Head in the clouds

Quackers

I've got a 10yr old who has been like this forever!

We know she is clever - but, and she admits it now, she cant be bothered. She is only interested if it is something she enjoys. She loves Maths & Art and that is all she is interested in. Her English is atrocious and no matter how hard we try she is just not interested. We do make her read to us but she hates it and is very slow. Her spelling is really bad too. The teachers say she is capable but because she isnt bothered about it she is not willing to try.

We had parents evening last week and her teacher told us we must make her try harder Although we will continue to get her to do as much as we can there is only so much we can do - and I do believe she does try her best (well, most of the time). Her teacher said that she has her sats soon and she is not going to get a good result.

She is a very bright girl. She told me a few months ago that she nearly fell asleep in class. i went mad and told her that this was really bad and even though she does not go to bed late we should look at her going to bed earlier. She said 'Mum, I wasn't tired - I was bored - it was in literacy'

She said last year that she'd like to be an Art teacher when she gets older. I told her that English was very important if she wants to be an Art teacher as teachers have to learn and teach about artists and various types of art etc. She said she'd find something else to do instead!!!

Glad

starting to read this thread I was about to ask "is she bored?"

I see Quackers has already mentioned bored as well, if the school thinks she is very bright then it may be that she is just bored with listening to lessons that are easy for her, she may not need to do extra work as much as more challenging work, years ago special needs teachers dealt with gifted children as well to stop boredom happening, funding isn't now available for this which I think is a shame because getting into habits of 'couldn't care less' and 'this is too boring' may be hard to get out of in High school.

jellyhead

my son switches off in literacy lessons too. he can read and spell but writing and all the different stuff they learn about - adjectival clauses, different forms of poetry, etc. just bores him to tears. his reading age is too high and his end of year tests were good so they put him in the top stream and he hates it, he's desperate to go back into the bottom stream, poor sausage. having been a helper in school for 4 years i can see his point. literacy was my favourite subject when i was at school but i think even i would struggle not to be bored by the way it's taught today. it's not just the clever children who are bored, it's also those like my son who just can't follow it all (and have dreadful handwriting lol!), those who struggle with reading, etc.

i encourage my son to practise handwriting, etc. but the literacy homework is a struggle and i'm just glad he enjoys some of the other subjects such as history and science.