"Lazy" parenting for the win?

[giramomma]

Mar 31, 2014 10:21:25 GMT -5 mmhmm said:

If it were me, I'd tell the teacher I hear what she's saying, but she needs to talk to my son and I will do the same; however, I'm not going to continue to be his enabler and his conscience. In addition, I'd tell my son if he really loves band, he'll practice without the need for someone to hound him about it.  I'd let him know I'm not going to continue along that path and that he's on his own.  Then, I'd back out and wait, letting him know when his trombone will be sold if he decides not to practice.  As it is, he's depending on you to keep him in a band he says he loves instead of taking his own responsibility to maintain that which he says he loves. It's just not a good dynamic, IMO.

I'm a somewhat accomplished musician. I have to tell you, even in college, there were days that I simply did.not.want.to.practice.
So I didn't. And, yes, sometimes I had to be hounded to practice growing up. Even though I was on a track to pursue music at the college level.

Some kids are needier than others. My son is a needy kid. It has NOTHING to do about teaching him responsibility. He gets it.  In fact, I'm a little surprised at what he does get given his behavior.

My H and I were talking about our DS. Likely he's the kid out of all three of ours that will want to find a job and stay close to us, in his adulthood. He's going to be the one that wants the routine, the Sunday night family dinners together. He's not the type to decide one day on a whim that he wants to move 2K miles away, sells all his crap, packs up his car and goes.

My DS is also a people person. He will need to find a job where he can interact with others and chat them up. He won't do well sitting in a cube, staring at a computer for 7.5 hours a day.

[Deleted]

My underachievement is the bane of my parents' existence, even after all these years. I am sorry they feel that way, but I happen to like my life. 

[Deleted]

Mar 31, 2014 10:30:44 GMT -5 @beerwench said:

My underachievement is the bane of my parents' existence, even after all these years. I am sorry they feel that way, but I happen to like my life. 

My parents feel the same way.  


I would like to think I would be ok with an underachieving child, but I am pretty sure that I am going to be upset if I think my kids didn't live up to their potential.    Shit.

[Deleted]

My son is a lot like me and it wasn't until college that I realized how important school/grades and staying on top of things was.  I wish someone would have hounded me a little, I do think it would have altered how things turned out.  But, my case was a bit extreme.  I had zero parental guidance when it came to school.  I remember registering for classes in high school and just picking everything that I thought would be easy.  Why ANYONE would take an honors or AP class was beyond me!  I can't imagine not being involved in going over my son's choices for classes now and at least letting him know what I feel about them, if not completely vetoing taking "pet care". 

My son just skates through school on his smarts.  They don't test except the mandatory state exams since it's a charter and he always scores in the top 5-10% of the state, so he's learning what he's supposed to.  I don't know.  Maybe that's good enough? 


“I choose a lazy person to do a hard job. Because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.”

― Bill Gates

[milee]

Mar 31, 2014 9:51:56 GMT -5 ArchietheDragon said:

Mar 31, 2014 9:41:08 GMT -5 Shooby said:

You seem to be missing the point. They aren't going to want to sit in their room doing nothing for very long. There are standards they have to live up to with out excuses and with out me chasing them around to "remind" them like they are 3 years old. You will take out the trash, vacuum, etc OR I don't need to bother to pay for all the fun things you enjoy in life like cell phones , ipods, etc. They can choose to do nothing if they want to have nothing.

I don't think I am missing the point.  I think about how my brother, sister and I were raised in relationship to these parenting article.  my brother was especially tough for my parents.   He was essentially grounded most of high school.    He was extremely passive aggressive (still is) and he refused to give in to any punishment.  He was smart as anything, but refused to do any work.   He would sit in his room, grounded, and just read.  


I wonder what my parents could have done differently to motive him more to work harder.   maybe there is nothing they could have done and he would have ended up who he is regardless.  

I don't know. 

Before I write anything else, let me admit that I'm far from an expert. My kid's only 14 (today - yay!) and could still end up a mess, so I'm not in any way claiming I have The Answer. But he was (and still sometimes is) a pretty tough kid and sounds similar in many ways to your brother.  Some of the things that have been effective for us:

1) Figure out which punishment is effective.  Doesn't sound like grounding your brother was effective for him if he didn't change the behavior. Grounding isn't very effective for my son, either, so we get creative. Sometimes it's extra chores that he dislikes, sometimes it's removal of the computer, etc. - whatever is his hot button. And the hot buttons change, so you have to know your kid and also be willing to try different things. 

