Then you don’t really disagree at all, as you don’t have a reason beyond “because you’ll lose points”, either.
everyone seems to be sharing anecdotes, so allow me to do the same. I’m going to be a senior come fall. I entered my high school with a full scholarship because of my admissions test scores. Now ask me, what did I do my freshman year. I did nothing! I completely slacked off. But then something happened to me. Ready for it? In my sophomore year not only did I lose 20% of my scholarship, I wasn’t in honors english anymore and I thought I was going to kill myself! (Not really, it was just really scary how stupid some people could be.) So I resolved to actually go to school more and do my homework (which was what made me almost fail. in fact, my english teacher told my mom that the only reason she passed me the third quarter was because she could tell I was doing the reading [I wasn’t, it was Romeo & Juliet and I used to be obsessed with Leonardo DiCaprio, weren’t we all?]) So I worked hard and ended the year with a 93 average. I got my scholarship reinstated and worked my butt off this year too. I’m pretty confident that I will be able to get into a good college and all that jazz. So! here’s what I say and I think other people have already said: let her fail and see what the consequences are. She isn’t going to learn a lesson from you trying to show her the light. Maybe that works with some kids, but it didn’t with me and it doesn’t seem to with your daughter.
Best of luck with all that. Sorry that it’s so frustrating for you, I hope that if I ever have kids they don’t think I’m some crazy old biddy. 
doreen,
You could just tell him that it’s silly not to take advantage of “free” points–by doing the busywork he’s building up a nice cushion of extra points that may be of help to him if he doesn’t do as well on a test as he’d expected.
This may not be applicable to this particular case, but one reason your son should study in general, even if he doesn’t really need to, is because there probably will come a time when he’ll need to know how to study. Even if he can get by, or even do well, on sheer intelligence, there probably will come a time when he’ll need to be able to learn material he’ll have to put time and effort into understanding (this gets more likely the farther he goes with education). Having been able to offer good arguments, write good papers, etc., without having done the reading may get him good grades, but won’t be of any help when he actually has to learn material on his own that is difficult for him. I’m currently suffering from this problem, and I wish I had learned how to learn when I was younger, rather than waiting until now. There’s nothing like finding out that you don’t really know how to gather the important points from a lengthy detailed text when doing just that for many such texts suddenly becomes absolutely necessary.
This is pretty much the same kind of advice as, “You should stick with piano lessons because I didn’t when I was your age and I now wish I had,” but unfortunately, it’s true.
Good luck!
I basically stopped doing homework sometime in 11th grade, mainly because I understood the work. When the teacher explained something in class and worked a few sample problems, I understood it and I performed well on tests; I didn’t see the point of wasting my time at home doing what amounted to mindless busywork.
Another factor was that I was pretty lazy and I didn’t give one whit about my grades. I preferred to watch my GPA fall than to take the time to do homework. I did get a lot of the work done when there was time in class, but I ended up failing my 11th grade English class because I didn’t do the work (and found the required reading to be tiresome and irrelevant), and then failing the same class for the same reason when I had to retake it in 12th grade.
I ended up with a cumulative GPA of about 2.0, a National Merit Scholarship semi-finalist ranking, and an SAT score of 1420. The SAT score alone was enough to get me accepted to college, so I must say I don’t regret my high school laziness at all. My philosophy of not caring might not work for everyone, but it worked for me.
Hm. I can’t actually argue with that logic.
Damn.
Just to chime in, in addition to considering whether depression / ADD / etc. are playing a role in this, I want to reinforce what evan sven, Dragonblink and doreen have said about the coursework possibly being too trivial to interest your daughter. Even though she’s in the gifted program, the work may be too dumbed-down for her. Just a possibility. There are lots of resources on the internet. Since she likes web surfing, maybe you could cobble together some interesting assignments for her that she could research over the net and present to the school for extra credit? There are also web courses she could enroll in.
Here’s my tale, not having anything to do with homework, but with grades/effort in general:
I’m intelligent, was a mature child, & was always complimented on how intelligent & mature I was. When I started grade school, I found out that I was could skate by on native intelligence - that became my methodology.
I was also spoiled. My parents were soft on me 'cause I’m disabled & can’t do certain chores, etc. Not trying to pawn off my fuckups on my parents, but it was part of the problem; my cushioning was too plush.
My compulsory education GPA was a B or B+. I always got the “not working up to potential” comment. My feeling was, “I can get 'B’s without approaching a sweat. ‘B’ is a good grade. Ergo, I don’t need to sweat”. It irked those who knew I was capable of more, but I was still doing well. The real shit started in college.
One variable that might’nt be at work with your kid is what I had to deal with starting in college; major depression. Therapy/meds helped, but what really helped was to hit bottom. So then…
I flunked spring semester freshman year of college. I felt badly (& stupid), my folks were angry & upset, but we attributed it to some medical problems I’d recently developed & moved on. I intended to do well.
I spent the next semester out of school for medical reasons, then returned & again flunked everything, all while pretending to everyone that life was dandy. The second failing semester was the final straw.
The college kicked me out. I appealed on my own, citing depression. The decision was reversed, but my parents refused to pay, citing my two flunked semesters. They were done; if I wanted to continue there, I’d better start looking at big loans, 'cause they weren’t going to burn more money. Otherwise, I could figure out a cheap alternative & maybe we could work something out with the help of my therapist & some group sessions.
Man, was I knocked on my ass. It sounds ridiculous now, but I was shocked when my folks wouldn’t pay up. It knocked my ego for a loop that no one had confidence in my native intelligence anymore.
We talked with my therapist & her overall response to my folks was, “You’ve spoiled her, but good for you for finally not coddling her anymore! Let her live at home & sink or swim for a semester in a smaller school before you invest serious money”. I must’ve looked stunned, 'cause she commented,
“You can’t be a diva all your life, y’know. It hasn’t been all you - you were coddled - but you took advantage & had an overblown ego. Always being told how mature you were probably didn’t help you grow in certain ways. You needed to fall on your ass to see that success takes effort. Start over, smaller”.
I’ve just completed my Associate’s degree at a community college & got out with a 3.5 (maybe a bit higher) & will be attending a smaller 4-year in the fall to complete my B.A. Better late than never.
The moral of the story:
See if your kid has some issues with depression & other problems, as has been suggested by other Dopers. Otherwise, let her sink or swim as she sees fit.
I think that if intelligent young adults are made aware that they must suceed on their own 'cause there ain’t no bail money, they’ll do it - initially, it might just be to make the folks stop bitching, but they’ll probably end up seeing the value as they mature.
Whoa… lots of replies to this. Well, I’m a student (girl) and I’m in the top percent of my year group, though we don’t have that gifted and talented whatever here in Blighty.
I know I’m lazy as hell, but not schoolwork wise. But I do know this - if I decided not to work, there’s not a thing my parents could do to make me start again. And that’s not just me. I just know its applicable to all teenagers.
So I think if your daughter doesn’t work, she deserves to fail. And when she has failed properly and not borderline, she might change her mind.
What do I answer here:
Why not explain to him that you want him to work to his full potential, that you want him to make good grades, etc. Suggest to him that he discuss the issue with the teacher. Perhaps he could negotiate an alternative assignment. This would give him an opportunity to hear the teacher’s side. In addition, he would be practicing communicating his concerns, wants, and needs. The answer given may be considered a victory or a defeat. Regardless of the outcome, it may prove to be productive. It begins to establish that sometimes it is appropriate for him to seek solutions to his wonderings and problems, independently. Also, it would demonstrate that power structures are a reality and that there are acceptable ways of expressing concerns about things we perceive to be unreasonable or unfair.