I will also add, if you end up being an, “I told you so” family, in general, try very, very, VERY hard to not actually say, “I told you so.” Of course this varies with your individual student and family dynamic – YMMV.
Yes, we did tell him so … many times, in many ways, over the years. But we haven’t said that to DS; for us, I think that would just end up building a wall and shutting down communication. When he has told us about things not going well, he has been genuinely upset and frustrated with himself. Us piling on would not help. Instead, we try our best to bite our tongues and listen. Let him vent. Eventually, probe what he thinks went wrong; guide him toward looking forward and figuring out his next steps. Don’t tell him what to do … let him at least start; then toss in other suggestions for him to consider. Keep the conversations short and give him time to think about it on his own. We do keep him honest if he strays down the road of finding excuses or blaming something besides himself (e.g., okay, yes, a 12 question MC final in deforms sounds completely horrendous, but that by itself is not the reason you failed the class; if you’d aced all the other tests that were not MC, failing the final would have dropped your grade but you wouldn’t have failed the class). I think this is the only way he ends up owning it and learning from it. It’s a delicate balance between letting them own it and take responsibility and have boundaries as they move forward, while still knowing you’re in their corner and even if they’ve failed, you don’t see them as a failure. And absolutely, no matter what, even if they no-kidding fail out of school completely … there is a path forward. Probably not to the same destination they’d planned, or on the same time schedule, and yes, that is something to be grieved … but there is a tomorrow and there are steps to be taken. The speech given by Sheryl Sandberg at a graduation this year is an excellent piece about bouncing back from hard times. She says in part, “Option A may no longer be available to you. So kick the **** out of Option B.” The speech is here: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2016/05/15/it039s_the_hard_days_that_determine_who_you_are_382623.html