2) Punishment is only a small part of discipline teaching. You also have to model effective behaviours (and that can feel weird, like you're deliberately play acting or talking through things that seem obvious to you.) If he's a smart kid and he's choosing not to work, part of that may be he doesn't understand exactly what that entails, believe it or not. To you, it might be obvious that by just doing X, Y will happen, but it may not be as obvious to him and just telling him - if he's resistant - will not work.  You'll have to show him through what you do.

3)  Inspire him or figure out what his great loves are. Work at connecting the behaviours you want to him receiving some of his great loves. Our kid sometimes has been unmotivated enough that he didn't have any passions great enough to encourage him to be willing to work to get them. That's tough. So what you have to do is both spend more time with him until you can make guesses at what might spark that passion or even (Machiavelli alert!) deliberately expose him to things you think he will love so that he discovers some passions. Once you know what inspires your kid, you can craft measurable steps of things he has to do to get what he wants.  

[sheilaincali]

I wish my parents had been more involved or at least aware of my schooling. They knew I got good grades so from 7th grade on they were basically hands off. I don't recall ever asking them for help or them ever asking me about a project or assignment.  Although I work with my parents and see them every day we aren't really what I would call "close". They don't really know what my life is like outside of work, they don't do casual drop bys, I ring the door bell (after calling in advance) if I go to their house for something. I don't ask for advice or assistance with things either.

My DS hasn't ever really asked for homework help in years.  To be completely honest he's been smarter than me for a while now so I really don't think I would be much help in the actual homework department. However, he does discuss school with us daily. We ask and he tells us. I know what project he and his three friends are working on for AP US History and that it's due on Thursday. Or only help so far was to suggest he run over his lines a few times before he records his voice over for the video they made for the project.

He has a Health project due next week. He asked for our advice on what he could do for his project.  It has to have a "hands on" portion to the project and his topic is Breast Cancer so he asked for suggestions on what he could do that wouldn't get him suspended.  For the record he is putting marbles on different sizes in sand filled balloons and passing them around the room so the kids can see if they can find the "tumor".

We are involved to the extent that we know what classes he registers for. We voiced our concern at the workload of next years schedule (very heavy on the AP classes) and had a lengthy discussion of AP versus PSEO.  In the end we let him stay with his AP plan. 

I've only called the school once and that was when the first year English teacher (assigned to the Advanced English class) told them to skip the middle of To Kill a Mockingbird because it was "unnecessary fluff".  I did complain about that because as advanced Sophomores A. that book is beneath their skill level and B. it's a literary classic and they should not be told to skip 75% of the book.  

[sheilaincali]

One of my husband's close friends is the principal of the local Catholic High School. He claims he spends at least 50% of his day fielding calls from parents whining about their kids: grades, punishments, amount of time on the bench at the last game, homework, etc.

He has said before that if it weren't for the parents his job would be about perfect.

[Deleted]

Mar 31, 2014 10:46:52 GMT -5 milee said:

Mar 31, 2014 9:51:56 GMT -5 ArchietheDragon said:

I don't think I am missing the point.  I think about how my brother, sister and I were raised in relationship to these parenting article.  my brother was especially tough for my parents.   He was essentially grounded most of high school.    He was extremely passive aggressive (still is) and he refused to give in to any punishment.  He was smart as anything, but refused to do any work.   He would sit in his room, grounded, and just read.  


I wonder what my parents could have done differently to motive him more to work harder.   maybe there is nothing they could have done and he would have ended up who he is regardless.  

I don't know. 

Before I write anything else, let me admit that I'm far from an expert. My kid's only 14 (today - yay!) and could still end up a mess, so I'm not in any way claiming I have The Answer. But he was (and still sometimes is) a pretty tough kid and sounds similar in many ways to your brother.  Some of the things that have been effective for us:

1) Figure out which punishment is effective.  Doesn't sound like grounding your brother was effective for him if he didn't change the behavior. Grounding isn't very effective for my son, either, so we get creative. Sometimes it's extra chores that he dislikes, sometimes it's removal of the computer, etc. - whatever is his hot button. And the hot buttons change, so you have to know your kid and also be willing to try different things. 

