Corona Cohort’s Year 12 adventures

[FoolsAssassin]

We’ve made it into year 12 and rapidly approaching the end of the first half term .

Lots of challenges we could never imagined as we started the year but we’re all keeping on keeping on and this thread is for anyone who would like to jump on board to share the rather unusual journey this is turning out to be.

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Obviously advocating this as an approach! But it was a bit of an eye opener as to how much motivation did come into play, I had thought with her dyspraxia it wouldn’t much and she couldn’t help it.

@Pasanda so glad to hear she's up and eating a bit, small steps. x

I know this really isn't funny but dd even had to put make up on before going to A&E last week

pasanda in a way I think that’s positive that she still wants to look good to her standards! I know about dark humour though. Dd and I can get very dark. She’s had so many setbacks with the virus she had but I think you could get a pitch black comedy out of it sometimes. Today’s best line from her: I think I could cope with these new meds for longer if they would just let me shit at some point! She also scared a teacher who asked ‘what’s wrong with you then...?’ She actually had another seizure in the middle of telling them. She said after that, they won’t ask again!

Ensemble performance assessment is next week, not this week which is good.

Welcome Fern.
Small steps Pasanda.

I have both ds's at home because school is closed. For 2 weeks. Ds2 is doing 6 live lessons a day. Ds1 seems to be doing bugger all. Today he had 2 hours sociology. That's it!

Zanda - I agree with trying to find the funny side! I also keep telling myself she can't possibly be like this when she's 35!

Oblomov - It is so crazy how schools differ in the way they handle isolation and closures. Every time I think of how little teacher contact DD has had I get the rage! So I try not to think about it too much and fail dismally

I have been trying to manage DS this week on his newly reduced timetable. Mondays he has 2 x 90 min lessons in college plus a study support session of the same length. Tuesday and Weds each day has one online lesson. Thurs and Fri each day one lesson in college.
Around those he should then be doing an equivalent amount of 'independent learning'. He struggles to focus for more than half an hour, so ends up starting and stopping, playing on xbox to "distract and calm himself down" and not looking like he is doing much. Very difficult to not constantly prompt him to get back to work. His anxiety is still bad, and I don't want to make it worse.

@Fern204 is he trying to do homework that’s been set or revision or just vague ‘independent learning’? Dd is very hardworking and independent (unlike my ds!) but even she doesn’t really do stuff off her own bat really. Given your son’s anxiety, i should think he just needs to make sure he’s done any homework and a bit of revision for tests.

I agree with Crazycrofter

Agree with Crazycrofter also. Keep revision sessions short (but regular if exams coming) for attention span, more useful than hours staring at a book. Can you find some short online multiple choice tests for the topics?

We've just had our five minute online meeting. No video just audio and teacher was late so ended up getting 4mins before being unceremoniously cut off. Also no proper subject teacher 'meetings' for the foreseeable. Great.

We just had our zoom equivalent parents eve. It was weird. All went well. They have not done any tests yet so not a lot to discuss, but seem pleased with him so far. I did laugh at one teacher...when I said we had the resources needed for the course as ds1 did the same A level course. She said she didn't realise they were brothers. So I said it's not like they have a common surname. My boys have a double barrelled surname that no one else has. So it's funny she never made the connection. I think she was a bit embarrassed. Yet ds3 in year 7 she has called him by ds1's name. But I'd probably be just the same if I were a teacher as I never recognise anyone or remember names.

Popping my head in again, after falling off the page rather lately.

Huge hugs to you and your DD, pasanda. I'm so sorry to hear you're going through such a tough time. DD has ADHD and gets very down at seemingly random times, for reasons she can't explain. We are lucky that she has never self harmed but she experiences feelings of self loathing, which is hard to watch. In the 10 years since she was diagnosed, we have never been referred to any kind of MH agency, surprisingly.
ADHD is so often missed in girls, and anxiety and depression is a very common co-morbidity, so I'd definitely try to get her assessed if at all possible.
Funnily enough, DH had wondered whether he too has ADHD, since recognising DD's traits in himself. A couple of months ago, he finally plucked up the courage to talk to our GP, who referred him to the community mental health team; he had to fill out an assessment form and then had a telephone consultation, and is now waiting to be referred to psychiatry. I could say he self harms, but it's not in a physical way, if that makes sense?
I really hope you can find some answers and support.

Life rolls on as normal/new normal here. DS still hasn't been able to work since March, though he does have a day of rehearsals next week. DD says she's doing fine at school, but has also made it clear that we're not to get involved with homework or anything else; even asking her about school work results in rolled eyes, heavy exhalations and protestations about "privacy".
The contrast from earlier in the year, when I was required to sit with her and take her through every revision session is quite extreme. Problem is, we know that she's not capable of keeping on top of things, so things have become pretty tense between us all.
In addition, she has become addicted to her phone, snap chatting and whatsapping her friends and the notBF constantly, and her free periods are spent messing around in the 6th form common room. She's already decided psychology is not for her, nor is an EPQ, but she has no idea what she wants to study at uni any more, so doesn't even have that motivation to keep her working.

