I have been watching “World’s Worst Mom” on TV, since it is helmed by Lenore Skenazy, whose “free range kids” concept has been my parenting inspiration. Years ago, Lenore allowed her 10-year-old to ride the subway alone – and ended up making national news, a book, and now a TV show to support her parenting style.
She’s my reminder to step outside my fears and allow my kids to be kids.
Meanwhile, the parents on her new TV show make me look like Mom of the Year. With all of my screeching and changing rules and odd negotiation tactics with my tw/eens, I actually look good.
A mom of a 10- and 12-year-old wouldn’t allow her children to have playdates. They couldn’t play in the backyard unsupervised. And when they tried to actually bounce on their own trampoline, they were reprimanded. What is the point of having a trampoline if the kids can’t bounce?
Luckily, Lenore stepped in and saved the day. The mom – who was deathly afraid of water, but owned both a backyard swimming pool and a boat – actually took a 10-story plunge on a water slide by the end of the show.
It’s amazing what can happen in 23 minutes.
Another mom, on another episode, wasn’t as fortunate. She determined Lenore to be completely insane, and insisted that her five kids would never, ever, ever walk the three blocks to school without her – even though they were ecstatic during the trip made especially for the show. (I suppose mom allowed it since the cameraman followed them the whole way to keep them safe.)
I feel better, knowing that there are parents who are more neurotic than I am. It’s sad that it takes a set of parents willing to imprison their own children to make me feel better – but it certainly does.
For now.
After two postponements due to snow, the high school finally held its Introduction to IB program.
For those still uninitiated, the IB program is the International Baccalaureate diploma program. Basically it’s a high school degree that’s accepted worldwide and, if one ignores all the controversy about whether or not it’s actually better than the more practiced Advanced Placement program, an IB diploma supposedly guarantees admittance into top universities. The program only takes two years to complete, but there are a number of prerequisites that have to be taken in 9th and 10th grade, so that the rigorous IB schedule is possible in the junior and senior years.
Dylan’s school has an optional IB Certification Program, which – given his ADHD and hands-on learning style – is, without a doubt, a better fit for Dylan. For the IBCP, Dylan needs to choose a pathway. The pathway choices are quite limited. Since he chose an engineering pathway in middle school, we assumed he would follow the engineering pathway.
But he’s been hesitant about taking the introductory class for engineering.
“Everybody says there’s like a ton of homework in that class,” Dylan said. Had he not been uprooted and gone to a private school (with no engineering classes), Dylan would have been taking that class in 8th grade – and he has friends who are taking it now, and reporting back to him.
So I started to question his issues with engineering. He’s been building things out of nothing since he was old enough to sit up on his own. His focus would quadruple when given manipulatives with which to create. He’s a brilliant designer – with his hands – but doesn’t care much about drawing, or designing, or even conceptualizing.
He likes to build without thinking about it first. And engineering is all about the thinking part that takes place before building.
Later, I asked him about engineering again. “I thought I would really like it,” he said. “But you just draw and draw and draw. I thought it was like construction, only smaller.”
So, I thought, engineering is probably out. (And then I wrote that whole blog about how algebra turned him against engineering which, I now see, was probably entirely false.)
Then, last night, they announced two new pathway choices – things that, in spite of my years of research, had never appeared on my radar. One of them was justice and law, and the other is media production. Both of these interested Dylan, and the words “media production” made my heart skip a little beat in ecstasy. (I majored in communications in college, so I have a weakness for that sort of thing.)
Then, it was announced, there is a chance that they will also offer a computer coding option as a pathway within the next year – meaning, Dylan could choose that, too.
So now I have a new mission: find out about the coding pathway. See how much media production is involved in media production. See how many hands-on classes Dylan can take, and still get an IB certificate – without taking engineering, which he no longer likes.
Oh yeah, and also, create a new list of choices for Dylan so he can choose, and not me.
I took Shane into his Sunday School classroom a bit early. He goes to the “4th and 5th grade boys” class.
We were so early, in fact, that the teacher hadn’t arrived yet. One other boy was in the room – a very large boy, even for fifth grade. I’ll call him Bob, although I have no idea of his real name.
Bob was drawing on a white board with a marker. Meanwhile, I sat down with Shane to wait with the teacher.
“You can just leave,” Shane said to me.
“But I want to stay with you,” I told him.
He didn’t respond. I glanced at his feet. His white socks were falling down – or had never been properly pulled up, which is quite likely since I am such a stickler for making sure he has high quality socks.
“How are those socks?” I asked him, while Bob continued to draw on the white board across the room.
