I think you did the right thing, and I’m interested to know the outcome. BTW, I truly wish that my parents had done the same with me at that age.
Father of two, but both are younger than yours.
I agree with intent and basic approach. I also agree with some of the other posters that, since we didn’t witness your approach, it may have made sense to be more demanding that your child stay in and work on the project - expecting a kid to know how long it would take may have been too much to ask - I don’t know. I’ll get back to you when my kids are that age.
Also - I am sure your child is great and honest and has values - but how are you going to make sure that your note to the teacher gets to the teacher in an unmolested, un-modified state? I ended up honest and an upstanding citizen, but if my parents handed me a note to give to my teacher that had to do with my being in trouble AND getting a bad grade, I’d’ve been hard pressed not to try something…
I’m just sayin’…
My 5th grader dropped the ball on a project early this year. She got a D on something that everybody else probably got an A on. I was pissed when I found out that it was due the next morning, but I was pissed at myself too. Fifth grade is, as was noted earlier, a time when parents have to start stepping back, but you can’t just quit helping totally. It’s hard to know when to let them fail. I felt like I had dropped the ball too, and have tried to be more vigilant about projects this year. Happily, so has my daughter. I think the D gave her a needed kick in the ass. And I think the cold hard grade was better than any punishment I could devise.
OH MY GOD!! Don’t you realize that an “F” would be on her PERMANENT RECORD!?!?! Are you trying to sabotage her for the rest of her life? What kind of monster are you? Won’t somebody think of the children?
I can almost see it now:
2037 Senate Confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Nominations
Senator Blowhard, (D): "Is it true you got an “F” in fifth grade?
BeezleKid: “Uh, well…”
Senator Blowhard: “We have your “Permanent Record” right here…and…”
BeezleKid: “You see, Senator, my father…”
Senator Blowhard: “Just answer the question! What are you trying to cover up? Did you, or did you not get an “F” in fifth grade?”
“SockPuppetGate” is born!
Delta-32 Skee-do!
first of all, calm down, dude. it was a mere offhand comment. my basis is that I SEE a lot of kids who just don’t seem to care about consequences nowadays. perhaps it isn’t like that in your neck of the woods but I surely see a lot of them like that around here, k?
i absolutely agree
and i agree again. i don’t know why you are so miffed about my comment. I added my suggestion that he should have made her stay in, because that’s what I would have done. In his case he allowed her to make the choice and she failed to take responsibility.
However, when I was younger, the driving force for me to take responsibility was an inherent need to please my parents by getting good grades. I don’t specifically recall them EVER telling me to get good grades or else; perhaps it was just the positive reinforcement I got . Whatever it was, they didn’t put a whole lot of effort into it.
This difference I see with my personal experiences as opposed to “kids nowadays” spills over into many other aspects of their lives, which is what I was referring to (I was thinking about the troubles a lot of kids I see 'round here get into). hence the reason why I feel a lot of kids don’t have that “internal urge” to take responsibility for themselves. I personally find it slightly odd because I wasn’t really ever pushed to exceed, I just did. I wasn’t really ever pushed to behave, I just did (most of the time). 
I hope that made it clearer. if it didn’t too bad. I’m not going to argue with you about it. Get annoyed all you like because I knew what my aside was about. And i don’t want to thread jack.
p.s. **Beelzebubba ** , updates? 
Hm. I generally agree.
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I disagree that your wife made her research the person first. I second the statement in this thread saying that if you’re going to give her responsibility with timing the project, then you must give her responsibility for knowing how to complete it, as well. On Friday evening when you asked if she had started her project, you could’ve given her a sock then. Since it was fresh in her mind then, she may have done it then. Or at least over the weekend.
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It was right of you not to badger her to do it. Hopefully, when she receives a poor grade, she will remember it in the future. If not, it won’t be hard to casually mention it to her next time a project rolls around.
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Similarly, I agree with letting her go out and play during the day. I would’ve said “fine, but remember your project is due tomorrow”.
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I agree with the 8:30 bedtime, given that it is a standard, well-known bedtime for her, regardless of how much work she has neglected.
Good parent. Final grade: 94 A. :>
Hi Beelzebubba,
For what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing. My one concern is about the lesson being well learned. I would worry that, in the neverending human quest to shed responsibility, your daughter may see this in her own mind as:
I failed because Dad made me stop.
as you correctly anticipated her telling the teacher, rather than:
I failed because I waited too late to start.
