Hi parents,
For those of you with a high achieving, bright, HARD WORKING first child wonder how your second child who is bright, but seems kind of lazy will fare when it’s their turn with all this college stuff? My DD 17 has always been super self motivated and on task, we never had to push her, she pushed herself more than enough. At the end of her junior year, she seems to have set herself up well for the upcoming college applications. We shall see in a year, of course. All of her hard work and great grades, great test scores and swimming success makes me think of her 12 year old brother who is definitely smart and doing well in 6th grade, but whereas my daughter maximizes everything, he seems to do just the minimum to get A’s and nothing more. He plays baseball well, but is certainly not as into it as my DD has been with swimming since she was 6. I know she’s probably more the exception and he’s probably more the norm, but can a kid who gets good grades but doesn’t seem particularly driven get into a good school 5 years from now?! I’m not overtly worried about this, I mean, he’s in 6th grade, but the difference between my 2 kids as far as drive and passion goes is super interesting. And this college acceptance landscape is nuts now, I can only imagine what it will be like in 5 years. Does this “drive” just kick in later for boys?!
I could have written this almost verbatim a couple years ago. Super intrinsically motivated and hard working D who is a senior. My son is three years younger and up until this year (9th grade) he was “Mr. Bare Minimum” for school work and never has committed to a sport. He was also very disorganized in middle school and his grades reflected both his work ethic and his organizational challenges. We got him some outside support in 6th grade which helped with the organization issues.
I was concerned he was ‘opting out’ – deciding he didn’t even want to ‘compete’ with D’s academic success. But suddenly this year it’s like a light went off and he pulling straight As (knock on wood). We encouraged and supported, but didn’t put a ton of pressure or anything to turn things around. That said, I very matter of factly pointed out b4 Freshman year that the better HS grades, the more college options there are.
It does seem with boys sometimes their drive kicks in later. My only advice is we really worked VERY hard not to verbally compare the kids over the years in any arena. And to always emphasize hard work leading to success – not innate abilities.
My son ended up changing his social circle when he got to HS and is hanging with other high achieving kids now - so his peer group is what motivates him.
Honestly, it’s a mystery to me how this happened – and I guess we don’t know for sure it’ll last.
Hope this helps!
As the parent, perhaps the most important thing to do now is figure out your financial plan so that they will not perceive unfairness in your college money contribution to each of them (though take into account college cost inflation between them). Of course, each must know the price limit before making the application list in order to make a financially realistic application list and avoid wasted applications to colleges that cannot be affordable (check net price calculators on college web sites).
“My son ended up changing his social circle when he got to HS and is hanging with other high achieving kids now - so his peer group is what motivates him.”
That peer group thing is real. A little friendly competition with high achieving pals can really kick things up a notch.
Yes, we see this too. I’m wondering whether things will change for my younger son when his older siblings have gone off to college and there are no longer such obvious comparisons to be made.
Your younger kid is in Sixth grade? Frankly, you don’t need to be worrying about his college successes now…at all. Lots can change as this younger kiddo enters middle and high schools. He likely will find his “tribe”.
As hard as it might be…please try not to compare your first kid with your second. They likely both have their strengths…and weaknesses. Really, your second kiddo will have college options that are right for that second kiddo.
Our two kids were polar opposites in terms of college searches.
Kid 1 had the better standardized test scores by over 150 points…but those didn’t matter as he was a music performance major.
Kid 2 studied and prepped like crazy…hoping to at least match her older siblings SAT scores (which would have opened the door for significant merit aid for her) but her second SAT was long for point the same as her first. Still, she got accepted to all of her top choice colleges. She was a Sciences major…so a very different college hunt.
Talking about peer groups, I used to say “Who needs tiger parents when you have tiger friends”.
I have two sons - and have this exact issue. Their personalities are completely different. The first one is a rule follower, does what is expected of him, and puts in the effort he needs to. The second one is the polar opposite. He is looking for the loophole in the rule, doing the work that he likes to do and ignoring the work he doesn’t. The second one actually tests higher than the first, but his grades are much lower. Both are in the G&T program.
Son #1 is finishing up junior year, and it is looking like he will get good scholarships and he will be able to go away to college. Son #2 is in 8th grade now - if he continues on his current trajectory - he will have to commute to community college or commute to a state university that is an hour’s drive away (closest affordable school). We’ve explained the situation to him, and let him know that if he can’t go away to school because he didn’t bother to put in the appropriate effort on his homework and projects, that it is all his personal choice. I’m not going to make myself crazy about it.
How do you know my son? For that matter, how do you know my daughter?! I’m really suspicious!
Kidding aside, but this is clearly pretty normal. As is often said here, love the kid on the couch. Your son will probably not be applying to Harvard. Mine won’t either, though he got a 34 on the ACT. He has no interest, which helps.
