<p>I wonder if there are perfectly bright people who just have no academic interests. I’ll forego any Sarah Palin references and say that until recent times, the majority of people on this Earth were not educated…they did not study science or math; most did not learn to read. Yet they were successful farmers, soldiers, silversmiths, artists, weavers, cobblers, dressmakers, etc. There have to be genetic throwbacks left who just want to work with their hands/bodies.</p>
<p>I’m a mom, not an educator, but could it be that your daughter is having to put effort into her classes for the first time in her academic career? If so, the “I don’t care” could be a defense mechanism—if she is accustom to getting A’s with little or no effort, she may not want to admit that she needs to study/ask for help, etc.<br>
We had/have this situation with our daughter, fortunately our school has edline, which allows us to stay on top of her classes (at least most of them, a couple of teachers don’t use it). And we have made it very clear that ALL assignments, extra credit, etc must be done. No excuses. Long conversations about how asking for help is ok, how studying/learning how to study is a good thing. And if she isn’t getting her assignments done, she must need more time to dedicate to them—so less time for her other activites, which she loves. (Yes, it’s possible to stick with something they choose, while not paying attention to what they “have” to do). It sounds a lot harsher than it is in reality…she’s figured out we mean business, we are avaliable to help, and willing to support her efforts—as long as she is making effort in class as well as outside of it.
Good luck, I know first hand how challenging this situation can be!</p>
<p>Do her friends fit into the academic mix at all? Are most of them conscientious students (or not)?</p>
<p>The closer friends (where she goes to their house) are smart, good students. </p>
<p>The other cheerleaders seem to be pretty dim bulbs. </p>
<p>The volleyball team seems to be majority dim bulbs, with some bright girls. </p>
<p>Other than athletics and choir, she’s in all pre-AP/GT classes, so I don’t think she’d not do well to “dumb down” to the other cheerleaders since they aren’t in her classes anyway.</p>
<p>Firstly, yes, I think there are people who are simply more interested in things that are not “academic.”</p>
<p>Secondly, it is not uncommon for a kid who has never been challenged in grade school to suddenly hit a wall when things begin to heat up in middle school and s/he has no study habits and no experience of working to master something. (One of the MANY reasons why G/T kids, contrary to popular assumption, do not “do just fine” if their needs are not met earlier.) In your d’s case, I would think that gymnastics would have supplied the experience or working to master something, though. On the other hand, perhaps she knows how to do it with a coach telling her what to do, but not how to do it on her own in an intellectual instead of physical arena.</p>
<p>It is not surprising that a bright kid who has essentially been under-challenged isn’t willing to jump through the hoops required to get top grades in middle school, where it usually involves a lot of following-the-directions and so on that they can find meaningless. Organization is something they really try to teach them at that age–it doesn’t come naturally to most of us. Does she have a planner? Does she use it?</p>
<p>With my S, I emphasized that if he didn’t get good enough grades, HIS future options would be compromised. The teacher wouldn’t be affected at all. He was inclined to despise several of his teachers–and in one case, I shared his sentiments–but I told him that it didn’t make any difference: his job as a student was to get from each teacher what he needed. He certainly didn’t knock himself out to get every single point in every class, unlike some of his friends, but he did well enough, ultimately.</p>
<p>Lastly, having a peer group of academically-oriented friends is a big help. Gets the competitive juices flowing. ;)</p>
<p>I feel your pain–we’ve got one of those, too. Perfectionistic tendencies, feeling stymied by having to actually work when others just get things, plus wanting to just hang out with friends on iChat or hang out in her room and read CosmoGirl. </p>
<p>At any rate, New Scientist had an article a few months back about working to change that mindset of “if I can’t do this easily, I must be stupid”. I’m trying to incorporate the general idea into things that D2 hears from me, not that she necessarily believes me 
Some excerpts from the article (can’t link to it, it’s by subscription):</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Here’s the link to the company; they don’t have the software up and running yet, but it may be worth keeping an eye on.
[The</a> Brainology Program: Cultivate a Growth Mindset](<a href=“http://www.brainology.us/home.aspx]The”>http://www.brainology.us/home.aspx)</p>
<p>Sounds just like my daughter’s mind set!</p>
<p>Edited to further ponder the mindset idea. It’s kind of hard for parents to lead by example here…she was not around to witness how hard I had to work in undergrad and especially law school. All she sees is that I go to a pretty office and bring home money.</p>
<p>S 3, now a freshman, gave the least amount of effort required to pass classes in middle school. Recently,I’ve been talking to him alot on the importance of going to college and that with good grades he could possibly go to any college. He is not a stupid kid. Lazy yes, stupid,no. After seeing S 1 search for his dream college, apply, and be accepted to all that he applied to, maybe it finally sank in. S 3’s grades are so much better than I have seen since elementary school. All A’s and B’s. I looked on his myspace account and in his blog it was telling the importance of getting good grades and going to college. I pratically fell over. He is listening. It is getting through!
Keep talking to them every chance you get. It might actually sink in as it did with my S!
