Unmotivated 13 year old

[Lizzy Lemon]

My eldest Glen who's 13 has been attending karate lessons for the last 4 and half years. In November he is due to grade for his black belt, quite an achievement, we are so proud of him however, with just a few months before this he's decided he's 'bored' with lessons. His attendance has dwindled to the minimum 2 lessons a week lasting 45 minutes each so its only one and half hours per week. Doesn't seem much when there are plenty of hours in a week. Now he's older he's allowed out to play with friends (football mad) and also has a little job delivering free newspapers once a week so has a bit of spare cash for himself. He's getting more independant which is a good thing but I don't want him to blow his chance of achieving this goal, I think its important to see things through, I'm going to have a word with the instructors when I next see them but has anyone any advice what to say to him without it turning into a slanging match (a lot of conversations usually have him yelling at me before I've finished a sentence - hormones, more trouble than they're worth!!!!)

 

[gilld]

At this age it is quite normal. The same thing happened to my daughters who had danced since age 2, competed in and won at various festivals, achieved a high level of exams and danced in professional pantomimes. I tried to get them to keep at it for an extra exam ................and they gave up completely

Push it at your own risk I'm afraid.

 

[catherine]

My sister was in the very same position with my nephew, but he was grading for his black belt in Kung FU. She talked to DN about it, but she didn't talk to his instructor. She knew that if she put too much pressure on DN to continue with his lessons that he would just be more determined to quit. He ended up finishing several months before he was due to do his grading. However after he had been away from Kung Fu for 9-12 months he decided that he wanted to go back. Obviously he has had to put in more work to get him back to level he was at when he finished, but he is still going to grade for his black belt. My sister feels now that she made the right decision in not pressuring DN to continue when he wanted to quit. She feels that if she had he wouldn't have gone back.

Good luck with what you decide to do!

 

[Lizzy Lemon]

I'm not going to push him into doing something he doesn't want to do but I think if he doesn't complete this he may regret it. It's that message I want to get across to him. In the last few months he's realised if he wants to get good exam marks he's got to buckle down and get on with his work (we've been telling him this for a long time, as we feel he's not working to his full potential) and I know its early days yet but if he's got something like this showing commitment to something and he shows sticking power it can only look good on his CV in the future. It maybe just a phase of 'I'm not going to do what you want and tell me to do!' we keep reminding him in the last few months everytime we've given him some advice about something we've been proved right which he has found out to his cost.

 

[sunshine2blue]

My Ds 14 has been a black belt in Tae Kwon Do for just over a year now we didnt go through the same as your sister is but he has got other interests and went from training every night mon-fri (his choice not ours) to 3 times a week he plays basketball and football on the other days, but so far for 3 weeks out of his holidays he has been teaching classes with another instructor and has been going from 5pm-9pm Mon-Thurs. All I can suggest is that you all tell him how proud you are of him and compromise with him by allowing him to drop some classes for football as long as he keeps to his 2 classes per week. Its a fantastic hobby for them and I think its good to have a focus in their lives. I bet he has worked so hard to get to the stage he is at and it would be a shame to let all his hard work go to waste. Good Luck