Pick of the List

Recent threads gleaned from the list
that we thought would help out other Working Moms

Liz C, Sat, 11 Oct 1997

Just a short rant; yesterday my 12 year old daughter brought home a D in Math and a D in Science on her report card. I grounded her for 8 days of extra studying, it but she was leaving for her fathers house, so I asked him to ground her for the weekend and make her study. He said he didn't think it was necessary to ground her and wasn't I being a little hard on her as "girls usually have trouble with that stuff". Guess it just goes to show why we are no longer married. What the hell kind of message is that? I blasted him for being a pig, and asked him if he would prefer that she grow up learning impaired and marry some idiot like him. All I get from her teachers is how pretty and sweet she is. I care about her grades, her attitude, and her intelligence but sometimes I think that I'm the only one.

Rosemary P, Mon, 13 Oct 1997

Hello Liz,

I do not wish to tell you how to raise your child. I'm a dog owner, not a mother. But, I do want to question "grounding" a child to get her to study. That strikes me as negative. What about turning it around 180 degrees and making it a positive experience? If she's getting D's, then she clearly needs some help.

Mentorgrrls, anyone? What about a tutor? What about *you* tutoring her with patience and kindness? Positive reinforcement is surely more encouraging, and more conducive to learning than negative reinforcement. You seem pretty passionate about wanting girls to learn math & science, so why not begin at your kitchen table?

Liz C, Mon, 13 Oct 1997

I've been doing that for years but this year she has pretty much refused my help and even lied to me about her homework. Heather had a cataract removed in 3rd grade so up until then she was extremely visually impaired so I taught her to read and tutored every evening when she came home from school on her math and other stuff. I pretty much did it up until last year when she said she didn't need my help. At this point she is no longer visually impaired; I'm beginning to think that she is attitude impaired instead, that's why the grounding. I also don't usually ground her if she gets high effort marks because I know that she is trying but that wasn't the case this time. Her Science grade was low because the quality of her homework was bad, her Math is a problem but I really grounded her more for the Science thing since she has been telling me that homework is no problem this year. I am also holding her hostage with her beloved Color Guard. I don't mean to be harsh with her, but this is so important and nothing else has worked.

I don't blame you for what you said, I would think the same thing but I really don't think she is trying as hard as she should be. Her step-father and I really enjoy helping her, but she is going through this independence phase and it's just not as easy as it use to be.

Diana D, Tue, 14 Oct 1997

Hi Liz,

Okay, this has nothing to do with girls. My son is 14. He tests at the top of the charts. He got Ds and Fs last year one quarter and A's another. This year (freshman in high school) he has been telling us he's planning on getting all A's and that, yes, he's up to date on all his homework, so can he have computer time to play WarCraft, etc.? Then his Lit/Lang teacher calls about the ****D***** he is getting and about the papers not turned in.

I blew a fuse. Internally. He was only grounded for a few days. He had to turn in the papers, even though they are zeros and ask the teacher to call me to let me know they were turned in. Now he's back in counseling. And I am making up little forms for the teachers to fill out each Friday to let me know if he is up to date. I suppose he could forge them. He admitted to us in a counseling session that he had lied directly to me and my partner. I feel like the homework police.

I sat at the table with him doing homework. I went over his papers and praised his hard work and extra hugs for good results. We set up a reward system for good end of quarter grades with special treats, movies and such. And the goals were not too high. He has the brains for straight A, but As and Bs are considered great. He was in gifted program for years. Not turning in the homework has been going on for years. And it's really not the grades, it's the not trying and the lying that are the killers. All the teachers know he can do the work. He just won't bother. And incentives don't matter since he was being asked to do the same math and English in 8th grade (not gifted) as he did in 3rd and 4th. It would be so easy for him to whip out the few papers he has to produce.

So I understand your frustration. His dad hands him money, lets him stay up until 1 a.m. or 4.a.m. or whatever on weekends despite my concerns about it affecting Jas's diurnal clock during the school week. No encouragement to get the work done.

