Starting secondary support thread 2

[PenguinPandas]

Support thread continued.

The criteria for evaluating subjects seems to be

1. Does this subject help people become rich ideally for minimum effort? No then its pointless, yes will consider against two.

1. Does it have clear rules so that only "an idiot" couldn't understand it and its not one of those other impossible subjects were rules aren't clear.

1. Can I be bothered to do this subject.

Ours only do RE in year 10. DD has been asked to do French in y10 but am not keen, its different if say she was bilingual.

at the criteria

DS1 is convinced he will become a Youtuber, his channel will be about Dungeons & Dragons. So he doesn't need any GCSE's

DS2's do English Lit in Yr10. I am not convinced it's a great idea, surely another year would give them a better chance of a better grade? Though when I did GCSE English it was 100% coursework for both. think I was the last year it was allowed.

DS recently went through his 2 year business plan to set up his YouTube gaming business about his views on Fornite, he doesn't even play it as that's wasting money. Took him about 1 hour to go through everything, the plan was impressive but also involves not needing to study at school.

If ds goes by that set of rules then he'll be doing maths, computers and food tech only by the time he gets to number 3.
He did also come up with a cunning plan to be "home schooled" which seemed to involve me buying lots of computer equipment and him playing games all day. Unsurprisingly I didn't go for that one.

DS was very keen on home schooling at primary - would ask how many things does a person have to do to get thrown out of school - would 12 be enough? How many have I done already?

The idea seemed to involve a lot of home but schooling was just maths and lazing around all day. I asked him to describe an ideal school the other day - 4 children, no lessons and you just eat junk food.

We are playing the guess DS's homework game - so far we have established the poetry one but not which poem, a self portrait for art (told him he should get his haircut so it would be less homework which he thought was very amusing), IVR which is actually IVF - a poster on it. 12 year old boys and reproduction lessons! And a mystery one. Told him his sister was IVF and he said well you wasted your money there.

Told him his sister was IVF and he said well you wasted your money there.

We're discussing haircuts. I've told him he can choose a haircut if he'll go to the barbers. He says he only wants the one I can do, which is very rough. And that's only because I've said it's got to a length he needs to brush it in the morning, rather than leaving it along.

I think ds' ideal school would be on the computer doing what he wanted and doing maths tomorrow.

He says he's done the homework. From past experience that means next Saturday he'll have to spend all day doing it.

He's clearly been reading something on the internet (I suspect about big cats) about Alpha Males. He's been telling me that males are stronger and able to do more things because they've been bred that way.
I pointed out that some female spiders eat the male after mating, which shows how useful they are, then called him a MCP and sent him to bed. I think that shows the pecking order here.
He's going to wind his sisters up no end if he continues it, which is probably the main aim of the exercise.

DS likes to do lots of things tomorrow as well - he says its good as tomorrow never comes.

DH is in Paris this weekend. Cat is currently sleeping in his place in the bed purring away and DD has come and said this house is so much more relaxed without him around DD has been stuffing herself - she had two cheese toasties at 3am and then had a 13.5 pizza all to herself for lunch and was trying to persuade her brother to go to the shop a couple of doors down and buy her a big box of Valentine's chocolates. He refused but did go for the cat's tuna. The answers to the Intermediate Maths Challenge are out now and she thinks she'll have kangaroo. She thinks they may enter her for junior too and says this year she's trying for the Olympiad not like last year were she said she deliberately got just below as this year "there are boys I need to annoy".

I would be tempted to give your big, strong DS lots of tasks Witchend that you and his sisters can't do as weak females - does the gardening need doing, washing up is also surely too hard for a female too

Witchend - I’m afraid I check the homework portal daily and check on progress. I said around Oct half term that I was stepping back on non academic subjects (art, music etc) but haven’t been very good at keeping to that when there’s a last minute panic on Sun evening.
DP is meant to be the go to for maths and science (being an engineer) but he doesn’t have the patience to help with revision for example. So I am massively over involved.

We don't have a portal. He has a planner, but doesn't seem to write in it. But he's only missed one homework according to his teachers.(he says that he didn't miss it, it was just away when it should have been handed in)

I like that plan Penguin I think I'll tell him he has to treat his sisters with courtesy, and also pay for drinks for them when he's out.

We have ShowmyHomework in theory but I can't access it nor can DS. They gave DS the details for him and us but he "lost" them and school don't know what they are.

DD now is telling everyone she is going to Cambridge University and she keeps getting me to look up data on which schools send most. I managed to get hold of our schools GCSE subject results online by each grade, they are on compare school performance website data download but have to download whole of England to get them, 77,000 lines of data to get 200!

I remind mine that some animals eat their young!

DS1's school has ShowmyHomework but he still does his homework at school for now.

DS2 is meant to write his in his planner, though he seems to be favouring invisible ink of late. He's got better at doing it as he gets it, him and a friend even did some English homework at lunchtime on Friday.

DS did surprise us by deciding to go to homework club after school after school a few weeks ago! Luckily DP was at home that day as I would have been on full on panic by 4pm, but DP didn’t notice until school rang to let us know where he was.
He’s been a few times since but I’m not convinced as to how much he does there.