2) Punishment is only a small part of discipline teaching. You also have to model effective behaviours (and that can feel weird, like you're deliberately play acting or talking through things that seem obvious to you.) If he's a smart kid and he's choosing not to work, part of that may be he doesn't understand exactly what that entails, believe it or not. To you, it might be obvious that by just doing X, Y will happen, but it may not be as obvious to him and just telling him - if he's resistant - will not work.  You'll have to show him through what you do.

3)  Inspire him or figure out what his great loves are. Work at connecting the behaviours you want to him receiving some of his great loves. Our kid sometimes has been unmotivated enough that he didn't have any passions great enough to encourage him to be willing to work to get them. That's tough. So what you have to do is both spend more time with him until you can make guesses at what might spark that passion or even (Machiavelli alert!) deliberately expose him to things you think he will love so that he discovers some passions. Once you know what inspires your kid, you can craft measurable steps of things he has to do to get what he wants.  

Milee, by the time you get to high school what can you take away from a kid?  My mom had nothing.  I took the bus to school, so she could not physically keep me home, she gave me no money (I started working at 15).  Basically she had my high school to pull or my living with her.  And really, if you pull those too many times, they do lose effectiveness.  Some kids just don't punish well because they decide the action is worth what punishment they get.

[Deleted]

I have been told that I was a frustrating child to parent because the punishments never fazed me. I have a child just like me so I now have first hand knowledge of what I put my parents through. 

[Deleted]

Mar 31, 2014 11:44:08 GMT -5 @beerwench said:

I have been told that I was a frustrating child to parent because the punishments never fazed me. I have a child just like me so I now have first hand knowledge of what I put my parents through. 

what is your strategy to handle that ?

[nutty]

I kind of took the line of Shooby, still wonder if I should have done more, but I believe we gave them the tools, their brains. Neither of my children graduated HS, makes me sad that no high school grad pics. Both wanted to get out to work. Both got their GEDs.

[whoisjohngalt]

My Dad tried his hardest to teach me discipline.  But I had "slight" stubbornness issues.  It took me DECADES to appreciate that. 

I think when it comes to parenting I've been very curious in the nature vs nurture idea.  I never really thought about.  I am an only child so always thought that the reason I turned out OK was 100% my parents influence.  And then I met my husband - and he has a sister and they are about as same as ice cream and poop.  So I began to wonder about nature vs nurture.

[milee]

Mar 31, 2014 11:38:06 GMT -5 @gin1984 said:

Milee, by the time you get to high school what can you take away from a kid? And really, if you pull those too many times, they do lose effectiveness.  Some kids just don't punish well because they decide the action is worth what punishment they get.

Yes, if you overuse one particular punishment, it does lose effectiveness, that's why you have to be creative. Once you see one isn't working, you move to the next.  Luckily, our DS seemed to start to "get it" a few years ago and we rarely get to the punishment point now.

As for what works in high school, mine's only in 8th grade and I can only speak to what works for him, but right now losing computer privileges or not being able to participate in one of his hobby matches is a very effective punishment. Who knows what will be effective in high school? But I'm sure we'll figure something out.    

[Deleted]

Mar 31, 2014 11:45:29 GMT -5 ArchietheDragon said:

Mar 31, 2014 11:44:08 GMT -5 @beerwench said:

I have been told that I was a frustrating child to parent because the punishments never fazed me. I have a child just like me so I now have first hand knowledge of what I put my parents through. 

what is your strategy to handle that ?

Beat her into submission! 


Actually, I have no "parenting strategy". I deal with each problem as they arise. 

[Shooby]

You can find a way to PUNISH your child into doing what you want them to do. And, of course as parents there are times to do exactly that. And, you can push, cajole, punish to get results. Yes. But, what you cannot do is make your child CARE about whatever it is you are punishing them to do. You cannot make them WANT to do it. My point is that when real responsibility occurs when it is finally internalized and becomes important to them. But, when they are adults they are simply going to choose whatever they choose to do. So, part of my parenting style is to allow them to feel the consequences of their choices and actions in some of these things such as school work or whatever and hopefully the natural consequences then become an impetus for whatever it is to become important to them. Or not.

[milee]

Mar 31, 2014 11:44:08 GMT -5 @beerwench said:

I have been told that I was a frustrating child to parent because the punishments never fazed me. I have a child just like me so I now have first hand knowledge of what I put my parents through. 

