Year 11 and no revision, no studying.

[Travelledtheworld]

Dd16 is clever and at a selective girls Grammar. She cruises along. Good at some subjects and middling at others.
She never does a stroke of work outside school.
She has done her mocks and will pass everything.
But she will not put in any effort at all to learn the things she has missed over the last two years, or do any revision, or do any extra studying to improve her grades.
Her attitude is " I don't care, my grades are good enough to get me into sixth form college, so why should I bother?"
She is friendly and happy and no problem at all. We have a good relationship but she absolutely refuses to discuss school, homework or revision with me.

Do I leave her to sink or swim ?

My eldest was like this. I never saw a book or any sign of homework ever. He always said he did it at school. ( Selective Grammar/ Boarding .) He was incredibly clever, but I did worry about his under achievement. His response to my concerns was ' trust me'

GCSE was just a doddle for him.
However, it was the same story, regarding work during his ' A' levels. You can't wing 'A' levels quite so easily. He still did well compared with most, but he had a bit of a wake up call. Scraped in to a prestigious Uni,nevertheless , but no Oxbridge place.

However, all my worrying was a waste of my time as he is now a Doctor.

I provided a nice warm hotel for him to study in and I love him, and loved him very much. I think that's all you can do. You will just stress yourself out otherwise.
At some point they have to stand on their own two feet.
Xx you have my sympathy.

My 13 yr old daugher is the same way. She has always been this way even in elementary school, she manage to just wing it....now that she is older she still sees no reason to worry about her bad grades. the teachers and i try to press her about it she has now begun to say that she cant study because she can concentrate or remember what the teacher says during class. to be on the safe side i am having her seeing a few specialists to be sure that she doesnt have a Learning disability or something but i still worry that she is going to have a hard time with each passing school year as the subjects get harder.
i also struggle with what i should be doing to help her out without bailing her out all the time.

I was like this when I was younger. It upset the hell out of my mum at the time, but she realised a few years later that it wasn't such an unhealthy attitude to have. Doing well at school is important, but some kids put so much pressure on themselves and make themselves sick. If her grades are decent enough to get her into 6th form, that's all that's really important. In a few years GCSEs mean very little.

From your post there is no suggestion that she'll sink - so leave her be and be happy that she's happy and not stressed. Surely that's what you want for her?

Could it be that she just finds the teaching at the school uninspiring?

I was like this at Grammar School. I was not particularly brilliant compared to some of my peers, but I was nowhere near the bottom. I did night before revision for my actual O levels and got pretty good results.

I picked A levels that I could "do" - French and Maths, (but foolishly chose Chemistry over English because I hated my O level English teacher) and didn't have to put much effort into A levels either

In hindsight, I think the teaching at the school was incredibly boring, sausage-factory stuff and it just didn't light any enthusiasm in me.

But on the positive side, be very, very grateful that she is not getting anxious and stressed and over pressured by the whole GCSE performance. That is NOT something you would wish on anyone's teen

Bigtilly yes some of the teaching is very dull and the curriculum is stifling too.
She also is a bit of a daydreamer and I know sometimes she just switches off and doesn't listen in class.
And I am greatful she is not stressed, self harming, or hanging out with a bad crowd etc.
If she had a hobby or interest she was passionate about I would be more forgiving. But she just lies around playing on line games and chatting to her friends, so is hardly making good use of her time on this run up to GCSE's.

She will pass, but will she get the top grades? She needs to have it pointed out to her that getting into sixth form isn't the only time in her life that her GCSE grades will be looked at. The top universities will also be interested, and she'll be putting them on her CV when applying for jobs. Does she want to be able to prove her real ability by having a string of excellent results, or does she want to be constantly having to excuse a string of ones that could have come from a far more average candidate with 'but I didn't do any revision'. People won't be impressed at the 'no revision' excuse, it will just make her look lazy.

Travelled, I think that's what a lot of teens do

Is there anyone she would listen to about trying harder? Someone whose opinion she would value? Maybe someone from the sixth form college that she wants to go to?

