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?

The point is if the mother doesnt bother with the homework, the dad doesnt bother helping her, step mom suddenly stops doing homework with her now her age is making things difficult then what chance does this child have with no one willing to guide her on the right path dhe is destined to be in the lowest sets at high school following the failure of sats
What have the school.said.about this? My 10 year old has just gone into year 5 and if there are any children who need extra help they are given extra classes after school closer to sats

She said that SD is uninterested in anything she has to work at. Not hugely unusual for a child of that age, but it doesn't bode well for adulthood if it's not outgrown. If you're reading projection into it, that's your issues, not hers.

Sounds like she's given up. This is not a happy child. What would you do if this was your bio-daughters, or a student? Someone needs to care, I think but I can appreciate the attitude being a difficult situation - Currently there with my eldest and youngest daughter's. Makes you want to bounce your head off of a wall, but you know through perseverance they'll actually get somewhere with their academics. I'm afraid this is a whole different ball game you might have to battle compared to your daughter's.

Mum doesn't seem to care, Dad needs to pull his weight, Mum should be reported to the school for the sake of the child's future wellbeing...?

Maybe tough it out a little longer, make the learning outdoors and fun with some motivation and incentive, show her someone cares and loves her.

Keep doing what you are doing cos she's showing behaviour that indicates she is troubled in some way. Try seeing yourself as a homework table buddy rather than helper with homework (unless she asks). Her sass may be cos her mum is sad and etc etc. It's never just sass is it? To stop now is unreasonable only because you've set a lovely standard of helpful interested stepmum, and if she is showing disruption at school, any sudden change could have a dispiriting effect. But maybe ask if she is ok? You could also convey openness to critiquing the whole homework treadmill and reassured her about all the ways humans can be amazing not just academic. CF Chomsky's brief amazing little talk on what education is for (or should be) and how non academic people can be and are intelligent and it is a false distinction. She will appreciate your decent behaviour when she looks back, I'm sure, one day. Google ways to respond to her type of sass in calm way and don't forget to take her out to her fave cafe or maccy ds to reward her for all her hard work. Ten is an age she should be enjoying friendships. Always remember to express admiration for her mum's radical ways etc. keep up the connection, feign deafness if u have to cos at ten she should not be acting out like this and she will confidebif you keep your hand steady on the tiller. U r woman and she girl so she may not approach her dad and the orob may be with, eg, her mum having an upcoming second husband or just about anything as I'm sure you can realize. Well done to you I say. It's lovely when step mums are nice to their step daughters. And vital.

We always talked about the ripple effect. So let her work through mentally the ripple effect of falling behind now. Ask her the questions and let her draw her own conclusions. Then say ok so now you can see that working in a supermarket or whatever is a natural conclusion or not making an effort now. The lack of effort will be cumulative.

This is def a dh area and let him take over.

I feel your pain though. My own kids throw a strop or mess abut for an hour for literally something that would have taken 20mins if they just did it.

I wonder if you stick with it (and you have absolutely no obligation to do so) that she will thank you when she’s older and wiser. There’s a saying that goes something like “love me the most when I deserve it the least”.

A lot of this behaviour sounds very familiar, and my child has ALN/SEND.

Can your husband get her assesed privately? Primary schools are often terrible at identifying ALN in kids who mask - teachers are simply not aequately trained to spot it. The wheels often come off for these kids in Y8 or Y9, by which time it is nearly impossible to get support in place fast enough to have a good chance at GCSEs. Encourage your DH to act now. Simply trying to force the child to do the homework without adapting your strategies is not going to make the situation better, or improve the child's skills or self-esteem.

U mentioned hormones and behaviour so for peace of mind could u or mum or dad take girl to GP and ask for a checkup. They probably could refer her to a nurse who could help her with her general health and development changes. Hope this helps. They could run simple checks that won't her, and it will establish a neutral person for her to approach should she feel she needs that bit of extra privacy and u can always talk to doc afterwards.(Or dad or mum) Good wishes.if a mental disorder is a factor you have done your utmost at first signs not wait, wait, wait.

I think part of the problem is that you are trying to shove a square peg into a round hole.

Had you been my step mother, I would have gladly taken you up on your offer to assist me with my school studies. But then I have always had that academic curiosity.

Either your step daughter does not, or there is something else there impeding her learning (her relationship with her mother, perhaps?).

As the saying goes, “You can take a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink.” Until such time as your step daughter is receptive to learning, you will be wasting your breath.