Me too.   I even remember once or twice being very open and up front about what I was doing... "I'm leaving now to go to _____.  I understand I will be grounded for two weeks when I return, but I'm OK with that and think it's worth it.  Bye."

There are some major differences between my relationship with my parents and my son's relationship with me, however and I'm hoping we can avoid those types of issues.  My parents didn't know me well enough (or frankly care enough) to know what my hot buttons were so they weren't as good at punishing as I am.  And before you think that's mean, I knew I had to be good at it to gain my son's respect early on before he developed into just that type of teen that I was.  I think we're there in that he is fully clear on the fact that if he deliberately defies me in that way, he will be punished and I will make sure that the punishment is way worse than whatever benefit or fun he got out of his actions.  But we also have a much better relationship and we've helped him develop better communication and problem solving tools, so I think we won't get to those point-of-no-return situations as frequently as my parents and I did.  So far, so good - he thinks we're tough but fair.  He also understands the system; it's not arbitrary and he has the chance to get many of the things he really wants and enjoys by working with and not against us.  (Not the case with my parents/me; there was no system, things were very arbitrary and changed all the time, and no matter how well I did there was no chance to influence/change/achieve anything, so why bother?)

[Deleted]

See, I think I would have been easy to manipulate into doing well in school with bribery.  But, my Mom didn't seem to care about what I was doing in school, so neither did I.  There was no expectations, no rewards for doing well, no punishment for failing classes.   Not saying she was a bad mom.  She was young and single and worked hard to keep food on the table and the bills paid, but when it came to school I think she took the sink or swim mentality a bit too extreme.  I was skipping school starting in grade school!

[Deleted]

There are some major differences between my relationship with my parents and my son's relationship with me

YES!

Also, we have 2 kids instead of 6 so I have more time and energy to spend with DD. I don't take her "I did my homework already" at face value, for starters. 

[sheilaincali]

What do your kids do that you have to spend so much time either punishing them or dreaming up ways to punish them? I really don't get it. I know I should be grateful that I have the kid I have because all of this talk of punishment is really strange to me.

DS will be 16 at the end of April. We haven't had to punish him for anything in several years. This makes me wonder if I am missing something.

So, seriously,  what are your kids doing that require punishments? 

I was punished frequently for missing my curfew that was the only thing I ever did wrong.  I petitioned my parents to cancel my unnecessary curfews and once they did I never got in trouble from them again.  

[swamp]

Mar 31, 2014 12:04:48 GMT -5 sheilaincali said:

What do your kids do that you have to spend so much time either punishing them or dreaming up ways to punish them? I really don't get it. I know I should be grateful that I have the kid I have because all of this talk of punishment is really strange to me.

DS will be 16 at the end of April. We haven't had to punish him for anything in several years. This makes me wonder if I am missing something.

So, seriously,  what are your kids doing that require punishments? 

I was punished frequently for missing my curfew that was the only thing I ever did wrong.  I petitioned my parents to cancel my unnecessary curfews and once they did I never got in trouble from them again.  

I tell DD to do X.  She looks at me, tells me "You can't tell me what to do" and walks away.   I physically go get her to do it, and she drops on the floor. 

She does NOT like being told what to do.  

[sheilaincali]

Swamp- Wow. That's crazy. I've never had DS do anything like that. I can only imagine how frustrating that must be.

To be fair- the Boy may have behaved like that 10 years ago and I just repressed the memories. I can't imagine him at nearly 16 dropping to the floor and throwing a fit if I asked him to unload the dishwasher.

Reading this is really making me worried that the other shoe will drop and my kid will turn into one of these horrible, moody teenagers you hear about.

[Deleted]

Mar 31, 2014 13:15:05 GMT -5 sheilaincali said:

Swamp- Wow. That's crazy. I've never had DS do anything like that. I can only imagine how frustrating that must be.

To be fair- the Boy may have behaved like that 10 years ago and I just repressed the memories. I can't imagine him at nearly 16 dropping to the floor and throwing a fit if I asked him to unload the dishwasher.

Reading this is really making me worried that the other shoe will drop and my kid will turn into one of these horrible, moody teenagers you hear about.

Yeah, just take your perfect son and go away.  Let the rest of us bitch about ours. 

Some people do luck out.  My cousin's son is amazing. 