But on the plus side, maybe she will find the sixth form college a bit more inspiring?

What does she want to study at 6th Form, Travelled? What does she want to do after 6th form?

Noblegiraffe she is not " Top University" Material TBH.

BigTilly that's a good idea I'll have a think and see if I can come up with somone for her to chat to.

IIjjk she wants to do Politics and Government, English, and Computer Science. Undecided about the 4th subject.
A bit of an odd mix. The sixth form is part of her own grammar school but mixed boys and girls. They have to get B's in the subjects they want to study.

She hasn't got a clue what she wants to do after 6th form.

There is another sixth form college if she messes up exams and ends up with lower grades. We have been to have a look round but she wants to stay with her friends at her existing school.

I would like her to go and get a Saturday job to get her learning some skills.....

She does know doesn't she that some subjects have grade requirements to do their subject at A level? e.g. A level maths generally requires A grade GCSE. She'd feel a bit foolish if she didn't revise and then missed out on doing her preferred subjects because she 'just' got a B or whatever.

Mind you I'm worrying about my hardworking DD actually getting to C grade, so I know which problem I'd rather have!

She's a clever girl at a selective girls grammar, and she's only aiming for Bs? That's pretty poor really, why is her school not all over her like a rash?

DS is still not that bothered, but the idea of aiming a bit high & then a little unexpected slippage won't screw anything up, he can go with that as a strategy. So he aims for As and it's okay if he gets Bs. (And I can hope he actually does get some As.)

It doesn't seem like she is going to sink from what you've said so I would leave her too it. You may find she knuckles down when the exams get closer.

Our dd also does nothing. Sadly, she's not at a selective girls' grammar and expected to get B's regardless of revision. My expectation is that she'll fail most if not all of her GCSE's, not simply because of a lack of revision, but because she's not really engaged in many of her lessons, not completed coursework, and has spent a good chunk of the last 18 months in internal exclusion at school, so she's missed loads of class work.

I'd be weeping for joy if I thought she could get through with no work and still come out with whatever grades she needs to get her through to the next stage of the educational process.

I'd also be weeping for joy if she was happy and friendly, rather than aggressive and hateful 24/7.

Sorry, that's not very helpful.

Just a thought in case it's something you hadn't considered - and doesn't apply in the case of my DS who is also bright but can't be bothered and daydreams in class too - could she be frightened of trying her best in case she doesn't do as well as she'd hoped?

Why won't she talk to you about her attitude? Does she think you won't 'understand' (you know on account of you being a different generation and therefore not knowing anything relevant to being a young person today)? Does she think you'll disapprove of her attitude to life? Or resent the fact that you'll try to get her to change her mind over her approach to exams, ie attempt to 'control her'?

My DS is very similar to yours - with the added problem that he can't/won't get himself organised (crumpled worksheets scattered round the house). He says his heart sinks when he sees a page of maths problems - boring - but is naturally good at maths. At the third attempt DH managed to get him to make a timetable for prelims revision - they start at the end of this week. To my horror DH accepted his plan to spend hardly amount of time IMO on each subject. DS thinks he's done a lot of study if he's done one hour. ..

I think DS feels that people who work really hard are sad cases who don't have much fun. Like your DD he doesn't know what he'd like to do and is probably slightly depressed at the thought of eventually having to spend most of his days mostly at work.

I imagine she will pass them all. It's possible to do well at GCSEs without too much work if you are clever. Probably not well enough to get a sweep of As. When she sees others basking in the success of 10 A she may feel disappointed in herself.
At A level it's much harder to do well without working hard however clever you are.

Having said that, it is only January.
Really, most of Y11 is spent on revision and exam techniques so a great deal will be done in school. I don't think starting full scale revision so early is necessary. DS2 started in March and felt he peaked too early, he was all revised out before the exams began .

