Ds says school work is boring.

[MollieO]

He is 6 and in yr 2. He says he can't see the point in doing it. He also says if he does do it he simply gets more work to do and why would he want to do that?

He is falling behind with his work. He had spellings to learn and three books to read over half term but has refused to do anything.

I've posted before about his reluctance to do school or home work but up until now I've been unable to find out why he refuses to do it.

We have had problems since he started school but it has got worse and I've asked the school for an Ed Psych referral. I have a meeting this week with his form teacher and SENCO to discuss it. The SENCO is reluctant to refer as he is average in his year group despite making absolutely no effort at all.

We don't have problems with his out of school activities. In fact the opposite. He is interested and motivated.

Am I right to push for an Ed Psych referral or is there something else I should be considering?

Quite often when kids say school work is boring, it means one of two things. One it is too hard but they dont want to admit they cant do it, or 2) it is too easy and they cant be bothered.

What parts of school does he really hate, what does he like?

A good teacher will usually find a way to motivate a reluctant child, and they need to work with you and him to find a method that works. Some children just dont conform to standard methods of schooling.

There are different strategies that could be tried with the spellings and maybe the books just dont interest him.

What does his teacher say? is she being helpful? has she offered any solutions? Is she co-operative?

sorry Im not being more helpful. Its hard sometimes for teachers to find the time to something different for each child that is not fitting into the norm, but think about the strategies that work outside school. What motivates and interests him. What demotivates him at home. Finding a pattern that works can then help you give suggestions to the teacher.

This situation sounds like it needs a strong teacher/parent partnership to help your ds.

It does sound like a lot of homework for a 6 year old. 3 reading books and spellings over half-term. Does he even like these books?

Can you get him to do stuff he enjoys outside school, so read books he likes etc.
I would also talk to the teacher, and ask if he needs extra help. If he does see if you can find a tutor who will make things fun, maybe use computer games or something? Even places like Kip McGrath do things in a more fun way.

I would be very tempted to take him seriously, maybe he does find the work at school boring. So rather than doing more of the same at home, encourage him educationally with very different activities at home.

(BTW he doesn't sound as if he is falling behind at school if his teachers see him as average.)

I was very bright at kid and remember getting really really cheesed off about extension tasks - I did the work expected so I got more work?! Sod that - that wasn't fair so I dossed about and avoided the extra stuff!

I don't know what consolation it is - but I came around (after being at the level of getting an ed psych referral and, on one noteable occasion, an exclusion... someone had wound me up and I walloped them) and when I went to secondary school, in sets and was in the top set for everything - I absolutely flew.

Doesn't help you in the short term though. I believe my mother had resorted to heavy amounts of incentivizing (bribery!) spelling tests and the like - and would do things like fire spellings at me when I was in the car with her (so no chance of escape - muahahahaha)!

We get two weeks for half term so probably not too much to do in that time.

Not sure what the teacher is doing other than keeping him in at break time to complete his work. I have refused to allow her to do that to complete homework as it had no effect.

I think Ds is either very bright or very thick. Not sure which tbh hence my hope that an Ed Psych referral might identify if he has particular strengths and weaknesses. He is an exceptionally talented golfer (according to the pro who teaches him) and he is very good at learning lines for the performing arts class he does. He is also good at bossing motivating his team at rugby.

He seems to be very interested and motivated but not for school work unfortunately.

Hopeful evening bump.

DS in Y2 gets homework each weekend, but hasn't had any at half term or any spellings. He is an absolute saint at school - at parents evening teacher says he finishes all work set really fast and asks for more. She thinks the sun shines out of his backside. He reads voraciously and is always the first to volunteer to be heard read by a parent helper.

OTOH, at home, its a very different story. If the homwork interests him, fine. Spellings he seems to know, so they aren't a problem. The problem comes if he gets a book to read he doesn't like or homework he doesn't fancy. Its like pulling teeth. Its boooooooooooring. I'm not doing it. No.

He's had one book to read all half term and he still hasn't read it. 1 hour to go until bedtime and back to school tomorrow. Honestly, he can have the same book all week. I give up!

So I do empathise. I've been told since pre school he's a boy with a strong sense of what his needs and abilities are.

Putting it bluntly, is it possible that the work could just be paralysingly boring?

DD became completely unmotivated in yr 1 - the writing that they had to do involved copying mindlessly tedious paragraphs (I've seen them - I don't think that is an unfair description). DD is very bad at writing, and very very slow, so she would be sat there (again this I have directly from the teacher, not from her) literally all morning, including break time, supposedly copying one paragraph.

Its extremely rare that the children are ever asked to write anything creative - approx. two poems, and a couple of 'change the endings to the story' so far (she's now in yr 4) - essentially all writing is factual stuff related to the work they do. On the three or four occasions they've had the opportunity to write something made up, dd has been wildly excited (and come home with a certificate for her good work!).

Basically, having seen the work they do, I think a lot of it is very, very boring, and I'm not in the least surprised that a lot of children aren't enthused by it to great efforts. It has got somewhat better in dd's school from yr 3 onwards, and funnily enough, her performance has picked up somewhat in line with this.

At nursery he was considered to be very bright and they taught him to read at a younger age than they would normally. In reception the teacher thought he was stubborn. In yr 1 the teacher said she had never taught a child like Ds. Not interested in reading, writing good, maths outstanding. In yr 2 he is falling behind in all areas.

Definitely a perfectionist in his work but sets himself up for failure by refusing to learn his spellings. Last year he got away with it but this year the words are harder and he is getting low marks.

Homework tonight is his spelling corrections, the three books he didn't read over the holiday plus a new one. A total of 96 pages to read tonight. If he doesn't do it he will be sent to see the head tomorrow. [hhmm]

It doesn't help that he questions everything he reads. He is very curious and keen to learn about things that interest him but not, it seems, schoolwork.

It makes me very sad indeed. He is a lovely and lively little boy and I just wish there was something could do to make him realise school can be enjoyable.

I think that is an unusual school takver, particularly as creative writing is a sizeable part of the KS1 literacy curriculum. How did they get away with it?

Good question stoatsrevenge - writing appeared to be always copying out a story that they had been read, or answering questions about it.

I did ask - the answer was that they weren't ready yet to write their own things . . .

I know that the Welsh KS1 curriculum is quite different from that in England anyway, so possibly there is more freedom for the teacher to make such decisions?

I should say that dd did enjoy lots of other things about school, and found some of the work interesting - and as I say, they seem to do much more varied stuff now in KS2. I just think it is worth bearing in mind that the school work might be very boring!

I have two older children and as a childminder I have supported many children with homework. Very few of them skip to the table in happiness to do their homework to be honest. They all find it pretty boring, and it probably is boring.

First, try to speak to the school to find books that are interesting to HIM. Does he like football? does he prefer fact books? Adventure stories? Once he will find books that he actually likes, he will read them.

Secondly, bribes do work. I basically set up the timer on the oven for 15 minutes. That's not a long time. They all do their work quietly during that time and at the end, they get some kind of positive reinforcement. Football in the garden, a game of cricket, a biscuit, 15 minutes on a computer game.

Out of interest, what kind of books do you think he would like? What are his interests?

It's an old thread that's been bumped up by a spammer.

The OP's DS will be in his teens by now.