“They’re okay,” Shane said.
“Are they comfortable like that?” I asked.
“They’re okay,” he said again.
“Do you think you might like to pull them up, or do you prefer them falling down into your shoes?”
For one moment, Shane was still my baby. The next moment, his babyhood ended.
He spoke quietly, but with real conviction. “Stop talking about this stuff!” he said.
It was obvious, quite suddenly, that I had embarrassed him in front of Bob. Since Shane had never, ever been particular about what I said to him before, in front of anyone, I was a bit … surprised.
I stopped talking about socks.
Meanwhile, Bob left the white board and came over and sat down. He had drawn a very intricate picture of an electric eel that could easily have been featured in a publication somewhere.
“Did you draw that?” I asked Bob, as if I hadn’t seen him do it.
“Yeah,” said Bob.
“Do you ever draw comic books?”
“Sometimes,” he said.
“You should, if you can draw like that,” I told him. Bob responded by thumping on the table.
Shane echoed Bob’s thumping. Then Bob thumped back.
I got up to go to church. The teacher still wasn’t there, but I was not needed.
“Have fun guys,” I said, patting Shane’s head – and instantly regretting it.
As I walked out, the dueling drummers continued – having a great time, now that the old lady was gone.
In order to make sense of the whole IB thing – for Dylan, and for myself – I studied the IBCP program in great detail. Then I studied the IB program (which will not work for Dylan, for a variety of reasons). Then I studied the most important thing of all: the actual requirements for high school graduation.
Interestingly, there aren’t a lot of requirements to graduate. Dylan gets a choice of a whole slew of classes – almost like college – and just has to decide which path he wants to travel. So I made him lists, to show him what his different path options might look like on any given day.
He will be coming into the school with three high school credits: Algebra I, Physics and Guitar 1. I kept that in mind, and I included a lot of music and P.E., since he loves both. Then I remembered that AP classes hold a ton of weight, since you can (and maybe he will!) get college credit for those.
Here’s what the options look like:
MINIMUM EFFORT (HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATE)
Grade 9: English, Guitar 2, Geometry, Applied Science, U.S. History, General P.E., Chorus
Grade 10: English, Health, Bridge to Algebra II, Biology, World History, Chorus, Volleyball
Grade 11: English, Algebra II, Net Sports, Government, Theater, Piano I, Chorus
Grade 12: English, Pre-Calculus, Foundations of Technology, Basketball, Piano II, Digital Photo, Chorus
ACTUAL EFFORT WITH PASSIONS EMPHASIZED (COLLEGE BOUND)
Grade 9: Honors English, Foundations of Technology, Honors Geometry, Applied Science, U.S. History, P.E., Guitar 2
Grade 10: Honors English, Introduction to Engineering Design, Algebra II, Honors Biology, AP World History, Concert Choir, Honors Health
Grade 11: Honors English, Pre-Calculus, Principals of Engineering, AP Government, TV Production I, AP Music Theory, Chamber Choir
Grade 12: Honors English, Calculus, AP Psychology, Radio Production, Aerospace Engineering, Concert Choir, Chamber Choir
SERIOUS EFFORT WITH SERIOUS FOCUS (IB CAREER-PREP AND COLLEGE BOUND)
Grade 9: Honors English, Guitar 2, Geometry, Applied Science, U.S. History, P.E., Introduction to Engineering Design
Grade 10: Honors English, Honors Health, Algebra II, Biology, World History, Concert Choir, Principles of Engineering
Grade 11: IB English, Pre-Calculus, Digital Electronics, AP Government, Global Information Technology, Net Sports, Chamber Choir
Grade 12: IB English, IB Mathematical Studies, Foundations of Technology, Engineering Design, IB Music, Chamber Choir, Concert Choir
I’ve learned two things from all of this.
1. There are too bloomin’ many choices! … and,
2. It just doesn’t matter all that much which classes he chooses – although it does matter if he gets good grades in whatever he chooses. And that’s going to be another fight altogether.
After all this research and work and plotting and planning, I am so overwhelmed that I’ve had to take a big step backward. At this point, my head begins to swarm with that Doris Day song from my childhood – so many, many years ago…
Que sera, sera… whatever will be, will be.
The future’s not ours to see. Que sera, sera.
Shane has been rejected for so much in the past few years, it pains me.
The key to that sentence is, of course, that it pains me. Shane recovered from each and every rejection beautifully, and never talks about it, even in passing.
He didn’t get into the Gifted & Talented program – while most of his friends did, and those who didn’t get in were waitlisted – and two of those ended up in the GT program in 5th grade. Shane didn’t even get waitlisted.
