Help please with 10 year old DD - Page 2

[VisionaryMom]

So, this is her schedule:

Monday evening: skating

Tuesday evening: Tae Kwon Do & piano

Wednesday evening: piano

Thursday evening: Tae Kwon Do

Friday evening: skating

Saturday morning: skating

2 mornings a week before school: skating

When did you expect her to make up 7 days of homework and still get enough sleep? I suppose she could have spent a Sunday doing it, but she should get some downtime. It seems there's just too much on the schedule. I would imagine the reason she sits & reads when she's at home is to get a break. Reading lets you relax. I read voraciously all of the time, but if my life starts spinning out of control, I will ramp up my reading to give myself a calming mechanism - kind of like others meditate or do yoga.

[Linda on the move]

Originally Posted by StoriesInTheSoil 

If skating is something she really loves, regardless of whether she is good at it or not, please don't pull her due to her grades.

When I was 11, I was in my second semester of 6th grade in a very accelerated program for the profoundly gifted and we were having some stress at home.  I got a B on a report card and my mom pulled me out of ballet.  I soon began getting Ds and withdrawing from my friends.

This deserves repeating.

[Tjej]

Personally, I'd have one piano, one Tae-Kwon Do, and 3 or 4 skating practices a week (cutting one or two evening practices).  It would free up 2 or 3 more evenings.

Tjej

[qandrews]

First of all, the child is only in 5th grade. 5th grade is an excellent time to learn organization. Typically, children in 5th grade do not yet have a good grip on organization skills.

Schools are not really good at teaching organization skills, so it would be best if you could work with her on organization. It sounds like she forgets to hand in assignments, does not do well on getting make up lessons from the teachers and so forth. Punishing her will probably not achieve the goal, but working with her on that will. You can buy her an organizer, or if she has one, help her keep it updated. Show her how to keep an organizer updated, how to keep her notes organized, how to write down assignments on the right page, Also, you can help her by reminding her "remember to pick up the make up notes from the teacher", or "remember to hand in your homework". It is ok at this point to help her, she is very young and might even be overwhelmed.

Of course, another suggestion would be to lighten up a bit the load of extra curricular activities. I am not saying to give up some activities that she loves and is very talented at. I am talking about asking her about all these activities, which ones are important to her and which are less important. Establish a priority list. Then you can decide if she gives up a low priority activity, or just reduces the amount of time she is spending there. Maybe Tae Quon Do only in the summer, piano in the winter? This way, in the course of a year she gets both, but not at the same time?

Hope this helps.

Esther Andrews

http://www.all-gifted-children.com

[chaimom]

I know exactly what you're talking about in terms of a talented, driven child.  My 3rd grade son sounds a lot like your dd, only he does competitive gymnastics, excels at violin and is in a gifted magnet school with high expectations.  It's just not as simple as telling him he has to choose one activity.  He's good at virtually everything, he likes everything and he has the passion to put in the hard work.  We really tried to discourage him this year in gymnastics because it's demanding, but he was willing to give up everything in order to compete-- how can a parent say no to a kid who's willing to work so hard? Same with violin. He doesn't practice a fraction of the time his teacher wants him to, yet he's good at it.  

But like your dd, he recently had trouble turning in his homework. It coincided with the height of gymnastics season, so I think he was tired.  He was behind in math and writing.  So we took away the computer and TV, which he did in the mornings, for a month. He's an avid bedtime reader, but we would have taken that away, too, if he hadn't completed his homework each day.  We also created a homework planner that also included all his activities to keep him on-task.  We got involved in his schedule in a way we hadn't earlier in the year.  And within weeks, he was back on track.  But we're not letting up on the planner.  

I hope you tell your dd you've changed her mind about making her quit skating.  I know it would devastate my son if we took away gymnastics.  There must be another way to get her back on track.  Maybe it doesn't even involve punishment, just more prodding. At any rate, I get it.  It's a tough dilemma.

[Casha'sMommy]

Originally Posted by chaimom 

I know exactly what you're talking about in terms of a talented, driven child.  My 3rd grade son sounds a lot like your dd, only he does competitive gymnastics, excels at violin and is in a gifted magnet school with high expectations.  It's just not as simple as telling him he has to choose one activity.  He's good at virtually everything, he likes everything and he has the passion to put in the hard work.  We really tried to discourage him this year in gymnastics because it's demanding, but he was willing to give up everything in order to compete-- how can a parent say no to a kid who's willing to work so hard? Same with violin. He doesn't practice a fraction of the time his teacher wants him to, yet he's good at it.  

But like your dd, he recently had trouble turning in his homework. It coincided with the height of gymnastics season, so I think he was tired.  He was behind in math and writing.  So we took away the computer and TV, which he did in the mornings, for a month. He's an avid bedtime reader, but we would have taken that away, too, if he hadn't completed his homework each day.  We also created a homework planner that also included all his activities to keep him on-task.  We got involved in his schedule in a way we hadn't earlier in the year.  And within weeks, he was back on track.  But we're not letting up on the planner.  

I hope you tell your dd you've changed her mind about making her quit skating.  I know it would devastate my son if we took away gymnastics.  There must be another way to get her back on track.  Maybe it doesn't even involve punishment, just more prodding. At any rate, I get it.  It's a tough dilemma.

This is the exact reason I suggested just lightening the child's load a bit by reducing a couple of activities by just one day per week. It could be a temporary change to her schedule as well.

My 16yo dd was just faced with making a tough decision about her schedule. She's got a lot on her plate. She's graduating a year early and in order to do so she must attend summer school this year, she's striving for acceptance at a prestigious university so her grades must remain high, she's attempting acceptance to National Honor Society, she's taking the SAT this fall, she was planning to go to DC for 12 days this summer leaving the day after summer school lets out, she's looking for a job, she makes you tube videos (make up tutorials, product reviews, etc), she's looking for volunteer opportunities, she has daily chores, and she has almost no social life but she tries to make time for friends.

After discussing all that she has going on this year dd decided to put DC on the back burner until next summer and, hopefully, she'll be able to find the time to go. It was a difficult decision for her but, ultimately, she had to decide what's most important to her.