Could work ethic be the one thing schools could teach to really change results

[gofigure5]

Sometimes when looking at my DC and talking to other parents who lament the lack of work ethic/drive (for academics) in their children too, it seems a topic that comes up very frequently.

I should add that these kids are all at an academic (independent) school and and did very well in primary and went on to have grammar school offers so they certainly have the potential to achieving highly.

Issue is, they still, at 15/16/18, tend to procrastinate and be very uneven in their application towards study.

At home we talk about the importance of effort. I do get frustrated when I see they only put in the bare minimum. DC have class mates who are super bright and don't do much work (or at least they say they don't) but most of the others are not necessarily brighter than them at all but they do seem to put an enormous amount of effort and hours into their work and so reap the benefits.

My DC's school, and I suppose many schools, teach study/revision skills and talk about the importance of setting out what to do, time tabling and using past papers.

But when I look at the common denominator amongst my friends and our children who seem not to be reaching their potential, it's this lack of drive/work ethic (and instead their procrastination) that seems to be what sets them apart from those who are successful.

We have noticed that, generally speaking, children of teachers ALL seem to work consistently hard and get great results (even those who are 'average'. Teacher kids are clearly not all naturally super bright; some are, some are not, as would be expected amongst all groups, but there seems to be this ingredient which means they work consistently hard with a steely drive and work ethic).

Both my DH and I are driven, our kids see us work hard, help others and volunteering in sports/the community and we always frame things in terms of working hard rather than talking about 'intelligence'. At times we do discuss results (and might ask what was achieved v the class average score) which I guess is a no-no.

Would love to know if there are schools out there that actively teach working hard/drive/work ethic (and, if so, how do they do it) AND what teacher parents/grandparents do that seems to produce such hard working children who go on to do so well.

@TheaBrandt That’s great for your DH but few reality deprived DC get anywhere near Cambridge. Even now. There’s plenty with well educated parents that do who don’t necessarily make much money. They are different though.

I didn’t have a cushy life. But I’m not clever. My dad actually left school at 14. My DDs had a lovely life. They still worked though. Both wanted good careers and have them. They might have not pushed themselves all the time but that’s often a boring person who needs to do that. There’s something to be said for being a rounded person too!

I think background makes some difference but why do some dc with a cushy life (as you put it) do better than those who don’t? Might it actually be that brains and application do matter as well. I worked hard to get a good job but all the effort in the world wouldn’t get me to Cambridge! Snd I know what being poor looks like.

Not “reality”. Really deprived..

I think work ethic is a balance of a lot of things and some luck
You need a stable home life where you aren't worrying about family members etc
You need to be shown results of hard work (role models)
You need to be mentally well and fit - vitamin deficiencies rife in UK
You need to have the opportunity to find something you excel at
You need to be praised when you are doing well to reinforce the good behaviour

It's not as easy as some parents think, largely because things that come with stability (money for eg) are not something they've had to do without so it becomes hard to see why some kids just don't seem to "care".

In essence, a good work ethic comes down to discipline. This can be fostered by expecting kids to do chores regularly.
So many people are scared of hard work and wouldn't expect their kids to do anything beyond what is expected. Even doing school homework is often left to the school to manage and parents don't get involved.
As for using the holidays to catch up or get ahead, many parents are horrified by any suggestion of extra work.

Did you know you can now edit posts within I think it is 10 mins? So if you notice you’ve made an error you can click the three dots on the right and edit - as I’ve done here

Not so sure that working hard is necessarily a good thing. Working, yes but surely the skill is doing the minimum you need to get the results you want? I know dc who've worked too hard for gcses, burnt out and didn't get the grades they'd wanted.

Exactly - burning out because of pushy parenting will have a very opposite effect. I have seen a dad shouting at his kid in the pool because she was too busy drowning to "use her fucking arms properly". If your kid does sports you get a sometimes terrible insight into some parent's minds.

Some people enjoy working hard though. I do! DS2 does! It's part of my identity and gives me pleasure. I don't mean overworking , working long hours etc - that's different and often not what is really the best version of 'working hard'.

If you want your kids to develop these habits you need to supervise and insist. Most parents don't especially in secondary. They allow their kids to hand in rubbish work or make excuses for them. Unless you have a naturally conscientious child then your kids fall behind or don't achieve what they should.

My son would like those last posts - he always worked just before exams and did very well - he had it down to a fine art. It was quite worrying to watch at times - even in his very last law exams - working to the early hours but then pulled it off at the last minute (probably more common for boys than girls).