A year later, every single one of his best friends – and several acquaintances – were chosen to be safety patrols. The selection process completely overlooked Shane.
So when Shane was voted in as one of only two student government representatives, everyone leapt for joy. He is thrilled with his new position, and does a great job.
Around the same time, Shane decided that he’d like to attend the local magnet program for performing arts. He enjoys acting classes, and thinks he’d like to go to a school that emphasizes the arts.
My stomach sank. The program is a lottery, and people are chosen quite randomly. Other than gender, possibly, there is no way to influence the decision about middle school. I thought, I don’t even want him to apply.
But Shane wanted to apply. And while many of his friends were applying to the GT program for middle schools, he put his application in the lottery for the performing arts middle school. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to go – but he wanted to be accepted.
And then we forgot all about it because we are following the motto: Whatever is supposed to happen will happen.
Then the letter arrived in the mail: Shane was accepted. He got in!
I called him downstairs to read the letter, which he did. He read it very quietly. He got through the first two paragraphs, then he looked at me.
“Can I go to my regular school?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said, “if that’s what you really want to do.”
“I do. Unless suddenly all of my friends get into this school, too, and I don’t think any of them applied.”
“Do you want to think about it for awhile and then decide?”
“Not really,” Shane said.
Still, I forced him to make a big announcement to everyone who came into the house – his dad, his brother – and then call his grandparents, too. He got in!
But Shane didn’t care. He said, “I got in, but I’m not going.”
And that was the end of it for him.
For me, it was a missed opportunity for celebrating acceptance.
And then it occurred to me that it was only me who cared about celebrating. Shane just lets things roll right off his back. He’s not burying some deep resentment over the things that happen. He simply notices them as they do.
I think he was hurt when he wasn’t chosen to be a patrol. But he grieved a little – and then he was done. He felt the pain, then moved on.
Meanwhile, I’ve been rolling around in that pain for half a year, wallowing, and letting it build up on top of the pain of his being rejected for the GT program. And his getting accepted to this school felt good – even if he didn’t want to go.
But Shane doesn’t care. He is going to go where he thinks he’ll be happiest. And when he gets there, whatever is supposed to happen will happen.
Earlier this week, in the course of about 25 minutes, Dylan created one of the most beautiful, complex, fun marvels I’ve ever seen. It was a kind of marble roller coaster game that involved gambling, guessing and statistics.
The marble track started high on a table and led across the room through obstacles, ending on the floor in the kitchen. The track itself was awesome, but it’s what he did with the track that was so awesome: he made it into an awesome game.
The end of the track had nine stations where the marble might land at the end of its run. He marked each landing area with playing cards and deemed each area worth a specific amount. Then he set up a betting area on the table, so that people could guess which station might catch the marble – and win points.
Shortly before this, Dylan said he’s “not sure anymore” if he wants to go into engineering.
Engineering involves math. Dylan was a whiz at math in fifth and sixth grade. His grades were so high, in fact, that he skipped a class and went directly into algebra class in seventh grade.
And Dylan hates algebra. He sees no real-world reason for learning it, and I must agree.
Thanks to some poor teaching, years of neglect in preparing kids for algebraic thinking, and a teacher who so humiliated Dylan in class that she may as well have asked him to wear a dunce cap – my son is now ready to give up on his career as an engineer.
Music is easier, he says, so he thinks he’ll do that.
The statistics on this phenomenon are horrific. In spite of efforts to the contrary, the number of graduates in the STEM fields (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) continue to steadily decline. Students with awesome intellect and creative abilities are refusing to follow their dreams of designing, building and inventing – because math is so abstract and mind-numbingly dull in school, they assume it will continue in real life.
There’s no connection between algebra, for example, and anything in life. And at least for Dylan, if there’s no greater meaning in something, it becomes an unnecessary burden – for him, and for the world.
He does want to take calculus, though. “It looks really cool,” he says.
He’s already taking physics. The way he talks about it, the concepts in physics are just common sense.
I can’t even imagine thinking the way he thinks. It hurts my head to imagine thinking the way he thinks. I simply can’t.
We need his brain in the world. We need him to create incredible things. But I can’t convince him that engineering will allow him the opportunity to do this. Nor can I guarantee that, because of his specific issues, he’ll be able to complete the work – and turn it in – that’s required of an engineering student.
Worse yet, I don’t know what he can do with the gift that’s been given to him. He’s been building spectacular games since he was barely old enough to talk. He’s been taking common household items and turning them into awesome strategy challenges for ten years.
He takes nothing and turns it into something for his entertainment all the time.
