's not his job, I'd be really disappointed.

The attitude of people towards step-parents on this board consistently baffles me.

What does your dh say? If he thinks you’re amazing for putting that work into sd then I’d talk to him. If he thinks you must love it because why else do homework with a child and wouldn’t make any effort himself to get her to do homework then you’re on a hiding to nothing, tell him it’s up to him from now on if he wants his daughter to do well, he’s going to need to do approx 1000x the effort he’s put in so far. (You do not need to have gone to university /high school yourself to value it for your children)

No it isn't your responsibility. Her parents should club together for a tutor. Though frankly the mum sounds like she's actively discouraging her daughter from succeeding academically so I don't know if she'd go for such things.

But either way she needs to know it's down to her own discipline and attention span if she will learn. And you can't force it into her brain.

She can still have options, opportunities and choices, but she isn't your daughter. She has parents who appear to have different ideas and aspirations for her.