Need advice: Son is interested in majors he has no apptitude for

<p>Thank you everyone for some really good ideas. We spent the last two days having a talk with son, requested him to make some changes with his courses this semester and just drove him back to college. He is not going into CS. He maybe continuing his studies in science, maybe at a major with more fact and memory based courses and less concept based course. We hope to persuade him to change and hopefully the college advisers and counselors can help. </p>

<p>susgeek : thank you for your suggestion. I will taking a note of it. </p>

<p>I am taking a lot of ideas given here and incorporating it into several emails I am sending my son. I think, because of his auditory processing issues and also the emotional impact of the subject it may be a better way of communication. </p>

<p>" …to continue funding are and decorator school for the color-blind kid,…" for eg. is one of the many phrases and ideas I am going to copy and use. Thank you, younghoss and everyone. </p>

<p>I got an idea from Blossom’s young employee failure to meet deadlines. Btw, I talked about her employee to son on the drive back. I told him this summer when he is home I am going to teach him and his sister project management, and how to use a productivity tool like MS Project. I think the knowledge and the tool may help someone like him. </p>

<p>To this and other suggestions, son said " You cannot help me to do better, only I can help myself". While I like this attitude (in a lot of ways he does try his best) I am going to point out this time that he is an adult willing to our money, but not willing to listen to us. </p>

<p>nysmile: I took a quick look at the program you kindly suggested. I think the executive function tutor my son had for a year taught a lot of those skills. Since it was a one on one, there will be some compensatory techniques that cannot be taught in that setting. </p>

<p>Son has asked us to pay for more cognitive remediation lessons at his old school. He said he wants to improve on his mechanical reasoning. We have agreed in principle. </p>

<p>Cardinal Fang : I am sorry about your son. Knowing what I know now, I think kids with executive function issues probably do better attending college closer to home. College is difficult enough for neural typical kids, it must be overwhelming for kids with executive function issues. If one reads Dr Rourke, the developing maturity that one expects for young adults does not develop in executive deficit kids. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>This is what I noticed about son. I think sometimes he learn the wrong lessons. He can come up with the most astonishing of ideas of how things came to be. Sometimes, he just draw a blank. I can see the frustration on his face when we asked why this go well or that didn’t go as expected. I think he really does not have the ability to analyze.</p>

<p>Thank you for the compliment; and best wishes in whatever course of action you choose.</p>

<p>My mom has been experiencing executive function issues throughout the past year, so I truly do sympathize with those of you whose kids have EF issues. It has been so very difficult for her, since she realizes that she is completely unable to do what she used to take for granted, no matter how hard she tries. It’s even harder for my dad, who has to suddenly switch gears with mom after 55 years of marriage, during which she had “normal” EF abilities. I see how difficult things are for mom. I apologize if any of my comments seemed flip, Cardinal Fang & others. I can only imagine how hard it must be to raise a child who has trouble in this area.</p>

<p>Good luck honey! It is such a challenge parenting adult children <em>hugs</em> He is so blessed to have parents who obviously love him so much!</p>