Trying to parent an overly social teenager, or not.
When did I get to thinking this was a good idea? Maybe I should start at the beginning. Over a month ago we had a family emergency and ended up out of town for a week. During this time our 14 year old daughter who is a cyber school got behind on her work. She still has not caught up fully on her math. I think she deserves some credit in that her grades are wonderful, even when she looses a few points for things being turned in late. Every time though I think she is close to getting caught up, she gets behind again.
Why is my teenager getting behind in school?
I have asked myself and her this over and over and it is the same issue over and over. Her social life! She spends most of her online day in her school being social with other students. She now even has an online boy friend in her class. I am fine with that, or at least I would be if she didn’t spend all her time talking to friends all darn day. Looking over her school chat window there are hundreds of messages with different friends. Looking over a program we have on the kids computers that captures screen shots of their screen every minute it is clear she spent the day chatting and not working. I know, what about privacy? She will have a lot of that when she is mature enough to handle it. Clearly that is not today!
I put my parenting foot in my mouth! Again.
Checking on her school work I noticed that she had not gotten two assignments submitted from last Friday and one from today and yet more math behind. She went out with friends, went to a sleep over, and more over this weekend. Never did she tell us she was behind. I admit it, I got angry. I even raised my voice when I stormed over to her to talk about it. She gave me the “deer in the headlights” look and didn’t say much beyond that she will work on it. This for some reason made me more angry so I did the thing parents should never do, I threatened her…. I threatened to pull her out of school. Now she and I both know that even if I did do that I would still have to pay the tuition. I told her I didn’t care as she will be wasting it anyway if she keeps up thinking it is ok to be behind like this. I told her she would have to use a homeschooling curriculum she hates and her social life would be virtually over. I saw her face go white like a ghost before words spilled forth such as “I will stay up all night to catch up! I will do better! I love school! Please don’t!” -sigh-
But things don’t change over night and if you keep up with this blog then you know this is a new but ongoing issue. I am not sure what to do at this point. She is a great person and while she has not been honest about her school work or her social life, I know that I can’t demonize her for these things. I know many parents who complain about the terrible twos and other such trying times but goodness this is all together different. One thinks if they can get through all those other times than surely they will manage the teenage years with grace and experience. I thought so… and I was wrong.
Now to figure out how to help her manage this without grounding her from school…. because that is just silly!
Is it possible to disable the chat window temporarily or require a parental password to unlock it each day after she proves she’s got her work done? It sounds like you need to find a way to enforce a “work first, friends later” policy. If you can’t do it through technology, though, the only solution I can think of is to watch over her shoulder and make sure she doesn’t open the chat (except to ask the teacher questions) until she’s done.
Sadly there is no way to limit it and I think your right that I might have to sit with her all day to make sure she stays on task. I know colleges normally love homeschoolers as they tend to be self starters and don’t tend to need hand holding. I think maybe this social situation alone with the lesson issue might be great right now rather then when she hits college though so she can develop the skills needed to balance school and her social life. I have been talking to other homeschool parents and they have reminded me that many adults have had issues with online social time and getting their work done and many businesses have blocked social networks and they have harmed productivity. This is a reminder that my daughter is not alone and this is a great opportunity to help her figure this out! I need to relax a bit more! 🙂 Thank you for your advice and taking the time to comment!