The only way this boy will make it to college is through his own hard work. I'll be paying off a $20,000 divorce and order of protection for the next many years. His dad went bankrupt when he stacked up credit cards and got in trouble with the IRS for not filing returns for years. Could this be genetic? His brother is completely different. Sure he doesn't do a piece of homework or two, but he works hard, and he doesn't lie about it.

I agree about the attitude impairment. I saw it when I taught biology at a community college. Kids would hand in half-finished trash for homework and essays that could have been written by a sixth-grader and wanted good grades. Somehow the hard work ethic isn't part of his repertoire of life skills.

So I am trying hard to detach from Jas getting good grades and concentrate on honesty. At 14, Jas will do what he wants. I'm hoping he can resolve enough issues to discontinue self-destructive behavior.

I suppose this has nothing to do with girls being discouraged from living up to their potential. But many kids' futures are undermined by influences not under the control of those who want the best for them. I think, as mothers, we just have to be there for them and try not to let it drive us crazy. At least the therapists can send their kids to college... :-)

Sybelle R, Tue, 14 Oct 1997

Oh, yeah.... the grades...

yup, all my kids have tested very high in IQ tests (which I do not believe in, btw... too much bias... but that is another topic). And ALL 4 of them went through the not turning in homework, bad grades, etc.

yup, yup, yup.... teenage years, here they come! It is the age when it is not cool to be smart, it is not kewl to be praised by the teachers for turning in your work on time, it is absolutely NOT kewl to have neat loving parents who help you and praise you....

It is the age when you need to have these horrible "struggle" stories of your life at home and how it is such a heroic effort to even finish your work... something akin to ... the neighbor has this horrible cat that likes to eat my homework, honest!

I don't know about your kids.... if I grounded mine they would be in heaven since their favorite pastime is to read read read. The way I have handled it has been to have a talk during which I passionately give them their future... I put it right in their laps if they fail or succeed. They are allowed to fall flat on their dear rears (or their faces, whichever end hits the ground first) and one way of falling is for me to get a call from school. Then I have a (passionate without name calling) talk with them about what is it that they see themselves doing with their life and ask them if they want to be the kind of person that is irresponsible with all the consequences that it brings. I honestly ask them expecting an honest answer. If they answer yes... I say, OK, from now on I will ignore all the calls from school. If they answer no, then I ask them what the problem is and why do they need to get my attention that way. If they answer honestly, we deal with whatever is the issue. If they start bullsh...ing me I call them on it and end the conversation with... it is obvious that you do not want me interfering so I will let you handle it but... and I proceed to dish out the consequences which usually are physical chores... mow the lawn with a weed whacker while I watch from behind a book... or anything else that literally exhausts them and makes them think... I'd rather do homework and turn it in than do THAT! AGAIN.... Trust me, no more missed homework.

However you want to approach it, give them their life... put the onus on them, not you. It is their grades. BTW one of them was deaf and did not speak a word until she was four. She got tubes in her ears and later on in life tested higher than her siblings. go figure... do not cater to an impairment and do not let the kids hold you hostage to their success or failure. Whatever they do... THEY earned it.

Hope this gives you another dimension of thought... :)

Liv F, Tue, 14 Oct 1997

Hi Diana & Liz,

I've got to respond to this, our children's future are of the utmost importance. If it doesn't work out for them, will any of us be able to say "too bad, it's her/his problem"?

A lot of people are having the same problems, whether their children are girls or boys. There are two main reasons:

1.  the schools have turned soft
2.  the parents have turned soft

Since we are the parents, we can fix ourselves and get tougher on our kids, But we still have the problem of the schools.

Let's face it, the best schools are private schools, with a few exceptions. But not everyone can afford to send their kids to private schools.

Here's the good news: there are TONS of scholarships for all ages. During the last 3 -4 years, because of my daughter, I've checked out a lot of excellent private schools, both in the US (East & West Coast) and England - most of them boarding schools.

To give you an example: At one of the top prep schools in the country (East Coast), a family with a yearly income of $42,000 can pay as little as $1,200 (that's right: twelve hundred dollars) per year for their kid. The kids don't even have to be gifted, just get generally good grades. Since they all want diversity, you're even better off if you have some minority blood. Some of the old prep school have larger endowments than Harvard! Approx. 40% of their students are getting some form of scholarship!

