<p>There’s failing and there’s failing. I discovered the hard way that when my teenage son left something at home that he needed at school, and my reaction was, “oh, you must have been hungry without your lunch or your wallet” vs. me trying to problem-solve- that my son stopped leaving his lunch on the kitchen table. ALL BY HIMSELF. Because I let him suffer the consequences (being hungry, bumming an apple and a granola bar off a friend) instead of showing him my superior organizational skills.</p>
<p>There’s a difference between direction- “have you thought about a topic for your science project? do you need a lift to the library this weekend or will you take the bus?” and swooping in to manage, find a topic, check out the books, suggest source material, etc.</p>
<p>For a kid like the OP’s- maybe starting to feel real life consequences is the way to go. If you are late meeting mom somewhere, she gets annoyed and nags that you’re irresponsible (at least I did). If you are late for work, your boss docks your pay. Different, no???</p>