I asked DD about homework club and she says its mainly for chatting but ours is apparently invite only.

DD seems to be very decisive tonight - she has chosen GCSE options, which 6th form and Cambridge University and gone through data for universities and GCSEs results for 3 schools by each subject. She has googled how many Oxbridge entrants every school in UK has.

DS has also chosen his year 9 options - engineering and design and tech then art and drama.

Food tech was rejected as you can find lots of recipes on the internet yourself so why bother going to school for that.

Business studies you can teach yourself off YouTube in 10 minutes from home per hour in school.

Music, well you could get a job related to that, but if you did all your other gcses were a complete waste of time and you shouldn't have bothered going to school for those.

Dance is just annoying and what is the point of it really what is it?

So last two options are least worst ones I am told.

DS would agree with him for dance!

DD said to DS she couldn't leave the house as her hair needed washing and DS told her to be like a boy and not care or spray some air freshener on your hair as that's what girls do.

Not sure what's got into DD but after refusing to read for a few years she's just ordered 27 books. She did say a boy had told her she needed to work harder and think about what she was doing with her life if she wanted to go to Cambridge. She did work reasonably at primary, forced hard at grammar but has done very little since starting comprehensive but seems finally to be turning a corner. I love the boys at DDs school. 😂

27 books! What type?

Murders 😂

Ds has spent this afternoon admiring a friend's husband's collection of WWII planes, magazines, DVDs and all sorts. He came home glowing and talked non-stop all the way home about the merits of different planes.

His idea of a perfect afternoon, and tomorrow he can binge watch the DVDs he's borrowed. He's going to start with 39 steps (he loved the book) and move on to The Battle of the River Plate I think.

I introduced Allo Allo to him yesterday. He loved it, although he didn't get quite all the innuendo. He did say that "The Fallen Madonna with the big Boobies" was a bit of a mouthful and maybe they should just call it "Big Boobies" or "BB" for short.

He also has decided that modern music is boring. It's all about love apparently. He asked me to prove that not all pop music was about love. So I played him Keith Harris and Orville, Mr Blobby and the Wombles.

He thought Orville was cute, Mr Blobby was scary (he always used to get freaked out by full body costumes) and was just at the Wombles. We then met someone who knew the person who played Mr Blobby and Uncle Bulgaria. He was seriously unimpressed.

DS has an Orville obsession thanks to his old Headteacher saying his brother was just like DS and obsessed with Orville. So he had to watch Orville, he often sings it, he often goes looking for ducks who he names Orville, Orville has been mentioned a few times today and this was 3 years ago I used to love Orville too, now its mildly annoying!

DD has done her annual tidy of room and half the kitchen has now been found. Her 32 books arrived, she apparently got in an extra 5 once I agreed. DH has promised her a fluffy rabbit for tidying her room, will see how cat and rabbit on - DD is keeping it in her room. DD was considering getting chicks and the cat licked her lips at the word chicks so she will be disappointed with a rabbit. DS was getting very excited about owning Orvilles but says he prefers fluffy rabbits.

No sign of any homework being done though did get DS to go through a junior maths challenge with me otherwise he will have a strop on the day with any questions that are unusual Of course they had 3 questions wrong and need DS to advise them, he seemed to get rest right though we stopped at question 22.

So lovely when they get really engaged in something witchend. at the modern music.

Good luck with the rabbit meets cat penguins. Mine are campaigning hard for a puppy now we are cat-less. Considering it maybe after our holiday in August but also thinking just no as it's such a tie.

Had GP appt for DS2. I'd booked a routine appt about his dodgy tummy, so he has a pot to send a sample away. Lovely half-term project(!)

Being DS2 he also managed to wake up with conjunctivitis and the GP gave him some eye drops. I didn't think they prescribed eye drops anymore but they do seem to have helped a bit.

I'm still without a car as the van isn't fixed yet! We've managed some trips out train/bus but in-laws are collecting us today and going to theirs. Should hopefully coincide with the van being fixed and getting my car back off DH.

We have had a big campaign mainly by DD for a St Bernard or White Mountain dog. They are lovely but was very grateful when vet said would kill cat through stress. So then we get DD saying when will cat die, how many days.

We had agreed pre vet but said DD would have to earn £1000 for it, doing tidying etc at £10 thinking there's only 5 years until she leaves home but she started helping with things at a much faster rate than anticipated. However, being a teenage girl the money got diverted to clothes as apparently you can't go to a party in outfit you have worn before.

Then showed her article about boy hatching an egg and she went over to ducks. DH agreed but then started arguing ducks for sale were ugly so no to that duck Then i spotted a lionhead bunny that needs a new house showed it to DH and he went aww so told DD and got told she loved it, its fluffy and perfect and fluffy. DH agreed if she tidied room so now looks like we are due to get it.

Hope get van back soon Dobbins I had bought 60 bulbs and some plants and DH did some gardening yesterday, asked him if he had planted them all - no none of them. Did you trim any plants? No What did you do? Well I spent an hour getting a plant out of a barrell then the barrell broke. So about as successful as his raking leaves, we he spent an hour raking but didn't put any in bin and it was very windy. 😂 I thought he may deliberately be being bad but says he loves gardening.