When my daughter was in the 8th grade, it was HELL - my former pride & joy, track star, basket ball star, good grades, great artist, etc etc, turned into a BLOB - no interest in anything except "hanging out" with her friends. She had tricked me into letting her go to public school that year - it was a disaster. Yes, some of those kids did very well, they had the tunnel vision needed in a "sink or swim" school. My daughter didn't. She was lucky to get C's. In spite of her threats to run away from home etc., I put her on a plane to England with her father to attend an excellent all girls boarding school (I had to lie through my teeth to get her in - but what don't we do for our kids?)

She cried bitterly on the phone for 6 months - begging us to let her come back - fortunately I'm able to get my ex to go along with me, kind of important, since he pays most of the bills. Some of her friends' parents stopped talking to me in disapproval of my "gestapo" tactics. But the next summer, at 15, she came back, reading Dostoyevski and Virginia Woolf, with a keen interest in Classical Greek art & culture and had decided that she wanted to be a movie director!

After 3 years in England, she's taking her senior year here in LA, at possibly the best school here (she had a serious illness last fall and I want her with me this last year before college). If she had stayed in her public school and not gone to England, she probably wouldn't even have been able to breathe the air of the school that she's in now. Meanwhile, her friends, whose parents so strongly disapproved of my tactics, had to take their kids out of the local public high school, and ended up paying *more* than we paid in England ($15,000 a year for tuition, room & board & extracurricular activities) They are now in one of those schools that everyone gets into as long as they pay. The sad part is, that a couple of her friends are very talented, they could have gotten into the top prep schools on the East Coast on scholarships, but their parents didn't even bother to check it out. So the parents ended up paying ten times more than they had to, for an inferior educations, just because they weren't on top of things. I really feel sorry for those kids.

I grew up in a country where boarding school was out of the question, but now I'm a complete convert. There's no way I could have duplicated all the benefits my daughter had at boarding school, even if I stopped working and dedicated myself to her 24 hours a day. The key thing is that the *students* are more motivated in a good private school. By definition they all come from families that CARE about education (contrary to popular belief, it's not just rich kids - 40% of the kids are on scholarship - and many of the parents are making great sacrifices to keep their kids in a good school - the kids get the message that education is important and they feel obligated to perform)

In one of her first, tearful phone calls from England, my daughter complained that all the other students were too snobbish and discriminated against Americans. When I asked what they were snobbish about, she said "they're so stuck up, they all just want to get good grades" Then I knew she was in the right place :)

Diana, I strongly suggest you consider sending your son to a good boarding school on a scholarship. He's obviously smart, and probably very bored in school. I'm sure they're not challenging or stimulating him, they're probably just "processing" him, like most schools. Please feel free to contact me privately if you want more info, I have all the prep school info in my database.

Liz, I suggest you start "thinking" about boarding school for your daughter - at 12 it may seem a little too early for you, although I wish I had sent my daughter at 12, but I didn't have the heart to do it. But now is a good time to start checking it out so that you may make an informed decision when she's 13 - 14. Please feel free to contact me if you're interested in the school info.

Just like Diana's & Liz' divorces, mine was none too pleasant. I was perfectly aware of the added advantages of getting my daughter away from LA and the built in day-to-day tensions between my ex and myself (not to mention his new wife's manipulations) For divorced parents, a good boarding school offers an added bonus: Neutral territory where the kids get a break from post divorce stress. It worked very well for my daughter, and it was nice not to have to deal with my ex other than in her vacations. It's really a win/win all around.

Cheers,

—see you on the list!!

Family | Career | Art of Juggling | Single Moms | Health
Dad's Voice | Bookshelf | News | Recipes | Sports Mom | Discussion Lists
Business Directory | The Boards | Wisdom of Mothers | Postcards | Resources
Search | About Us | Contact Us |Advertising on the Refuge | Home

Copyright © 2000   Working Moms Refuge.