Helping son with schoolwork

This is my first time here, I am hoping someone can give me a bit of advice as I am so worried about my son. He is 14  nearly 15, diagnosed in January. We are also waiting now gor an ADHD assessment. He is very clever and at a highly academic grammar school. We have been worried about him for 5/6 years, and with his diagnosis it is much clearer what he has been struggling with and why. The school is helping - a bit. But the school workload, exam pressure etc is mounting. He has refused to go to school a few times and the school have now let him have reset days which helps. But I don't think it is enough. He does most of his homework, but doesn't catch up after he misses days and won't revise for exams. He doesn't appear to care at all, which I had thought was a reaction to overwhelm. But I think it goes deeper - he says he sees no future, no point in exams, cannot imagine working. He has three GCSE exams this year for RE, other subjects will be next year. The first is on Tuesday, and he has done nothing. He had Thursday and Friday as reset days, he did no work yesterday and we left him to it, which I hoped would help him recover.Today I asked how I could help him, he said he didn't know. I try to support. I have offered to help him, to help organise the work, to sit with him, but he shouts at me. I have bought a whiteboard for him, and try to give him advance warning of things, and suggested we plan out schoolwork on that, so there is a visual plan but he doesn't want that. All the advice talks about organisation and giving control, which we try. I don't know what else to do. I feel like I am failing massively.

Parents
  • I did almost no revision for my O levels (GCSEs). If you know the stuff, I couldn't see why I needed to revise. I also got injured playing sport and didn't go to school for 3 months before them and was on painkillers and anti inflammatories. I got a bunch of As.

    I did my maths O level a year early when only 14. I passed it. But I didn't know why I was doing it. I just did it to keep people quiet. Work was an abstract thing in the future I couldn't relate to.

    I'd not worry too much. Maybe it will be fine, if not there is time to recover or resit, if this is a subject that matters.

    It is probably the pressure. The avoidance is part of that. Compartmentalise, distract and pretend it will go away.

    I don't know if there is much that can be done. I suspect inverse logic may help, i.e. the less it matters and the less expectation there is, the more the pressure comes off and the easier it is to do and perform.

Reply
  • I did almost no revision for my O levels (GCSEs). If you know the stuff, I couldn't see why I needed to revise. I also got injured playing sport and didn't go to school for 3 months before them and was on painkillers and anti inflammatories. I got a bunch of As.

    I did my maths O level a year early when only 14. I passed it. But I didn't know why I was doing it. I just did it to keep people quiet. Work was an abstract thing in the future I couldn't relate to.

    I'd not worry too much. Maybe it will be fine, if not there is time to recover or resit, if this is a subject that matters.

    It is probably the pressure. The avoidance is part of that. Compartmentalise, distract and pretend it will go away.

    I don't know if there is much that can be done. I suspect inverse logic may help, i.e. the less it matters and the less expectation there is, the more the pressure comes off and the easier it is to do and perform.

Children
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