I don't think parents should worry that some parents do things different from how they do. We all have different views on these issues. My children did not have chores at home to do but that has not stopped them getting on with life, doing cleaning at university when renting (one was the only boy in the house putting the rubbish out each week , not something he had ever done at home and all his life to that point we had had a housekeeper/cleaner at first 5 mornings a week and then 3). However I agree it is a good idea children see what other types of work than professional jobs are like - eg my son had a summer job once which involved some hotel cleaning, another child did a hospitality job etc, another worked holidays in holiday camps abroad. I did lots of work first cleaning and once I had done a course looking after children on holiday camps in the UK starting just before university and continuing even when I was doing my post grad year.

I should add that I have some students who have yet to hand in a piece of homework this year despite repeated reminders, offers of help and emails to parents to let them know their kids are not doing homework.

Back to the OP of why is it teachers children who seem to do so well I have a bit of a theory.

I am an ex teacher. So we're my parents. Myself and my siblings did well at school and well behaved etc. My two kids are both in selective state grammar schools and on track to do the same. Both are self driven (boy came to it later!).

I think some of it is seeing how hard teachers work at home to help them. I think kids are innately 99.99% good people. When they see how hard someone works for other people's kids up til 11pm and beyond marking, prepping etc they gain a bit of appreciation for their own teachers and therefore apply themselves differently to maybe other kids who don't see the back story.

There may also be a part of not wanting to be the disappointment kid or the naughty one etc.

It also helps that as a parent teacher you're a genuine expert in at least one subject and revision. Even my slightly intransigent 15yo will come to me for help with my subject and because I know how to help him revise effectively.

I also know from experience with many kids you have to let them make some mistakes and work things out in their own time. Painful as it might be, and frustrating it serves your own kids to do this just as well as it does the ones in the classroom to learn a few life lessons and discover that relying on innate intelligence doesn't work past a point etc.

Some parents never let their kids make mistakes and that's why they're anxious/not so resilient. Teachers might be a bit wiser about kids having to build resilience and knowing his to let them make their mistakes and know which are the battles to pick.

I think you’re focussing too much on the “teacher” aspect and not enough on the “engaged parent” aspect.

Praise, engagement, 1-2-1 attention and involvement from a parent carries a special weight with children.

Trained teachers will be able to offer those things to their children in an informed way of course. Then there is also modelling that behaviour in the home.

But it’s the emotional connection to the parent that is the real vector.

Trying to teach that in a formal setting in larger groups is going to be a very different thing.

I think partly it’s innate, DH’s family is full of hardworking busy people. But then his parents also expected them all to be available for chores/volunteering etc. I don’t have a great work ethic, my psychiatrist said it was perfectionism, fear of failure.

I’ve tried to make sure with DD (4) that I say things like “lets give it a go” “it’s progress not perfection”. But we always prioritise work first and play later. I try to focus on small victories but never talk about the end result. If she sucks at something first time I make her go back and try and try until she improves (in a kind way, “lets try again”). She does a lot of sporty things and partly it’s because I then have loads of examples of when she had to practice quite hard to get good at something. Goodness knows if it will encourage a work ethic or not but I’m trying to instil in her that most achievement is the result of hard work, not just talent or luck. She’s quite bright and attracts a lot of praise at pre-school for how quick she is and I do worry though that people who find stuff easy in the early years then hit a wall later on when they actually have to put some effort in.

Going to get her doing some chores!

I also think this is a home issue rather than one for teachers.

I do think it has a lot to do with how you are spoken to and treated at home. I was always told I was lazy which gave me the label. I wasn't good at hanging up my uniform every day or making my bed every morning but when I loved a topic I'd work really hard at it. If I didn't get any praise it would physically hurt and I'd switch off from that subject. This was early 90s though and teaching has changed. Confidence has a lot to do with it.

Another thing I try to stress is that gaming and arsing about on your phone is for down time when all your homework and any chores are done. (Heed my own advice )
I've been successful to some point but I do feel it's innate as I can see the difference in work ethic in my own dcs.
However, if I hadn't tried to instil it then I'm pretty sure that ds2 would have failed his GCSEs. Though if he had done, maybe that would have made him buckle up and more driven? Who knows.

@SpentAll Thanks. I need to get up to speed.

Often dc who are pretty bright work out what they need to do and save bits of themselves for other things such as hobbies and chilling. My DDs didn’t do chores. They helped out as required. I didn’t supervise any homework from y7 onwards. School did it. We made more effort to give them a broader education via holidays.