No, I don’t think it kicks in later for boys, or girls for that matter. They are who they are. My son is a junior now, and is looking at completely different colleges than we originally expected, and they are polar opposites to the ones my college sophomore looked at. In retrospect, I should not be surprised. The schools he is considering so far suit his personality. He is very much deciding what appeals to him, but he’s not interested enough to do the initial looking, so I come up with ideas, then he checks them out. My D was totally on the ball and did it all the way she wanted to, also, but went about it differently. Your kids are not the same, even if they have identical upbringings.
Your son is much too young for you to be concerned about this now. He might change, but you can figure that out if and when he does. Meanwhile, just let both of you enjoy him being him, and for you, save that cash!
They’re different people. Not unusual, mine are polar opposites as well.
Instead of focusing on how he compares to the older one and worrying about his getting into a “good school”, enjoy him. Figure out what school fits him. The school that fits him, that helps him achieve his goals and where he can bloom and shine (how’s that for mixing metaphors?!?) is a “good school.”
Your phrasing in your OP implies stress and judgment. You say you aren’t worried, but your post makes you sound like you are. When you describe your daughter, your adjectives are all glowingly positive - she is the standard bearer to which all are compared. When you describe your son, your description is negative - he is failing to live up to your expectations and is a loser compared to Golden Child. Read it. Make a list of the actual words you use about each. Think hard about how you view, compare and treat both of them. If you really aren’t worried, if you really don’t view him as “less than”, think hard about making some conscious effort to change what you project. Your kids hear those differences in language and will be drawing their own conclusions.
Another parent here with similar child dynamics. I have a DS19 and DS21. Both are gifted though DS21 has a minor LD.
DS19 is hard working (but I wouldn’t say driven) and high achieving. He’s a real intellectual with a wide range of academic interests. He’s in a regional AP program that was highly competitive to get into and is cohorted with other similar high achieving students who all support each other. He kind of coasted through elementary and middle school not being overly challenged but still achieving well. High school saw him bring that level of achievement up to an even higher level. He’s not a perfectionist but is meticulous with his work. I’ve never had to chase him to do his homework or ensure he was prepared for tests as he has always been very responsible and independent. Socially he gets along well with a wide range of peers though his closest friends are in the AP program with him and similarly gifted.
DS21 is an entirely different kettle of fish. He is equally bright but had a challenging start to school with a LD that caused a lot of frustration until it was identified at the end of grade 3. By then he had become quite anxious, developed low self-esteem, and turned off school. He also had a difficult time finding peers he could relate to. He was very disorganized and frequently forgot homework and assignments. I had to micromanage him constantly. He would only do the bare minimum required and always looked for shortcuts. Grades 6 and 7 were marginally better as he was in a semi-gifted program and he developed some close friendships. A change in school administration for his grade 8 year however had the program restructured and it became clear that more so than DS19, DS21 needed that peer group. He couldn’t get out of grade 8 fast enough. This year he is in a clustered gifted program for grade 9 and the difference in him is like night and day. His marks have shot up, he is much better organized, and most importantly he is happy having connected with other like minded peers. The curriculum in his program isn’t that much different than the regular curriculum but it goes at a faster pace and they go into greater depth. He’s much more engaged and less bored and finally motivated to want to achieve which is being reflected in his marks. That success in turn is motivating him to want to continue to succeed.
I too have tried very hard not to compare the kids. Their personalities are very different and while they are both highly artistic they express it differently. We’ve always encouraged both the kids (though I admit to struggling with DS21’s disorganization) but have not put pressure on them to succeed. Even so, it’s been hard for DS21 living somewhat in the shadow of his older brother’s success. Having his LD identified went a long way to improving his self-esteem though it has been a long road erasing the damage his early school years has done to his view of himself and academics. I worried about him for so long so it is a relief to finally see him achieving to his potential and more importantly happy. He’s never going to love school like his brother does, but I can see a bright future ahead for him.
First of all, your child doesn’t need to go to an elite school to go to a “good” school. I would actually drop that mindset immediately no matter what your oldest’s stats and accomplishments are. It’s a competitive admissions enviornment right now and something you might label as below your kid as a safety might actually be a good fit. As a side note, my dual enrolled junior is having a great experience taking classes at a CC. All the teachers hold PhDs, have excellent qualifications, and are passionate about their subject areas and actually enjoy teaching. Some are also teaching at 60K+ private schools in the same city.
2nd of all, same dual enrolled junior changed DRASTICALLY between 6th grade and 11th grade and is much more motivated about college. He still isn’t the best hoop jumper. He needs to have a reason to jump hoops. But when he’s motivated, he does great. I think people tend to underestimate these type of kids. But if you think about it, there are some merits to being more intrinsically motivated than extrinsically motivated and I think that is something that develops slower in kids.
So please watch your tone with both your kids. They will both find the right path for them. You really did sound like you were painting your younger with a negative brush in your original post. He’s an 11 or 12 year old boy probably just ready to go into a growth spurt. Those big growing years were especially rough on my son. Less so on my daughter.