My daughter was just the same last year at her academic state school. A mixture of being averagely clever but not bothered about doing more than the bare minimum. She did nothing at home and got fairly feeble mock results. Refused to work at home or talk about it. Did very minimal revision for the actual exams and got three A's, four B's and a some C's. She left the school to go on to a local college to do A 'Levels which she has found much more interesting. I stressed (and nagged) her and me all the way through her GCSEs and was on Mumsnet moaning and worrying often. It was a horrible time for both of us.

With hindsight this is what I would say:

• a good school with a reasonably intelligent child can produce good enough GCSEs to see her right for A' levels without excessive revision (though her friends who did revise hard got all A and A*).
• you can buy the revision guides, set cut-off times for TV and computer, gently oversee revision etc, but other than that they are too old to be heavily supervised now.
• keeping the lines of communication open and friendly is more important now than ever before; nagging and worrying about her work will shut them down (I learned the hard way)
• my daughter found her feet in college/6th form. She thrives on being treated as a young adult and managing her own time and studying subjects she likes. I think some kids are just bored by the number of subjects at GCSE and (what they see as) irrelevant stuff they have to cram in.
• don't back off completely - buy her notepads, highlighter pens, revision guides, be interested, find out her mock timetable, stay in touch with teachers, talk about the set texts for her English exam, whatever it takes to stay connected and interested! But other than that you can't force her.
• Get in touch with her teachers who can tell you what they are seeing at school.
• Most important of all - don't underestimate how stressed she may be. The schools put massive pressure on them, unwittingly or otherwise, and it can appear to them that their whole life hangs on their work. Some kids (like my daughter) just had to back away from it to keep the anxiety at bay, though from the outside it looked like laziness.

Good luck. :-)

x

Beelights I think you have hit the nail on the head there, and that is exactly the strategy I intend to adopt. Provide resources and practical support and then back off.

Your daughters results pretty much reflect my daughters Mock results. It is likely that school will continue to push them all hard with the aim of getting as many A/A*s as possible. So she will probably up her grades a little.

And yes, she may be a little stressed too.....

minifingers I am sorry that you have had such a tough time with your DD.
Your comments are helpful in that they help me to put my problems into perspective.

Thanks all.

This was my DS last year. Managed 2 x A, 1 x A, 2 x B, 4 x C (A & A were due to very good coursework). However he failed both english lang & lit. He still managed to get on his BTEC course and is doing really well, working hard. This is because he is loving the subject.

There is only so much you can do and after that they are on their own.

By the way his target grades were all C except for B in maths. Along as he was getting a C he didn't see the need to try any harder

Maturity has a lot to do with it as well

Can I add, that based on her KS2 results and dd's perceived ability, her target grades were all A*\A.

That makes the though of her failing everything even more gutting.

Beelights, that's all great advice and just about the same strategy I am trying to follow with DD who is not "lazy" but gets very stressed and then can turn into "rabbit in the headlights" So good to hear your DD has come into her own now.

Mini, has she got a plan for next year?

Yes. BTEC.

But she needs some GCSE's to get onto it.

my lesson from last year's GCSE trauma with my twins was that the 'target' and 'predicted' grade system works against them.

My DC were 'predicted' A and A stars across the board. DD works abit, on and off, and gets two A stars 5 As and rest Bs. And was in tears and extremely disappointed with herself for not working harder and with me and DH for not nagging her to work.

But DS got one A star, 2 As rest Bs and Ds and said along the lines of 'fuck them - they predicted me A stars, how come I didn't get them?'

Just may be worth checking she's not assuming that 'predicted' means she'll get them. I think what the teachers don't say loudly enough is the message that comes before the 'predicted' as in "[if you work hard and do plenty of revision] we predict you an A".

I wish I'd pushed them harder. Their hopes for eg Oxbridge have gone (middle class problem I know) and now they need to push hard on their A levels to make their options at uni viable (both want to study competitive subjects).

omitted to say the vital thing which was DS didn't do a stroke of work for his GCSEs but spent whole year gaming. Worked at school, fine - but nothing at home