Also I don’t like the idea that parents should be experts in subjects. This clearly means parents who haven’t achieved academically are deemed useless and their DC don’t have the advantages enjoyed by dc of teachers! All of whom will have degrees. In some areas this is a tiny minority of parents so how are these dc going to be helped to achieve if we think schools cannot do it?

This is the problem as I see it.
In this country you have to go back a couple of generations for most families to really know what poverty and hard work looks like.
I’m not saying that there are people living in poverty now but they are in a minority and for most it’s a different kind of poverty.
My children are in the same boat. They are hugely privileged, any thing and everything they could possibly need is provided for them either by us or their 2 sets of adoring grandparents. They are good kids and work well at school, they are grateful for what they’ve got but they’ll maybe never know what it means to have to truly strive to survive.
Teaching a strangers child a work ethic is almost impossible. Schools already expect their kids to work hard and perform to the best of their abilities. You only have to read on here all the moaning about extra homework and ‘pressure’ from school to know that it is often completely undermined by the family.

@AllProperTeaIsTheft

Arguably, schools do teachwork ethic, or at least they try very hard to. It's built into the normal stuff schools do, and what teachers say to kids all the time. They are rewarded for hard work and given sanctions for not doing their work. Their test and exam results also reward hard work. How else do you think a work ethic should be taught in schools?**

I think more explanation of the real life implications/practicalities rather than the artificial "school" life of reward charts and punishments, as that is not what happens in real life! Kids just learn to regard detentions etc as part of "normal" life so it has no impact on them.

Working "smart" is part of working hard. Pointless putting huge numbers of hours into something if you're not actually achieving anything. You need some kind of feedback/monitoring system to check that what you're doing is actually effective, whether it's revising for an exam, or practicing for a driving test, or anything else really.

@taxguru Thats a problem in many jobs. Taking ages to do something is seen as working hard. Working smart is what bright kids work out. DH and DDs have. They earn very well without killing themselves. DH was self employed for 40 years plus and never worked at weekends. Nor his staff. Being efficient and effective goes a long way.

I really want to know this. I do know I am a lot more laid back and happy than a lot of people I know who were more hard working than me. But I wish I'd worked harder and I work hard now and have no idea how to install a good work ethic in my kids.
I want them to be hard working but also not constantly stressed and anxious and lacking in the inner contentment I sometimes see in people who had stricter parents.

Some people are both hard working and have a sense of calm contentment. What did these people's parents do? How did they raise them?

If I copy the examples I've had or seen I feel like my kids will be lazy but happy or hard working but ultimately stressed out and have difficulty relaxing.

What's the magic formula??

I firmly believe the sense of calm contentment is not something DC get from parenting. It’s innate.

Of course environmental factors can skew it, so a DC growing up in a chaotic stressful household may lose it.

FWIW the DC and adults I know who have stricter parents do not glow inner calm contentment!!!

Be careful as well of the swan effect - not everything you see on the surface is reality. Often the most seemingly confident at ease people are a mass of neuroses and deep fears inside.

This is an interesting topic, thanks for starting this discussion, OP. I agree it is key, but not sure how it can be taught.

I don’t know the answer, but my own experience makes me think about this with respect to my DC and how I want to raise them. I do think a key issue is interest. I was bright and found school work easy and a lot of it quite boring. I definitely made more of an effort in subjects I liked - but I barely worked even at those, despite having super pushy parents. I have quite a stubborn streak and I think I rebelled against their pushiness. I don’t ever recall revising - I just turned up to lessons/lectures and have a good enough memory such that it was sufficient. So I definitely didn’t learn about effort and work ethic until I was much older.

I would say that I only started working really hard once I started in my professional field. I think that was because I am fascinated by it and there are real life impacts created by my work. The work matters to my clients and consequently me. But I do now work very hard. I do a job I love and care about and that is what drives me forward. I am considered successful in my field. So I’m not sure that there is necessarily a correlation between effort/work ethic at school and that in life.

Funnily enough, my sibling has always worked hard, right from his school days. He told me, years later, that growing up he felt he had to work very hard because my parents (inadvertently) showed him that he wasn’t as clever as me - they moaned at me about working harder and results, but with him they only ever said try your best. He took from that, that they didn’t expect as much academic success and so he really, really, tried. He is very successful now and as hard working as ever.

Not sure my post is specifically helpful, but I hope it adds to the discussion!