Just that really!
He has always been such a good boy, got good reports and praised at parent/teacher meetings.
That is, until the last year, he has detention nearly every day because he’s late to school and he lives literally around the corner from the best school in the area.
Last week his parents got an email that he had been wandering the corridors instead of going to his form class in the mornings.
He was always a stay at home boy, a bit overweight and sometimes bullied because of it but since puberty and shooting up to over six foot tall in 12 months and losing the weight, he’s had a personality change.
He’s hugely confident, think he knows it all, you can’t tell him anything, defiant at school by being late, not doing homework and telling us he “hates that school and the stupid rules” and can’t wait to leave.
The school has the best 6th Form in the whole area but he insists he wants to go to 6th Form College instead, which his parents have agreed to but they’re panicking he may not even get into the good 6th Form as his attitude to work and homework has gone right down the pan and his last report was not very good at all, saying he was lazy.
He IS lazy, he’s always had a very laid back attitude and been a lazy boy.
I know there are quite a few teachers on here and wonder if you can help at all, have you seen this sort of change in a boy before?
Thank goodness he’s still pretty good at home and respectful to his parents, although tries to push the boundaries a little and is very lazy.
He’s still the same with me, although I have seen his confidence and thinking he knows it all. I have talked to him about causing problems for himself by being late for school and not handing homework in on time and to just get on with it and stop the silliness, he’s a clever boy and can do his work easily, if he wants to do.
What the heck has happened to him?
MissAdventure
My boy doesnt need a tutor.
He needs a "kick up the backsider".
Getting him out of bed is almost impossible, and almost always involves lots of shouting (me) and swearing (me).
It's so wearing.
Put his phone, and any other electronics, in another room, then he will have to get out of bed.
Yes, that has been done.
Then he goes to school, tells them he feels unwell and they send him home again.
My gd is yr 9, bright, and coasting already. She is a dear girl but thank goodness I am just gran.
I had to leave school at 15 to begin work …..
Her great gran had to leave school at 12 to look after siblings.
My dd was bright too, brilliant actually , but also lost interest at about yr 9/10. There’s a coincidence .
Every day was a battle I used to shout and holler every day for her to get up fir school, do some school work. dont waste her opportunities…. Blah blah etc needless to say she wasn’t inspired by my wise words and took no notice.
Got myself in a real state, when looking back I should have left it because she was old enough and bright enough to work these things out for herself. Which she did. She’s doing well now and she’s happy.
.
Does anyone remember the Ben Elton sketch when 'Kevin became a teenager
www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Kevin+becomes+a+teenager#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:aa6d8525,vid:dLuEY6jN6gY,st:0
I came to hate my school. It was a very good grammar school but some of the rules were beyond petty. I rebelled. My parents said that if I passed my O levels they would allow me to take my A levels at the technical college. So a bribe I suppose but it worked. I had something to aim for. At the technical college we were treated like adults and the lecturers were very good. I have no doubt that I would have been a dismal failure had I stayed at school. I became a solicitor.
M0nica
Does anyone remember the Ben Elton sketch when 'Kevin became a teenager
www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Kevin+becomes+a+teenager#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:aa6d8525,vid:dLuEY6jN6gY,st:0
Yes indeed!
It’s called “adolescence’, OP.
That’s SO unfair!!
Try not to worry OP as all or most teenagers go through a phase of being bloody awful for a while.It was around 14 for my girls.By 16 they were much nicer.
It was a Harry Enfield I thought.
Utterly brilliant. I wish it had come out before my DD's teen years.
I learnt so much with that sketch.
We now know all teens tend to go through this terrible transformation. I wish I hadn't nagged so much cos it didn't help either of us.
Its been easier to watch with DGC. They seem to suddenly blossom.
'What's happened to grandson?' He's being a teenager, as so many others have said. My 14-year-old grandson quite suddenly went from being a sociable, outgoing boy to an almost-man who barely speaks, hides behind a thatch of floppy hair and shuts himself in his room at home. But we all love him and believe it's a phase and gradually he seems to be emerging again.
At least he's not doing things like his uncle, my eldest son, did, eg undressing with his best friend at midnight on New Year's Eve, and running naked down the hill straight into two policemen, who marched them back home. We were mortified, of course. Both boys are now responsible parents with good jobs.
He'll come through this phase in time.
My son stopped grunting when he was about 22 and reverted to the charming person he used to be as a child.
