Has Your Son Charlie Just Plain Out Refuse To Do His Work Or Study?

Q: I was wanting to know, if your son Charlie just plain out refused to do his work or study? My son tells my husband and I that he is bored and just doesn’t want to do his work. I don’t understand. I don’t want him to fail the 5th grade. My son also says that all he can think about is playing. When I ask him why he doesn’t pay attention in class he says he is daydreaming. I can’t destinguish if that is the truth or if he is telling me that cause he thinks that is what I want to hear. I have asked the teachers to send some extra work home for him to do or practice and they tell me they can’t do that. Why? They don’t want to show favortism. Give me a break. I need to know, how I can get some help on how to get my son some much needed help? What tests do I need to specifically ask for,where do I need to have the tests done, how long should the tests take to get an accurate score. How do I need to approach the school system on this matter?

A: Yes, we had that problem with Charlie in the 5th grade (and he was on ADD/ADHD medication back then) with him not turning in his homework or getting his class work done. He never said I’m not going to do it, he just didn’t do it. He’s super smart and makes excellent scores on all of his test. Back then we laid down the law and that was that. I would get on the computer and see what was due everyday, then ask him each night if it was done, check it over, and in the morning I would make sure it was in his back pack. It was very hard on us and flat out exhausting. If we ever let up for a second, we would get an e-mail from the teacher informing us that Charlie got a 0 for not turning in his work again. He was in trouble all the time. We realized early on that he HATED to write and read. So when he didn’t turn in work we made him write for an hour. That seemed to help. But looking back I realize that we used fear and negativity to control his behavior. Not staying that you shouldn’t be firm with consequences that you give a child but all we did was focus on what he couldn’t do or what he was doing wrong. When we discipline him we discipline him in an angry state of mind, screaming at him, asking him negative questions, etc….

Once I started reading books (Wayne Dyer http://www.drwaynedyer.com/), DVDs (Bruce Lipton http://www.brucelipton.com/ ), and going to Bob Proctor’s seminars www.thesecretpowerofthemind.com, is when we finally realized how we contributed to Charlie’s behavior problems. Your mind is very powerful! Children need positive feed back to have a good self image of themselves. Whatever you feed, will grow! What that means, if you focus on all the times he gets in trouble in class versus the times he actually is good, that is what you will get more of from him. Build on small changes in his behavior and do not expect major changes yet. You can not beat off ADD/ADHD, instead you want to out smart it. ADD/ADHD can be a good thing. Put his creativity and hyper focus to good use. ADD/ADHD all hyper focus, which means they will immerse themselves into a task that they find rewarding or interesting and they will become oblivious to everything around them. So what this means, is you have got to find something that interest him or something he’s passionate about. For example, my son joined the cross country team this year. He likes running with the team but hates to run or train by himself. So my husband and I had to find a way to make training interesting for him. He loves the beach and LOVES to be on his skim board. We told him if he ran his goal on the beach on the weekends he can skim board afterwards with his friends. The better his time improves the longer he gets to stay at the beach. He went from constantly complaining about his training to bugging me every Saturday and Sunday morning to get him to the beach so he can run. He absolutely loves running his 5K on the beach!!!!!!! And he has moved up to the second fastest kid on the team. Even if he doesn’t make his target time, and we tell him how proud we are of him that he pushed himself running in that hot sun. We apply this reward system with his school as well. Your son’s potential in life is infinite, it just comes harder for him that’s why you must help him develop it. Find a reward system that works for all of you. Is he involved in a sport? Or any outlet that will allow him to exert his excessive energy? This will help with the hyperactivity along with Biometics Cal/Mag supplement. 

You must have structure at home (chores such as keeping their room clean, clean book bag, etc) since ADD/ADHD minds are so chaotic and again you need some kind of reward system. Their mind needs stimulation to release dopamine and serotonin. If not they will become bored. So when a child is doing well you want to reward him/her by letting them spend time doing something they love. A child and even an adult will feel competent when they have a high self esteem. And they become good at tasks or activities by constantly wanting to do what they love.  Make him think, don’t make the mistake we made and do everything for him because it’s faster. Don’t tell him what to do and why. Ask him questions that makes him figure why he should do something a particular way and why it’s a good idea to do it that way. You want him to grow up and be able to think for himself and make decisions that are positive, you don’t want him to go along with what everybody else is doing and follow the crowd.You can get these all of these test done on line: http://www.integrativepsychiatry.net/neuroscan_neurotransmitter_test.html This site also has food allergy testing, heavy metal testing, Candida testing, etc.. Go to the website and check it out. It will answer all of your questions and you can also pay a small fee to speak to someone who will help answer all your questions and read your results. Plus some insurance companies will pay for all of these tests. Here’s another site you can check out too: http://forresthealth.com/store/home.php Or you can go to your local health practitioners (like Centers for Holistic Health, etc) in your area and ask them for these specific tests. Some family practitioner doctors (the good doctors at least) will have these test available in their clinic. Don’t worry about that teacher, you can go to the book store and find work books that he can work on after school. Usually most teachers will work with you so shame on her for saying she doesn’t want to show favoritism. She’s just a tiny obstacle taking your eye off your goal. So don’t let her get you down, okay ;). Set an appt with your principle and if that doesn’t go well contact your State Board of Education.Enthusiastically yours,

This entry was posted on 9. September 2008 at 15:23 and is filed under Charlie's Personal Experiences, Questions From My ADD/ADHD Website. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.