Wwyd - keep helping or are there different educational options.

[itsnotenoff]

Bright, emotionally young, some ADD/ focus issues, 14y totally disengaged and needs to be dragged through school and starting to hate us for it. Getting to the point where GCSEs will need total parental engagement with modern demands (in our day you just failed if you couldn’t do it alone but this seems last resort / unusual in educationally engaged families now). So, one question is whether needing / getting lots of help is unusual (get the feeling parental help is more common but few own up to it)? Also feeling a different educational set up would be good - but what? But not home school DS loves friends and sport. Are there any schools that cater for these kids (private or state) eg fewer GCSEs but motivational and nurturing?

There are schools that would suit your DS but you will need to give a rough geographical area unless you are looking at moving or boarding.

Lots of kids do get large amounts of parental help or otherwise are sufficiently bright that they scrape through just passing even when they could do much, much more. But it depends on what level of parental help you are talking about - parents absolutely should not be doing any coursework or marked homework (or any homework really) for their children but I think it is increasingly common for parents of struggling children to either hire a tutor or essentially be a tutor for their children.

Obviously this is not as good as finding a way to engage the kid to learn on their own, especially if A-levels and higher education are the goal. The right school for the right child can go a long way towards this.

I'm going to start by assuming that A levels are not the end goal, so start by working backwards. What course for 6th form? What would be the entry requirements?

I think you probably will need engagement to help pull through GCSEs, but if you know entry requirements you can be selective in your efforts, ie push on the key subjects to get required grades and quietly ignore others.

Are you y9 so not yet chosen GCSEs or y10 already started?
How much does existing (private? state?) school recognise his SEN? have you enquired of them about their level of flexibility?