ADHD DS8 - absolute refusal to do homework

[Hels20]

Posting to see if anyone has any suggestions or happy endings where they have had similar situations.

my DS is 8 and has a little bit of homework each work. He absolutely refuses to do it - total meltdown. I have given up I am afraid as can’t bear the screaming and shouting. He used to do a bit of reading and practice spellings but won’t even do that now.

thinking ahead to 3 years time when he is in Secondary School - and have no idea how I am going to cope. He does struggle with work but should be able to do some of it. Anyone else experienced this and got any wise words?

Homework is pointless in primary school. Totally, utterly pointless.

In secondary there should be homework.clubs so he could do it at school.

I would remove all the pressure to do homework. For some it is just too much.

Some DC with additional needs don’t do any homework or sometimes in secondary some only do homework from core subjects.

Does the school have a homework club? If so, would DS attend? This works for of those whose difficulty with homework is because home is home and school is school.

If DS has an EHCP, it could include DS being withdrawn from a lesson to complete it/some of it. For example, in secondary, some complete homework instead of a language.

I would say try to keep the reading going and drop everything else. Let school know this is the plan. Have you tried coloured filters btw?

With reading, would he respond to a conversation about it - something like “reading to me is very important as practicing makes reading easier so will help you. I can see it’s really hard for you at the minute so what are some ideas to make it easier ?” See if he has any ideas, write them all down even if not feasible. Then you can say which ones you can do - I can’t allow doing homework whilst bathing in chocolate as we would run out of chocolate. But we could do x and y and see which makes it easier for you.

Some ideas of what might help:

Reading whilst walking around
He reads one sentence, you read the next
Reading between dinner and dessert so there’s something to look forward to and he’s not hungry or too tired
Star chart for reading
Setting a visual timer (buy one out there are apps) so he can see the end time being nearer
Rewarding effort not achievement - sitting down to read with minimal complaining would get stars even if he only reads one page

Then try not to think about secondary school, just focus on the solution for here and now. You can’t predict the future, you can only support him now.

Good advice on this thread. I would add that trying to do some kind of quite strenuous physical activity each day is really helpful for sleep and overall regulating and managing anxiety.

Thanks for all the responses. I was hoping someone would come along and say “this was my child but 5 years on, it has gotten much easier….” We don’t pressure him with homework at all - but he used to do something, now even getting him to write his spellings out (3 or 4 a day) is impossible….

To be fair you asked for suggestions OR happy endings 😆

If it helps at all, we had an 8yo homework refuser, and now 3 years on through consistent insistence on doing timed homework which we adapt/scribe/read to him as needed, we now have an 11yo who mainly rolls his eyes and only sometimes cries when tired.

I swing between following my own advice on not worrying about the future and weeping at the idea of supporting homework at secondary school though.

Wear it lightly. The evidence base on the effectiveness of homework is very limited. If it causing distress, I think you are doing the right thing.

I have a child with demand avoidant features to their autism who always refused to do the reading bag stuff (cue much parental angst and embarrassment). He was tested when he got to secondary and has a reading age of 15 (through his practice reading websites I think). So they do sometimes work it out and surprise you using their own methods.

You don't want school work to become a major battle ground, where DC is becoming regularly really dysregulated at home, because of the risk they withdraw altogether once they get older.