I feel the key to this situation is to discover just why she is recalcitrant. That is a knot for her father to cut; meanwhile, remain genial and receptive should she wish to re-engage.

I would get dad to offer an incentive, eg £10 pocket money at the end of her EOW if the last 2 weeks homework was complete, £5 if one weeks was.
And then be on hand to help, but don't push it.
She needs to become motivated to do it herself before secondary, and this is the best point to build that motivation and routine before teen years.

Frame everything in a positive way - eg "let me know if you want any help with hard parts of the homework, once you're done do you want to go to the toy shop to spend the money or are you saving up for something with it" etc. Get her focused on the reward, at this age immediately rewards hold a lot more weight than trying to understand the ultimate reward of good grades.

Yanbu and should stop. If she's not getting a work ethic from her parents she's not going to get it from you. It's actually fine if she fails SATs - and it's better for her to get her "real" result even if that is low. It doesn't affect her long term life but if she starts secondary school with a low SATs score then that school knows she's going to need extra help and motivation to get her through to acceptable GCSE results whereas if you push her to do better the secondary school will think she doesn't need anything extra from them.

Not sure why you are so unpleasant ?

I feel sad for her, her parents not being bothered even though she's not doing well. If it was your own child, you wouldn't give up on her so even though it's not your responsibility I'd still try and continue supporting her. Dad should also be involved though, he should not just leave it all to you.

If it's causing arguments and bad feeling I can't see what good you're doing.

As an (ex?) teacher you're surely aware that there is little academic value in homework at that age?

Surely her father's education sufficient to help a 10-year-old.

Sounds very like my eldest child who was diagnosed with inattentive ADHD aged 11 & dyspraxia aged 12. The harder the work got the less they were able to focus, it was really becoming a problem. you need to stop comparing to your own children & accept that she might never be like them.
4 hours of homework at the weekend is excessive though. Homework at that age should be no more than 40 mins per day. If the focus is gone & she’s fighting you, you’re gaining nothing by making her continue for longer.

I would say to her that now she’s 10 she’s old enough to sort out her own homework, however if she has any questions or needs any help you’re more than happy to help her.

children do need to learn the consequences of not doing the work, and parents who take on the responsibility don’t help with the child’s self discipline

You obviously care for your dsd and you feel frustrated with her and her parents who aren’t investing energy in maintaining her good attitude to work.

Personally I would not give up on her but I’d take a huge step back and make sure dh tells her mum that you are not able to help dsd because she’s unwilling to learn and it’s just making the short time she has with her dad really miserable.

The poor kid really needs to spend that weekend time with her dad, not stuck at a desk with her step mum. It doesn’t take a primary school teacher to do homework with a ten year old - the work isn’t difficult -so why doesn’t her dad do it?

Then you could take the role of fun step mum instead of being the miserable old witch who forces her to do the schoolwork her parents don’t place any value on.

Seriously, who the hell cares about SATs apart from the school. Neither of my children took them and they are both flourishing in their chosen careers. They also never did any homework or took any kind of exam until they were 14.

I should add they were autonomously home educated for 8 years. When they returned to school at 14 they were the one of the few students who could research and learn subjects willingly because they weren’t used to being spoon fed information.

This is wise. Her EOW need to be about quality time with her dad, not you. They shouldn't be solely fun, but HE needs to be the one doing the parenting and insisting she spends 45 mins on her homework before the fun thing happens, not you.

At that age homework should always be time-limited. If it's supposed to take 30 minutes then 30 minutes is all she should do, and if that only gets a quarter of it done then so be it - if the school set 30 minutes homework and you force her to do it across 4 hours then the school don't get to see the alarm bells that she needs more help.

Exactly this. Read the hundreds of threads how SP have moved heaven and earth to be given a slap in the face.

Is she really your step daughter though if she is only with you alternate weekends? If you saw her as a daughter I think you would continue but she is maybe no more than your boyfriends child?

And what about the poor child?

Having no children, grandchildren, nephews or nieces, I only know what happened in my schooldays in the 1960s in the UK. We had homework from age 8 through to 18 but the intention wss that the teacher would teach the subject, set the homework and tgen collect it in and mark it. There was never any role for parents in this process at all and it would have been counter-productive as any instruction from the parent might be wrong and any involvement in the work produced would surely give the teacher a false impression of the progress being made by the pupil. I do not understand how modern school homework is supposed to operate.