I’ll be honest, my second child is a bit lazy but much healthier. The eldest twists herself up in knots. She is an excellent student that professors flock to mentor yet she never feels good enough and she spent all 4 years seeing one of the campus counselors to help her deal with anxiety and her feeling like a big fraud. She’s gotten much better but it still pops up… the idea that she’s not as smart, as talented, as hard-working as everyone thinks.
Up comes 17-year-old son who doesn’t really give a squid who thinks he’s smart or not. Gets “A’s” easily. Is really hard-working at things HE deems important but pretty lazy about everything else. He does not want us involved in his education AT ALL and since he gets good grades, I leave him to it. Since high school, he’s just been one surprise after another. I think “he never reads” and then he starts talking about religious doctrine and I find out he’s read the old and New Testament, the Koran, the Book of Mormon, countless manifestos and philosophy texts. Turns out he just finished a stem cell project in school that the staff was glowing about and I had no idea. At home he plays with his sister and games and watches marvel TV lol. In the end, he had comparable grades and test scores as big sister. A WAY better essay despite eldest being the writer. Only got one outright rejection to a mega reach. in fact, he committed to DD’s school for the fall with the same amount of scholarship and financial aid.
It’s been studied to death how eldest children are more high achieving and second children carve their own niche and are often under-estimated.
I had the opposite - older son, clearly bright but only willing to work so hard (his SAT score out-achieved his GPA), younger daughter, also clearly bright but set goals about her academics and worked hard to achieve them (SAT and GPA equivalently high). Interestingly enough they ended up at basically the same type of college - large OOS public university.
My son has maintained his same approach to school in college and is achieving about the same GPA so for him no greater drive ever kicked in. I wish that he’d work a little harder only because I know he has the potential to achieve more but as others have said “he is who he is”. It will be interesting to see if my daughter sets the same academic goals for herself in college that she did in high school.
But I agree with others who said that your son is still very young relatively speaking and who he is now may not be who he becomes in high school or beyond. Some of that you can influence but there is going to be a fair amount that you can’t and if you try to hard to influence you could end up creating tension and discord.
We had a bit of the same dynamic at our house, but both girls. A really high achieving older kid is a hard act to follow for the younger ones. Watching the girls and my youngest, a son; the most helpful realization was that kids are hitting developmental milestones at different rates all through the teen years just like they did when they were infants. Some walk early and some walk late, some get teeth at four months and some at nine months. There’s a wide range of normal and healthy. My girls finished high school with very similar, not identical, grades and test scores, but they took two very different trajectories to get there, particularly through 7-9th grades. My son is just as smart but he’s taking his own trajectory too and I think in terms of grades at least, he may need college to begin to appear on paper like his sisters. Maybe he never will, because he approaches school differently and has different priorities. When you add in all the other ways the three of them are unique individuals with their own really cool combinations of abilities and interests beyond grades and tests, it gets actually fun to watch. A snapshot now, with one finishing college, one in college, and one still in high school would show a confident, fun engineer, a world traveling adventurous math nerd, and a fascinating curious school hating musician who will probably make an amazing music teacher. I look forward to seeing what they will be that I can’t see or guess at yet. You just have to be careful about comparisons. We’ve tried to focus our academic expectations at least on each kid doing his or her best, not comparisons with the others, but they don’t always believe us. They compare themselves. I have a strong memory of one of my girls (they were both elementary aged) coming crying to me saying her sister was better than her at “everything”. Within a day or two the other one was crying with the exact same complaint. They were both wrong, but convincing them was tough.
Encourage your 6th grader to read for pleasure, and try to keep him on the higher math track in middle school. That is all I’d worry about at this time. Those two things lay a lot of the academic groundwork needed later.
I have an older kid who is a super people pleaser and hard worker. Younger is unbelievably bright, but will squint carefully at every bar in front of her to make sure she clears it by a millimeter and no more. Wouldn’t want them to get used to her putting in any extra effort, after all. 8-|
We had a similar dynamic with hard working, intrinsically motivated, first child and a “less than motivated” second child. Strange thing happened once eldest left for college - youngest started to try. I am still trying to understand how this happened. Perhaps our family could only tolerate a certain number of As.
I guess it’s more common than we think. In our case, High achieving S finishing college freshmen yr at a highly selective private. Was always (still is) self motivated, rule follower, excelled at everything (sports, academics, leadership, etc.) Daughter is artsy, creative, but lacks any discipline or desire to excel academically. Procrastinates, does as little as possible to just get by. However, she very smart.
We’ve already had the conversation with her that expensive selective privates are off the table for her because she doesn’t show the desire to stretch academically or take advantage of the things they have to offer. She’s fine with that. Actually just wants to perform in theater (is very talented and has always wanted that) in NYC and told us she may not even want to go to college (but then asked if the $ in the college fund would be made available to pay living expenses - pretty sharp kid).
Hahaha, @BearHouse and @intparent ! Let’s hear it for the .001 Percent Club! Clearing that bar, millimeter by millimeter!
.001 percent club. Add my son as a member! Lol!