It feels like she's hit the horrible teens later than most kids - her view of what's reasonable behaviour from us, and her, seems more like a 13 year old's. It's exhausting and stressful.

@Alsoplayspiccolo good to see you again. As I read what you wrote I thought it sounded like dd at about 13 - which is very frustrating timing for you and dd, as these years are a bit more critical. Hopefully she will start to come unstuck sooner rather than later and realise she still needs some support?

Sorry to hear about all the struggles here.

@Fern204 - one strategy for boys who get distracted by gaming is to catch them in a good mood and create a timetable together - show him he can do 30 hours a week of gaming and 10 hours of work (or whatever you think appropriate for him) and put specific times in, if he helps to create it, he is much more likely to stick to it. They really have no idea how many hours they are frittering away. However, don't forget that gaming is also developing essential skills for their generation. DS1 is doing medicine, wants to be a surgeon and was pleased to see the correlation between gaming skills and modern surgery techniques. DH worked with somebody driving Remote Operated Vehicles under water who was some kind of gaming champion and had extraordinary screen-hand coordination!

Thanks, crazy.
My worry is that DD is doing ok, but not as well perhaps as she could be, but, being new to the school, her teachers may think it’s all she capable of.
She just has no ambition and no real drive, and is just a bit rudderless at the moment.
Trying to discuss all this with her is proving impossible; she gets belligerent and either tells us we’re unreasonable or won’t engage at all.

@Alsoplayspiccolo is it worth contacting her teachers privately to let them know that you don't think she's putting the necessary work in and she needs a bit more 'oversight'?

I'm starting to think this through for ds, when he gets to sixth form age. He's not able to self-manage at all either and I can just imagine if he's left to his own devices he won't do the necessary work. But they do need to learn to manage their own lives at some point don't they - you just don't want them to learn the hard way!

Wow, out of breath after online Parents’ Evening with 7 back to back interviews!

All seems good - she’s scoring solid Bs on past paper questions which they’re pleased with at this point.

Interestingly, the Science staff said that they were noticing a difference in this year’s cohort who hadn’t had the ‘big push’ of pre GCSE revision where they would normally go through every topic from Year 9 onwards.

But good news that she is coping well with the maths content of the Chem and Bio syllabuses, even without doing Maths A level.

Actually, the best bit was sitting back and listening to her engaging in a mutually respectful and positive discussion with her teachers.

That sounds very positive @KingscoteStaff Interesting about the potential impact of not having had the intensive revision period. I suppose the science curriculum continually builds on topics and if you haven't nailed down the basic understanding it will be challenging when it gets more complicated.

DD seems to be thriving. The entire upper sixth have been sent home after a Covid cluster and a deep clean of their common room is happening before it gets handed to the lower sixth. It is bigger and has better sofas.

Parents evening for us last night too. Was really pleased that the computer science teacher didn't know he hadn't done it fir GCSE. He got 71% in one of the papers which was a full AS paper so really pleased with that and all the work he did in the summer paid off.

Clear the teachers are finding not being able to walk around the classroom to teach really hard .DS seems to like the fast pace lessons and credit to his previous maths teacher, he hasn't noticed much difference in the pace and that has stood him in good stead for this year.

We all had a laugh afterwards as one said he is very organised which isn't something we're used to hearing but i think the boarding has really helped with that. They also said how self motivated he is and that at times like these that will stand him in good stead.

Very strange though having parents evening with DS sitting in the corner of our screen!

We had 3 of out parent appointments weds. Then one last night. Last night the appointment seemed pointless really. It was the religious studies, ethics and philosophy teacher. He said ds had been joining in the religious studies conversations well. They hadn't done any tests, so can't give a grade. He said they've not started any work on philosophy or ethics yet. So it was a brief conversation lasting a few mins. He asked us if we have any questions, no. He asked ds if he was enjoying the course. Yes. That was it. So it made me think maybe it is a bit early in the school year for parents eve.
We didn't get much more from the previous evening either. They haven't done any tests at all yet. But for business the written exam I believe is this school year. I remember my oldest doing the same course and they had a written exam grade early on and an opportunity to re take in the summer when they other exams take place if they wanted to.

Ooh @icanbewhatiwant and others doing Religion/Philosophy I can post a useful resource for widening thinking blahblahd

youtubeaskanacademic

We did have a thread of useful resources at one point for gcses

So, the child that has wanted to drop economics just got one mark off an A* (allegedly) in his assessment...

Excellent news, Piggywaspushed, I hope it does the business for his confidence

And thank you very much, orangecinnamon, forwarding that to dd

We're just back from CAMHS where dd admitted to struggling in class at the moment - she is virtually electively mute in lessons and won't reply when asked questions Says her teachers are understanding and not pushing it, but it's awful to think of her sitting there in a state of internal panic all day

CAMHS counsellor is great, though, and I'm hopeful she'll be able to work through this phase

Lots of updates from you all, some good on DC thriving and others having more challenging times, which I'm sorry to hear.

Not much to report here. Did receive DD's GCSE certificates this evening. Felt a little weird, and also how long ago it all seems, now we are fast approaching Christmas break.