Good luck!</p>
<p>It’s wild that you topped this thead when you did. I’ve been depressed all afternoon because I checked Daughter’s 6 weeks grades online and her only As are in Choir and Athletics! Of my three kids (including one with Aspergers), none of them has brought home a report card as bad as she’s about to bring home.</p>
<p>She’s so appealingly honest and naive. A few days ago, we were talking about grades and she said, “Studying and doing homework just isn’t my thing.” As if everyone else just loves it…</p>
<p>Naive…hah! Kids exist to make fools of their parents. Found out today that sweet little miss was banned for life from Club Penguin for the use of obscenity. I don’t know this child at all. Of course it’s child no. 3. While Parents are absorbed the college app process for child no. 1, child no. 3 is taking dirty on the computer. Her life is about to change drastically.</p>
<p>Honestly, I was very similar to your daughter. Fortunately, I have very supportive parents who never mentioned that I was doing poorly (many B’s and C’s). I didn’t care about school for a while, never felt that doing my homework or studying a lot was important. All of a sudden one day I just grew up. I really think you should help your child to study and maybe try to help her get organized, but other than that, I think it’s a big maturity thing.</p>
<p>In our house EC activities and our paying for them depends on the child performing to his or her potential in school. And homework not done is absolutely not okay.
With that said my youngest who is now a 9th grader kept telling us last year that 8th grade grades don’t count. She did all her homework and did what was expected of her but did not take any extra steps to learn more or ask for help when she didn’t get something.
Fast forward to this yr. She had an event that she wanted to attend. Her progress reports came in all with the same advice. Change her seat and come and ask for help. These were conditions of our allowing her to do to this event she wanted. She did it for the two weeks leading up to the event. She was surprised that teachers were willing to meet with her one on one. She also was surprised at how much she learned. She is continuing the practice of meeting with her teachers.
She did say she is looking forward to Thanksgiving because working harder is exhausting.</p>
<p>missypie,</p>
<p>I just stumbled into this thread. It caught my attention because I could have started it a few years ago. Your description of your daughter reminds me of mine. I probably heard the “studying is not my thing” line a thousand times. She also used the line “he got the brains I got the beauty” when referring to her overachiever brother.</p>
<p>It was a long an painful period. Then sometime during her Junior year in HS things changed (just as familyoutdoors and raiderade described in #29 and #31). The fact that her brother left for college may had had something to do with that.</p>
<p>She did not become an academic star overnight but she managed to improve her grades enough to get into her a good school where she is doing very well now. She realizes that academics are never going to come easy to her (at least not as easy as they came to her bother) but she is willing to put in the time and he work. She also knows here strengths are in her ability to relate to people. Your comment about your daughter being “appealingly honest and naive” also remind me of her.</p>
<p>I guess my only comment, not advise, is that these things are sometimes resolved by time and the natural growth kids experience. In retrospect I can say middle school was by far the hardest time for both my children (and us by extension). Hang in there…</p>
<p>Artiesdad, what did your daughter do with respect to regular, honors, pre-AP and AP classes? I know we’ve got over a year to decide, but I have no clue what type of classes would be best for Daughter.</p>
<p>Missypie,</p>
<p>We are lucky to have a school district that offers many AP courses, not all in the “hard” subjects. I guess that is the good side of an otherwise hyper competitive environment.</p>
<p>My daughter did not take any honor classes, save Spanish (which we speak at home). She did take 3 AP courses (Spanish, Government and Politics and Art History). Spanish was an obvious one but the other two were taught by great teachers and she liked the subjects. She stayed as far away as she could from math and science :-)</p>
<p>Sounds exactly like me. I’m a freshman in college now at a good school (WPI) for engineering, but from the end of 7th grade right through the first half of 10th grade, I just didn’t do homework. I got 85’s in most of my classes, where homework accounted for 10-15 percent of the grade. A lot of times the homework was just busywork, and I would have rather done other things. Other times it just seemed pointless, when reading notes over quickly worked just as well. I can tell you, my parents tried lots of things, everything from redoing the entire prealgebra book over the summer from 7th-8th grade, to meetings with teachers weekly, to bribing me by saying they’d pay for my car insurance if i didn’t miss a homework assignment. None of those thigns really worked, i mean, i’d do them when forced to (being grounded) but as soon as I was off, I’d stop again. Around 10th grade though I started looking at what I wanted to do in the future, colleges, and it just kind of hit me that I really should start doing it. So I did, all for myself. Seemingly after my parents had given up hope, but it just kind of struck me. My best advice, would be to just keep after her, make sure she at least keeps her grades up, and drop subtle hints about the future sometimes. Just make sure she doesn’t stay too far off the right track. And good luck… if she’s anything like I was… you have a lot to endure.</p>
<p>Everyone above has excellent comments and observations. I will risk being a bit of a hardliner by asking: Do you provide consequences for her choices? It would not hurt her to have to earn privileges such as television, cell phone, computer time, by showing achievement or effort (completing homework, improving current grades.)</p>
<p>If she learns that it is her job as a child to do well in school (or the best she can do), just like it is the parents’ job to support the kids, she will value her family contribution.</p>
<p>If she learns she can have the life of a princess without any contribution to her future, where is the motivation to try? </p>
<p>She may have huge fears of failure, as she has seen her performance decline since 6th grade, so support the structuring of her time so she has the hours necessary to complete the work. </p>
<p>Biggest distractions?: television in her room, free access to computer playtime, cell chats? Have her do her homework in the kitchen, or family room where you can monitor her actual on-task time. </p>
<p>As a gymnast, does she get enough calories to be able to concentrate after practice to do homework? High quality proteins and complex carbs at lunch, and for after practice snacks, might help the mental energy. If she isn’t eating salmon once a week, try omega 3 fatty acid capsules for brain function. </p>
<p>Best of luck.</p>