When to let them sink or swim?

PASSWORD>aaI221mi7wL3II have noticed that kids with ADD-inattentiveness will do the bare minimum to get by, just to get it done and get it over with. It is frustrating. As a tutor I was helping one of my students bail on a project tonight. We have spent weeks on this and at the last minute she just slopped it all together. I had helped her organize the project, guided her as she typed up the articles and she didn’t care about the final presentation, I tried to explain to her, You have put so much effort into this project you owe it to yourself to have a beautiful presentation to get a good grade. But I felt like…why bother, she doesn’t care….so why should I?I can’t let this child sink, she is already drowning, she needs help to figure out how to wade her way out of the mess she is in. She is in a deep mess because her parents let her sink for too many years. I commend you for teaching your child what he needs to learn. He will remember all that you have done to assist him. I can relate about cutting back and I think you should try it.. on the extra tutoring for tests. Put the monkey on his back and if you have taught him the skills he needs to organize his time and study skills he should do well. If he starts to sink you can prod him. It is truly a fine line we trod as parents, teachers and tutors knowing when to cut the cord.

Jackie,I have one kid in eighth grade who is gifted with no LD and one GT/LD/ADHD kid in fourth grade. My experience with my older boy was that in fourth grade he was still not able to be self-reliant with respect to studying for tests, remembering homework, etc. It was not until 6th grade that he began to be able to handle these things without reminders from me. He is now totally self-sufficient and doing very well. So, maybe it is still a little early for your child to be very good at self-starting. Also, I’ve heard that ADHD kids tend to lag by about two years on developing these kinds of skills. That said, I do think you have the right idea about working with him to get him more self-sufficient. We are doing that with our 4th grader, but he still needs a lot of support. I used to have to sit right next to him for all homework and refocus him on every question. After a while, I would sit with him but not say anything unless he asked me a question. After that, I took to leafing through the newspaper in a chair near where he was working. I still am in the room, and I still have to refocus him from time to time, but he now works much more independently. Right now we are working on how to study, so that he can see that it makes a difference if you just glance at something vs. practicing it and quizzing yourself. He is not able to generate these kinds of strategies on his own, so he has to be taught them. So, I think it is okay for your child to still need help, but that this may be a good time to start giving strategies for being more independent. I don’t think it is necessarily a sink or swim issue but maybe more like stepping from the baby pool to the big pool, just not the deep end!Andrea

: You’re asking a great question and one worthy of any parent whether their child is LD or not. I think as the parent of Ld children myself we are particularly concerned that we not abandon them and particularly concerned that we might not be able to recognize the appropriate time to “cut the strings.”With non Ld children, it’s sometimes easier to my observation, because those children “brush their parents off.” It’s natural for a growing child to want to be independent of their parents. Most children and most people are not naturally “lazy” and they want to feel that they are capable of doing the job on their own.Is your son still asking for help? Have you had this conversation with him? What does he say? How does he act when you help him? He is “antsy” because of his ADD or antsy because he wants you to let him do it by himself?And, how will he feel about the Cs? What will be his take on that? Will he be as happy as you are knowing he has Cs or will it drive a wedge into his self-esteem? My own son’s answer to that was that he wanted the grades and so always asked for the help. I knew that without my help, he wasn’t playing on a “level playing field” and his learning differences would always see him getting the lower grades. My help in the evenings leveled the playing field. Over the years, he has been able to achieve greater independence from me and still maintain his grades.My other son, less LD but still LD, felt differently. He wanted to be independent of me and get his Bs. I was fine with that but I also know it’s easier to come to that decision when you’ll get Bs. My younger son would have failed in the early years without help and lots of it.My son is in 4th grade and he is ADHD-Inattentive and has CAPD,
: speech language disorder, and dysgraphia. He is getting good
: grades in school despite all this.: My question is when do you start to push your child to study for
: tests on their own and not to rely so much on you. All I know is
: that I had ADHD and CAPD also growing up and my parents never
: helped me with my studies. It was my responsibility. When I
: studied hard I got good grades and when I didn’t apply myself I
: failed. But my son seems to have developed this learned
: helplessness attitude and it’s starting to concern me.It also deserves to be mentioned that memorizing is not learning for every child. I also teach and I can clearly see that even for most children, much of what’s memorized leaves them shortly after the test. Your son may also be telling you, in his way, that memorization isn’t meaningful learning for him and so he does only what he needs to do to get by because he isn’t getting anything more out of that rather ancient “teaching” style except getting by. It’s hard to get excited about learning and acquiring knowledge if your teacher just has you memorizing.It’s also hard to make information exciting when it isn’t exciting. Too many schools use topics and material that children can’t “bite” into. If you have to “make the information exciting”, the curriculum is wrong from the start.But that’s not his fault or yours.: He gets mostly A’s and B’s on his report cards yet I feel that he
: didn’t earn them. I work with him so much, reading and explaining
: the material, helping him memorize facts, and trying so hard to
: keep his attention and make the information exciting. My
: motivation is not just for him to get A’s on the tests; but to
: learn and retain the material. I want him to learn it for the sake
: of knowledge. Yet I’m starting to feel like its time for him to
: take over? I think I’d be happier seeing him getting C’s on his
: own, than A’s with my help. Yet I feel that I’m abandoning him. Do
: parents of “normal” children go through this? And
: furthermore, I just want him to gain knowledge, and I know that
: all he’ll do is memorize just enough to get by. That seems to be
: his theme in life so far; I know that was my theme in school.: Jackie

: My son is in 4th grade and he is ADHD-Inattentive and has CAPD,
: speech language disorder, and dysgraphia. He is getting good
: grades in school despite all this.: My question is when do you start to push your child to study for
: tests on their own and not to rely so much on you. All I know is
: that I had ADHD and CAPD also growing up and my parents never
: helped me with my studies. It was my responsibility. When I
: studied hard I got good grades and when I didn’t apply myself I
: failed. But my son seems to have developed this learned
: helplessness attitude and it’s starting to concern me.: He gets mostly A’s and B’s on his report cards yet I feel that he
: didn’t earn them. I work with him so much, reading and explaining
: the material, helping him memorize facts, and trying so hard to
: keep his attention and make the information exciting. My
: motivation is not just for him to get A’s on the tests; but to
: learn and retain the material. I want him to learn it for the sake
: of knowledge. Yet I’m starting to feel like its time for him to
: take over? I think I’d be happier seeing him getting C’s on his
: own, than A’s with my help. Yet I feel that I’m abandoning him. Do
: parents of “normal” children go through this? And
: furthermore, I just want him to gain knowledge, and I know that
: all he’ll do is memorize just enough to get by. That seems to be
: his theme in life so far; I know that was my theme in school.: JackieI understand why you help him. I was the same way. Part of it is to relieve our anxiety and also part of it is to relieve our childs frustrations and anxiety. Also help is alot different than doing it for them. I would meet the school and ask them what they are using to measure his progress. You want to see visually benchmarks of progress. And the school should use the same form of measurement from year to year. What strategies is he using to learn? I know what you are doing to help him. What is the school doing to keep it exciting and helping him retain information? You won’t be able to do this forever with him. He should be learning compensating strategies in school. I think you should be there for clarification only. You can still help him drill for tests, but I would do no more. Good Luck, Terry