Frankly, there are a few students like this at my daughter’s school. They are a pain in the you know what and just wander about the school not giving a damn and making life difficult for the rest. I don’t think it’s quite as typical as you all seem to think as a small minority of boys and girls seem to swan around like this. They are the ones who “don’t care” and sadly they are usually the ones who fail at school. Some will turn it around as they grow up, but far from all. I wish I knew the answer as no amount of anything makes any difference to the ones my daughter knows. The teachers detest them as they are so disruptive. Sorry to be negative but it’s the truth from a school perspective. I do hope he grows out of it before he damages his future. On the plus side, my neighbour’s boy was like this and nearly drove his parents mad (so much stress). Was caught doing county lines (they are well off), smoked weed endlessly and went from a great and athletic student to a waster. He is now 17 (failed all his exams) but after a few months working outside, he is now joining the army and doing his key GCSEs again). I’m afraid the weed was a key factor in his behaviour. It seems the young take drugs like I drank babycham! I wish him all the best and think from what you have said, he will come good. In the meantime, I hope he recognises that his behaviour is not acceptable really soon.
I’ve just been trying to reassure my daughter that her eldest daughter, always so good and sweet and hardworking, hasn’t gone completely off the rails, but is just being thirteen.
School is boring, there are so many stupid rules, well there are, but that’s school for you, you get detentions for nothing, unlikely, you don’t need exams, loads of people do really well without them, well, one or two maybe.
But I think she’s alright, I think she’s just a mess of raging hormones, and she wants to be cool, no need to panic.
She’s still the same girl underneath it all.
pinkquartz I am sure you are right, I thought Ben Elton wasn't quite right, but couldn't think who else. Either way the episode is an explanation for the OP
I had to laugh at the clip Monica and I’ve sent to my Dd, with the caption that “things could be worse”.
Yes, I'm ashamed to say my grandson disturbs others, and is a general pain to teachers.
I can only apologise to them and say he most definitely hasn't been bought up that way.
I don't find it amusing at all.
I think teachers know the difference between children, especially boys suffering a teen age crisis and those that are a pain because of a poverty, or a disrupted home life.
These children will have had problems that started well before teenage.
I can remember talking to one of the teachers when my son was having a difficult time and the teacher told me not to worry saying that DS came from a secure and supportive home and would get through it, it was the ones that lacked that family support he worried about and where often the family background was the cause of the problems.
I hesitated to post my thoughts but felt strongly that poor teachers have to put up with this nonsense every day. I don’t know if it happened back in the day, but certainly if it did I was unaware. My daughter says behaviour has got shocking since the pandemic and it’s almost impossible to control the students. My daughter is pretty, 5 ft 2 and very experienced. It some kids do frighten her. How is it right that people go to work to be intimidated by big lads and mouthy girls? She’s more than capable of managing it but she has said she has been afraid of being hit or sexually assaulted by certain lads before now. She’s certainly been told to F off on many occasions. This is a catholic secondary school. Behaviour used to be very good before Covid.
He sounds quite normal 😁
He was always a stay at home boy, a bit overweight and sometimes bullied because of it but since puberty and shooting up to over six foot tall in 12 months and losing the weight, he’s had a personality change.
That amount of growing certainly takes it out of you!
Are you my DGC's other grandmother by any chance?
I would say he has outgrown school and a Further Education college might have a much better atmosphere for him.
I hope he can be persuaded to do well enough in his GCSEs to get a place at FE College and pursue whatever interests him.
Ps I know you're not on my DGS's other grandmother because he has suddenly started working at school, having found something to aim for.
DollyD
He’s 15 and will be 16 in June …
Oh, that explains a lot!
MissAdventure
My boy doesnt need a tutor.
He needs a "kick up the backsider".
Getting him out of bed is almost impossible, and almost always involves lots of shouting (me) and swearing (me).
It's so wearing.
Put him on a course of vitamins, especially the B vitamins.
It might increase his energy levels.
Teenagers need so much sleep ....
(I'm not joking btw!)
Ok, that is worth trying.
He can sleep for days, given a chance.
DollyD, He became a teenager! You may not have seen the 1990's comedy sketch called "Kevin the Teenager" but it really captures it to perfection. Parents throughout the land related to it in their droves.
I Whatsapped him at 9.30 and he was already in bed.
He told me he was really tired and had had an awful week at school and made his parents unhappy again.
I told him that the answer was so simple and so easy for him to achieve, by just arriving at school 5 minutes early and doing his homework and then he won’t find the teachers watching him like a hawk.
That he had the choice of making his last 4 months at school enjoyable and happy or carrying on as he is and making his life miserable.
He agreed and told me he was definitely going to do it, so fingers crossed.
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