I've read the GCSEs thread and it's great that so many DC are conscientiously putting in the hours to achieve their potential this summer.
DS is not one of them. I am at my wits' end trying to find ways to instil some motivation in him and don't know what to do. He is a perfectly able student when he applies himself, but he never voluntarily applies himself. Since November I have been trying to get him to revise, and all that happens is arguments.
Mocks were in Dec and in the run up to them he went mental every time I suggested revision, insisting that he was doing plenty. Mocks results were well below his "tag" grades - in some cases 2 or 3 grades below. After results he said he hadn't worked for them but if he had, he would have got all 7s. They had second mocks in English and Maths in March so I said fine, having learned what happens with no revision, now will you work harder for the next ones? He said he would. He did a bit more work but nowhere near enough. Grades coming soon but not expected to be any better.
His actual GCSEs are starting in 7 weeks! He has a maths tutor and an English tutor, both of whom say he is lazy. If I ever raise this with him, he goes mental about how nothing is ever good enough for me and he's such a disappointment. I wouldn't mind him getting 4s and 5s if that reflected his best effort, but all his teachers say he is capable of 7s and above.
His teachers are running extra revision sessions at school and every week I have to really push him to go to them. He says things like "I don't need to go to the History session on Cold War, because I'm fine on that". His History teacher says otherwise.
This isn't a pass/fail problem. He will still get 5s and above in most subjects with minimal work. But he could do so much better and just does not seem to care about how mediocre gcse grades will affect his a level courses, and uni applications, or jobs.
There is no point me banging on about it at him. How can I get HIM to care?