My Daughter's Lack of Caring

hi K., W. i have been in your spot. i have a fifteen year old that has had the same attitude and is now a freshman. my advice take everything away until the grades come up, if she dont care about the grades you dont care if she has anything to do. ny fifteen year old is grounded from computer, xbox, going anywhere and people coming over till his grades are c's or better. we are currently waiting on his grade card to come in the mail. are strategy to reward him for the grades that are up, and not giving everything back until all grades are c's or better. also since he is 15 we said no driving permit until the grades are up also. i wish we would of started where you are now. you will probably hear "the i hate you", "you guys are mean" and "you just dont like me" be prepared. and be strong. make sure dad and you are in aggreance with what you are taking away. and take away the things that are important to her. if its been going on for ahile then you are going to have to be this way to get your point across. i have 4 children 15yrs, 6yrs, 3yrs, and 3 months. let her dad is in aggreancce and we other parents got your back. be firm and strong, if you dont get it in check now it only gets worse, believe me our house is 2nd to hell right now, sorry for the word.. let me know if you need more advice

Just a suggestion, try giving her a seperate folder of just homework that needs to be turn in each day. Maybe if she pulls this folder out at each class it will remind her to turn in her completed work.

We've been raisng my 15 yr old brother-in-law and we've had the same issues with him. It helped us by contacting each of his teachers and letting them know we were working to get him back on track. Then it was more of a team effort between them and us, and he knew he couldn't get away with as much because his teachers were keeping us informed on a regular basis.

We ask him daily as soon as he gets home if he's got homework and mark his answer on the calendar. When we find out if something didnt' get handed in we know if he lied to us or not that specific day. This has helped to keep him accountable and "forget" less. Plus we make him write each homework assignment in a small day planner provided by his school, and we check it regularly to make sure he's writing down assignments. We're hoping that by getting him into a habit we can eventually lay off the looking over his shoulder and at some point he'll be so used to it that it will become more natural for him w/o being prodded.

Hope these things help. Good luck!

I think you have to do a combination of things. First, tell her that turning in her homework is not an option. (I'm sure you've already done this). Tell her that you want to work with her to come up with a way to help her remember. Ask her for her ideas. Have your own ideas. Use ALL of them. Something will work. Also enlist the teacher, if you haven't already. Ask the teacher to keep her inside at recess just long enough to go through her backpack and see if there's anything in there she needs to turn in.

In my family, we had a slightly different issue. My ex just couldn't remember to give my daughter her daily medication. Go figure. Anyway, I had to somehow teach her to remember to give it to herself. What worked for us was the purchase of a special bracelet that she never took off. My daughter understood the bracelet was a reminder - whenever she looked at it, she was reminded to go get her medication. She was only five when we started this, and even at that age, it helped her a LOT. It is the equivilent, I guess, of tying a string around her finger.

Good luck and let us know how things go.