How do I get my son motivated to do good in school?

Question

He is 10 1/2, doesn't feel the need to brush his teeth or take a shower, let alone do his homework and do it well. We wrote out a schedule for morning and afternoon. Get up, get dressed, brush teeth, eat breakfast, free time until we leave. Come home from school, do homework, have supper, study time, ask for chores, free time (if earned by doing previously mentioned items) shower, brush teeth, bed.

If I don't remind him to brush his teeth, he doesn't. On the weekend he won't take a shower unless he is reminded, which is aggrevating enough. Throw into the mix he doesn't see the point in doing homework. He beyond stubborn! He gets it stuck in his head that he, for example, doesn't have to re-write the sentence he is supposed to be correcting, he just has to cross out the incorrect letters and punctuation even though in the WRITTEN instructions it says to RE-WRITE the sentence. It's not just that, he does that for almost all of his homework.

Answer 1

I would have to say my best guess in being a teen myself... I was the same way. Except mine was brushing my teeth. Thankfully I grew out of it, but what my mom and dad would do is they would stand in the bathroom and watch me brush my teeth. Becuz there was times when i would just walk in the bathroom and shut the door and walk out 2 minutes later saying good night. But my dad would march me back in there and would say well if you brushed your teeth do it one more time to make them extra clean. so that got old and i just started brushing my teeth every morning and night.that may help.

Answer 2

My older brother was like that. Talk to grandma and see if she'd be willing to bribe him. Moms don't bribe, because it will make things hard for us later! Tell her she can give him, say $10 for every A, $7 for every B, $5 for C's, and maybe a special treat if he gets a certain number of good grades (trips or whatnot).

  My brother ended up doing really well when he got paid for it!

Answer 3

I think a lot of what you described is pretty normal.  I have a 22 y.o. stepson, 6 y.o. daughter.  When my stepson would visit us in the summer he wouldn't bathe or brush teeth on his own until he was old enough to be interested in girls and thus, his appearance.  Yes, we had to tell him to brush his teeth until he was about 16.  One time my husband and I decided to stop reminding him and just see what happened.  I think his teeth went several days without brushing because when they (no kidding) turned a shade of GREEN we couldn't stand it any more and went back to reminding him.  He's VERY well-groomed now.

As for the schoolwork--it is boring and no fun, isn't it?  I think you're on the right track to set up his free time as a reward/incentive for getting things done.  Many people set up a punishment system--things get taken away if the work is not done.  Though the reward/punishment is very similar, the negative spin seems to create hostility and resistance.  If you can find a way to put it positively (great, you earned 30 minutes of computer time!) that might help get him through until he develops more internal motivation.

Hopefully it will help you to know that this is not very unusual for a kiddo his age--that way you can reduce some of your anxiety about it and probably everyone will relax a bit.

Answer 4

maybe there are kids in his class who gave him this tought that homework is not important. Many kids learn from watching so is there something that you are doing to make him act this way?