DD13 - exams and refusing to revise

[mrsfeatherbottom]

DD13 (ASD) is in 2nd year at mainstream school. She missed a lot of 1st year but now has a 1to1 TA and is in school full time. She sat her exams at Christmas (provisions made, smaller room, could have breaks etc) and did pretty good. She has her summer exams coming up and is point blank refusing to revise. Won't write any notes, do BBC bite size or even read over her notes with me.

She says revision makes her too stressed and she's just going to wing it. (She tried that with some in-class assessments in March and annoyingly got really good scores)

I think she needs to get into a habit of revising but don't want to push her and stress her out. She'll not be able to wing her GCSEs in a couple of years, not matter how bright she is.

Any tips?

Dc2 is y9 won't revise because 'I don't need to, I get good grades without'.
The letting them fail doesn't work because they get good grades anyway.
I'm concerned about gcse years as dc won't have practiced how to revise and therefore won't know how they best take on information.
At the moment dc will make revision cards because its homework, but won't use them. I've told senco team at every meeting so it's documented and have suggested they may need to do some work in school as dc won't discuss with me.
All I'm doing is making sure homework is completed and also providing reading materials (dc loves reading). Making sure it's not stressful and hoping if grades drop the subject can be discussed.
Would like to know what sencos advise in these situations.

Sounds like we're in a very similar situation.

Very similar position here. There’s no making my child do anything they don’t want to do (at home). I’m trying not to worry about it though - only year 8.

What I’ve noticed though is they seem to do a lot of revision classes in school which will surely help with the learning how to revise. Study leave not a thing in year 11 anymore - they just do loads of revision lessons.

I reckon some kids can wing GCSEs and still get good marks. I’ve been trying to go down the angle of you can get even better marks if you revise which does tempt my child a bit.

If a DC is attending all lessons and keeping on top of homework, they could retain enough knowledge to pass a GCSE. What they may struggle with is exam technique.

As others have said though, they do quite a bit of revision in lessons towards GCSEs. Even with NT teens, you can't make them revise. I remember sitting in my room 'revising' (ie watching Neighbours!).

It sounds like your DD is doing pretty well as it is but I understand the concern. Especially if she were to go on to do A levels (you really can't wing them).

I think at this stage I'd be tempted to leave it and she how she gets on this time around.
It might be worth trying to get her to talk to you about what she's studying at school eg 'I can't remember anything about photosynthesis from when I was at school. How does it work again?'

Explaining a concept to someone is a very good revision technique.

Does she have idea what she'd like to do post school? Would it be helpful to start researching with her how to get onto certain carer paths so she can see what kind of grades are required?

Thanks for all the replies. She's very bright and so far winging it has worked quite well. The school provided a revision guide for each subject with bullet points so I've been sitting with her this weekend, going through each bullet point verbally and checking her notes etc where there are gaps. I reckon I'd do pretty well now if I was sitting the test!! We're doing short bursts with frequent breaks and it's working okay. We'll see when we get her results, I guess.

As with everything with a ND kid, it's finding the balance between what they can handle and where you should push them a little.

No idea what she'll do past GCSEs but I'm conscious that decent exam results will give her more options later in life to be able to find a job that will suit her.