So how do I explain that to the college admissions office?
And how do I explain to Dylan that his brilliance is not common sense, and that it’s really worth using for the greater good?
I guess I don’t do either. Because at this point, it’s up to Dylan.
Yesterday, we had a meeting at the public high school with Dylan’s soon-to-be guidance counselor. We had a few questions, as I’m sure all incoming freshmen do. And while the counselor had many strong answers, he didn’t seem to know the answer to the underlying question that – I only realized yesterday – is plaguing my every move.
What should I do about my son who’s so brilliant that he’s bored, and so unfocused that he can’t turn in his simplest homework assignments?
Dylan hates school. He finds it to be incredibly boring. So I was thrilled to hear that he could take IB classes – classes that are made for college-bound, advanced-level thinkers like Dylan. These classes delve deeper than the standard, add a global perspective, and offer the flexibility of open-ended, written answers during testing.
For Dylan’s brain, these classes are perfect.
But Dylan has a writing issue. Because of his ADHD, he has trouble getting words onto paper without a computer. All of his IB classes would require constant writing. And while he is excellent at organizing his thoughts, he has issues with capitalization and punctuation. His ideas are exceptional. His writing is wonderful. His technical writing abilities are not.
And while his ideas would add much to the IB classes, and while he would enjoy the mental stimulation that comes with it, he has not proven that he’s capable of handling homework and class assignments responsibly enough for even the simplest of classes.
Dylan has yet to succeed in avoiding a “zero” in any class. He has not turned in all of his assignments on time in any class. Ever. He usually does the work. But he never seems to know that it’s due.
And no matter how much I have prodded him to talk to each teacher after class, to make sure he knows what to do and when to do it, he absolutely refuses. So he doesn’t know what’s due, or when to turn it in.
In GT/LD lingo, they call this a “lack of self-advocacy.”
So I can hardly suggest that we put Dylan into a top-level class with advanced-level work, since he is completely incapable of turning in his work.
The problem is not: Is Dylan able to handle IB work? The problem is, Is Dylan able to turn in ANY work?
And unfortunately, I simply have no idea.
The day after I found Dylan on his computer at 10:30 p.m. (an hour and a half after the turn-it-off deadline), we had the following conversation.
“Dylan, we need to talk about this electronics thing. It’s getting ridiculous.”
“I know.”
“You are on the iPad, iPod, cell phone or computer all the time! This can’t keep happening. You have always been good about following the rules. So do you want to tell me why you have broken the rule about turning off electronics twice in the past week?”
“I don’t know. I guess it’s because there’s like no other person in the world who’s my age who has any restrictions on electronics. I mean, they are on them all the time. Not one single person I know has to turn off their electronics ever, and I am the only one who has a time limit.”
“Well, maybe you need new friends, but it’s not about them. You are on some kind of electronic device every minute of every day, except when you’re in school. We never see you anymore! So for the next few weeks, you are on restriction. No electronics, except your cell phone, until February 15th. And then we’ll decide what to do.”
“Okay. I was kinda thinking about doing that anyway. I wanted to do something, because I knew I was just on there too much. But I just didn’t really know what I should do.”
“Good. So you’re okay with it.”
“Yeah. It’s just that sometimes I don’t feel like I have anything else to do. I really want to see my friends but you always say I can’t see them, and they really understand me. And I love Shane, I mean, he’s like my best friend. And you’re always on the computer and Daddy’s never here. But mostly I just want to do stuff with people my own age, and I don’t ever get to do that.”
“So you want to have your friends over more often?”
“Yeah, or go to their house or whatever.”
“And you’re okay having friends over without using electronics?”
“Yeah, because really all I do on electronics is talk to my friends. So if they’re here, we can just talk and do stuff.”
“Okay. So here’s my issue. Instead of telling me that you want your friends to come over in ten minutes, maybe you could let me know a day or two ahead of time. That way, we can schedule our family activities and you can still have friends over. Can you do that?”
“I can try. But sometimes people just want to come over in like ten minutes.”
“Well sometimes, that works. But sometimes we have other things planned. But I hear what you’re saying, and I will try to make more time for you to have friends over. And you try to tell me in advance, if you can. Okay?”
“Okay. Thanks.”
And that was that. No yelling, no arguments. All kinds of mutual respect, and a new understanding for what’s going on with my son. Awesome.
Shane came home from school with a green piece of paper and a course booklet for middle school.
“We had five minutes to choose our electives,” he told me. “And we had to take a foreign language, so I picked French.”