As another poster suggested, a review of the “project plan” would be very useful for her do do with you when she receives an assignment, especially if you can divide the project into steps, and set interim milestones. That way, she can sort of procrastinate a little bit and work at the last minute for the interrim deadlines, but if she meets them (or experiences “consequences” for missing the interrim ones) then she will still deliver on time. It’s a good approach to learn, IMHO.
In any case, better this happens with the sock puppet than that thesis…
Good Luck.
I forgot to draw (or, rather, copy) this map we were supposed to copy once in, oh, fourth grade. And this was a genuine “forgetting,” not an “I forgot cause I’d rather be playing” kinda forgetting. My mom’s solution was to make me stay up and finish the godd*mned map. I was up til 2am copying that stupid map. But lesson learned, I didn’t forget again til I was in high school and could do it the morning before.
DAMN HAMPSTER ATE MAH POST!!!
I assure, it was passionate, eloquent, witty - all those things you automatically associate with the name Beelzebubba
To make the long story short - so far as I can tell My Little Angel feels bad about turning in a poorly-done project.
But the teacher scares me somewhat. We sent in a letter that says “Sorry about MLAs project, but she didn’t start it until 8PM last night”. The teacher sent home a letter that said “She turned in a sock puppet. What are you on about?”
Hmmm…
You have to understand about this sock. MLA used some kind of serious glue to glue a tissue on the sock as hair, and two googly-eyes. The glue soaked through the sock and so it does not function as a puppet. The hair didn’t work well because the tissue kind of fell apart at the point she was trying to glue it.
Hmmmm… I don’t know about this teacher. We’ll have to clear it up in the morning.
Sorry to be obtuse, but what am I missing here? A SOCK PUPPET is 1/3 of her grade?
What subject is this?
The subject is social studies. I guess I should elaborate - the kids in this class have all been assigned a state. MLAs state is South Carolina. They have been working various projects on their state since the beginning of the calendar year. Their latest project is to pick a famous person from their state and (here’s where it gets fuzzy) do some kind of 3-dimensional project regarding that person.
I don’t know the details of the assignment because the paper on which it was written has been lost (how inconvenient!). So this project constitutes a third of their grade. MLAs choice was a sock puppet.
As I said earlier, she’s known about it for a couple of weeks while I only just found out about it. I try to stay informed, but sometimes things just slip right past you…had I known a couple of weeks ago, I probably would have suggested that sock puppet was NOT the way to go (unless there was a show to go with it).
While I can’t say for sure (remember, the assignment page is missing) I’m willing to bet money that the projects should tell you something about the person in question. Of course, MLA says “No, it just has to be some three dimensional thing that represents the person.” I’m tempted to ask her if this is social studies or abstract art, but that probably wouldn’t do either of us any good.
Danalan; Thankyou that was my question too.
For what it’s worth we were kind of hands off parental units as far as home work goes. Except for one disastrous science fair project (and I know that the other party involved is lurking out there reading this). I did step in a couple times when hours of busy work were assigned the Pictsiekids. Basically saying sorry this work will not be done and will not be turned in ever so feel free to give them a bad grade because in my opinion grammar school grades are meaningless so there (sticks tongue out).
Then again I threatened to pull them both out of high school without a diploma and send them directly to college when their hs started with the bs homework attendance crap. So maybe people should take any schooling advice I give with a grain of salt.
On the third hand both Pictsiekids graduated college in four years with dual degrees.
I think this makes it especially important to have that teacher understand the point you’re trying to make and work with you for the benefit of YLA. If the teacher doesn’t care about the quality of the work (“It’s only a sock puppet”), then why would the student?
I would be curious to know how much of a fight she put up about not getting the sock until the research was done (and why the missus was adamant on that). If she challenged that edict with any passion then her later delinquency was just an attempt to wrest control of the project back to her. She was going to prove to you/missus that SHE controlled the project. Sometimes we just make statements and then feel we have to stick by them just because we’ve “said so”. I think a better to lesson to teach in this instance is to admit you’ve made a mistake (if you feel you made one) and give her the sock rather than just stick by what you said earlier “just because you said so.” If YLA feels that your limits aren’t arbitrarily iron-clad but are born out of something that makes sense, she’s much more likely to feel that she isn’t being controlled and thus have to take back control.
Overall, I’d give you an A.
This is the only part I’d quibble with. If a student is given a 2 week lead time, that tells you that the project isn’t meant to be done “immediately.” The fact that the teacher gave that much time tells me that it’s the kind of project that should take several work sessions over several days to do. Getting it done immediately isn’t necessary or even desirable. Getting it done several days in advance of the deadline seems like a better goal.