[raeoflyte]

According to my parents I was a really good teenager.  But I was that way to make sure that I had liberties to do all the other stuff they didn't know about.  My poor kids are going to have 2 parents who assume they are up to no good regardless of how they behave.  

[swamp]

Mar 31, 2014 13:15:05 GMT -5 sheilaincali said:

Swamp- Wow. That's crazy. I've never had DS do anything like that. I can only imagine how frustrating that must be.

To be fair- the Boy may have behaved like that 10 years ago and I just repressed the memories. I can't imagine him at nearly 16 dropping to the floor and throwing a fit if I asked him to unload the dishwasher.

Reading this is really making me worried that the other shoe will drop and my kid will turn into one of these horrible, moody teenagers you hear about.

DD is 6. It's only going to get uglier.

DS is pretty easy going. He's much more cooperative.

DD has spit at me before when I told her to do whatever.

[Chocolate Lover]

Mar 31, 2014 10:22:10 GMT -5 ArchietheDragon said:

Mar 31, 2014 10:19:20 GMT -5 @beerwench said:

The school did not fail me. I learned what they were trying to teach and I didn't want to do any extra work. I passed my tests with flying colors and I was just deemed a lazy student. So I also learned how to work the system; I knew if I passed the Regents Exam they would move me up no matter what my grades were. And they always did. 

The school failed you, greatly.  The school taught you how to get around working.  If that isn't a fail, I don't know what is. 

She learned how to understand the system and work within it and she learned the material they're teaching. Not her fault they were so transparent or that passing from one grade to the next was so simple.

[sheilaincali]

I had several aunts/uncles tell me "if I had the second one first he/she would be any only child!"  That's not why we only had one but it was a factor

MPL_ The Boy isn't perfect, he's a great kid but he has his flaws. He is a night owl and stays up half the night. Still gets up fine in the morning but I can hear him roaming the house at 2am all the time. He's decided that he wants to dress up for school. As in dress pants, dress shirt and bowtie.  He rocks the bowties but it still goofy. 

I do think you are right though- it's mostly dumb luck that he's a good kid.  When I was his age I was sneaking out to meet boys and when DH was his age he was skipping school and drinking.  So obviously he hasn't taken after us yet

The biggest problem we have right now is that he doesn't want to learn how to drive. We desperately want him driving so we can stop having to shuttle him around (his 7 am practices are getting real old).  We sat him down and had a long talk with him this weekend about the importance of him learning how to drive. DH is going to take him out practicing after school today.  We bought DH a new car (YM approved- paid cash for it) so hopefully he'll be more willing to drive.  He doesn't like driving my Volvo SUV since it's a tank in his opinion.  

[Chocolate Lover]

Sheila, I find the non driving teenager more blessing than pain, but he doesn't have anywhere to be at 7AM either.  He has nothing to drive and, in his words, nowhere to go so he can continue to save me car insurance money by not doing so. Be my guest....

[swamp]

Mar 31, 2014 13:54:10 GMT -5 @wrongsideof30 said:

We don't use punishment at our house, although if my kid ever spit at me, I'm pretty sure I'd immediately turn into my mom and start spanking and maybe even break out the bar of soap.

Both of my kids have a lazy streak and I have to work extra hard to keep them motivated and engaged. It can be pretty tiring.

She got spanked for the spitting.

She has also stuck out her tongue.  After a couple of warnings that I was going to put soap on it, she tried it again.  She got soap on it.  Thank god for the dispensers right there at the sink.  She has not done it again.

When this goes on DS just looks at DD like she has 4 heads. 

My mother tells me that DD is just like my sister.  It's not fair. 

[Deleted]

Mar 31, 2014 13:42:18 GMT -5 Chocolate Lover said:

Mar 31, 2014 10:22:10 GMT -5 ArchietheDragon said:

The school failed you, greatly.  The school taught you how to get around working.  If that isn't a fail, I don't know what is. 

She learned how to understand the system and work within it and she learned the material they're teaching. Not her fault they were so transparent or that passing from one grade to the next was so simple.

Not her fault at all.     not necessarily the schools fault either.  They may have been doing the best they could.  But it sounds like another environmental would have been better in challenging her and motivating her to learn. 

[swamp]

You just can't motivate some people.

My brother is a slug. Always has been always will be.  Will only do something when he wants to do it.