“WHAT?!” I shrieked, as I often do. Long story short, the middle school counselor had come to the elementary school, and had the students select electives during an assembly. The fifth graders turned in their choices on the spot, without so much as a note to parents that it would be happening.
Within minutes, I was on the phone with the middle school.
Shane and I went through his elective choices, read the course book, discussed the classes, and chose electives that he would actually enjoy: band, film and theater.
Two days later, the middle school counselor called me back. I tried to be polite, even though I wanted to crawl through the wire and strangle her with it.
“I was wondering if we could meet for a few minutes,” I asked, “so that I could give you Shane’s new list of electives.”
“Oh that goes to his homeroom teacher,” she told me.
“But you already have a list of electives from him, right?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, “but I don’t even look at those unless I don’t get a new one from the fifth grade teacher.”
In other words, I thought, 90% of parents whose children did NOT tell them about the assembly will never even know they had options.
“Well,” I ventured, “I would like to make sure that the old list is thrown away.”
“I always throw away the old list when I get the new one,” she said.
She wasn’t understanding how her stunt at the elementary school made me distrust her. I had to explain further – and with good reason.
“I have an older child,” I told her. “When he was in fifth grade, I spent 45 minutes with the counselor – a counselor who is no longer there – and we discussed his options. It all seemed fine until the first day of school, when we discovered that nothing from our discussion was in his schedule.”
“Does Shane have an IEP?” she asked.
“No,” I said. “In fact, after today, you may never hear from me again. Shane is a completely different kind of kid.”
“Well, she was a different counselor,” the new middle school counselor assured me. “I’m very detail-oriented and I make sure that every piece of paper that crosses my desk is handled appropriately.”
I envisioned her writing my name on a post-it note as we talked, scrawling, “TROUBLE-MAKER” after it.
I tried to laugh. “Oh, so you’re like me!” I exclaimed, suddenly hoping to bond.
She chuckled, but not much. “If it would make you feel better,” she said, “you can bring Shane’s electives list into the school and I’ll destroy the old one while you’re here.”
“That would make me feel better,” I agreed. “Thank you.”
Sometimes it just takes awhile to get what I want.
The last time we allowed Dylan to use YouNow.com, he ended up on the phone, in less than an hour, with some complete stranger in New Jersey.
“But I blocked my number,” Dylan whined, when we told him it was not okay to call a complete stranger.
As parents, Bill and I can’t keep up with what sites my kids are on. As soon as Dylan was old enough to have a Facebook page, which I understood, he moved directly to Instagram, SnapChat and Vines. I got an Instagram account, and kept up with it for about two days. Then I got behind.
I’d never heard of YouNow, but we thought it was risky. We said he could try it – and then we had the New Jersey stranger incident. To say that we kaboshed YouNow quickly would be an understatement. We CRUSHED it. Immediately.
Then, tonight, Dylan was bored and wanted to take another stab at YouNow.com.
From what I can tell, YouNow is a forum for anyone, anywhere, to broadcast anything – LIVE. From what I can tell, it is almost exclusively teenagers behaving randomly, seeking attention. It doesn’t look like a positive way for my boy to voice his talents.
“I think it’s a bad idea,” I told him.
“But I know better now,” he said, “and I won’t give out my phone number or any other personal information. I won’t use my own name. I won’t even use my own voice!” (How he can pull off this stuff is beyond my intellectual capacity.)
“Dylan,” I said, “you are 14 years old now. You are going to do what you want to do, no matter what I say. I am telling you that I think this is a really stupid idea.”
“But can I do it?”
“I would rather you don’t do it. I don’t like it. I don’t like what happened last time.”
“But that won’t happen this time. I’ll be much more careful.”
“But you don’t know what will happen this time.”
“I do know! I’ll be way more careful. You can trust me.”
“I’m not worried about trusting you,” I said. “I am worried about the people in the world who I don’t know, and who I can NOT trust.”
“But I know about all of that,” he said, “and I will be really careful.”
My voice rose to record decibels over the course of our 35-minute argument. By the time it was over, I still had not definitively said “no” but I had voiced absolutely no assent.
“I THINK IT IS A REALLY STUPID IDEA!” I screeched, accomplishing nothing.
Eventually, I left the house to pick up a pizza. He continued the debate by calling me on my cell. Then, after I accidentally hung up on him – my phone is broken and randomly does this, I texted him:
Here is the bottom line. If you make immature and irresponsible decisions, we will be forced to treat you like a person who makes immature and irresponsible decisions. It is your choice.
When I came home with the pizza, Dylan and Shane were playing together – sweetly. Laughing. Having a ball.
Like nothing had ever happened.