She chose Strom Thurmond?
i am not a parent, so i may not have standing to comment. but i wonder whether there could be a couple of other considerations. did the child actually understand the assignment? she may have known that she was supposed to do something by a given date, but did she really know what to do and how to do it? maybe the lesson to learn/teach is that if she needs help she should ask for it earlier, but she may feel that she’s being punished for not being *able * to do the work. also, it sounds a little bizarre that this could count so heavily toward her grade. did she put off doing the project because she was just afraid that it would turn out badly? what are the consequences of a bad grade? if it’s just a way of telling her that she didn’t do a good job that’s one thing, but if it means she has to go to summer school, or even, say, that she doesn’t get to go to the circus with the rest of her class, that might be a harsher outcome than you intend.
“Get it done immediately” is my shorthand for “Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today.” I wouldn’t expect the project to be completed on the same night the assignment was given. I would expect a little work that day, and a steady stream of work over the next couple of weeks. And, as you say, I would like to see it to completed days ahead of schedule.
Reader99:
To address your comments, first let me digress a little - MLA genuinely has trouble with math. As a result, we’ve had many discussions on fear of failure vs. actual failure, and asking for help when needed. The missus and I have also had a lot of practice at determining if she’s genuinely having trouble or just procrastinating.
As far as my intended consequences - I want my daughter to learn how to interact with the world on her own. I’m hoping we’ve taken a step in that direction by allowing her to face the external consequences of her choices and not keeping it in the home (say by forcing her to stay up late and complete it). Up to a point I’d say if those consequences are harsh, so much the better. I have it on good authority that the teacher simply doesn’t give out failing grades, so I don’t think that summer school will be an issue.
Note: I am intentionally not commenting on what I think of a teacher who doesn’t give out failing grades. This is not the thread for that debate, thank you
First off, I sure don’t think you’re a bad parent from I’ve read here. On the other hand, I think you’re taking the issue a little too seriously.
Second, why are 5th graders making sock puppets? I thought that was a kindergarten activity.
OK, here we go. I believe in teaching kids values and harping on the really important things: don’t hurt people, don’t cheat, don’t steal, etc. But a little project like this for school is, in the scheme of things pretty frivolous.
Sure, project management and whatnot are also important. But I would save the “disciplinary moment” for when something really big is at stake. If you keep making a big deal out of sock puppets, it’s possible that when the chips are down she won’t take you as seriously as you would like.
I agree that she should have gotten the sock when she asked for it. I agree also that you could have nudged her in the right direction over the weekend. It seems to me that both you and your wife were getting into it too much: looking for an opportunity to fuss and play the parent. I think you could take a page out of Dale Carnegie and just expect the best from her and help that to happen. Instead, it seems almost as if you were looking for a problem.
I also believe that, at the end of the day, so long as it’s not a matter of criminality or morality, you should protect your family and friends. I would have lent a hand to her and helped her to get the good grade. I also would have told her that she needs work on her project management skills. And I think that such a comment would have been “enough” for this particular situation.
So you’re saying that kids cared in other generations. My being upset about the comment is basically because I’ve heard the same thing over and over again for many different generations.
There are plenty of kids I know that don’t take responsibility for their actions. I also see many that do. This is the case in every generation. Some people just do not learn personal responsibility until later in life, but it doesn’t mean their generation is of lesser quality than previous ones.
I work with many different kids through coaching and religious education. Some get into trouble and don’t take responsibility for their actions. Others are great about stepping up and doing the right thing. There are some very responsible kids and irresponsible ones.
Comparing yourself to some irresponsible kids from another generation has no meaning. There are many more examples that you are ignoring, or am I wrong to say that there were some very irresponsible kids while you were growing up??
This has already gone on for too long. Please don’t label a whole generation based on a few examples. There isn’t any generation that could hold up to that kind of scrutiny.
Beelzebubba, I think you did a fine job on this. I’m thinking that perhaps your wife’s reason behind not giving her the sock before researching the person, is this: if daughter didn’t know what person she was making a sock puppet of, finding out might make a difference in what sock. For example: Jimmy Carter: tan sock; George Washington Carver: brown sock. See? I don’t know if that’s the thing or not, but it’s what I might have done.
I have an acquaintance, about my age (in her 40s), whose parents have been bailing her out of trouble her whole life. It’s not pretty. She does the same thing with her kids. Last year, she stayed up all night, finishing her son’s science fair project for him. He had done almost nothing on it, and this woman couldn’t stand the thought of her kid getting a bad grade. It’s a vicious cycle.