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Its all about a balancing act. My 14 year old son spends an inordinate amount of time gaming on his PC. We don't often chew him out for that, but when he igno

Its all about a balancing act. My 14 year old son spends an inordinate amount of time gaming on his PC. We don't often chew him out for that, but when he ignores routine chores or homework assignments in preference for gaming, then we bring the hammer down. The fact is, a lot of kids are terrible at time management and prioritisation. It is our job as parents to try and teach those skills. Quite often, that ends up with us having to excessively be the 'bad cop'. As much as the kid in the OP's story eloquently described his pent up feelings, I can say that I experience the same sort of rage (complete with balled up fist) when I walk into the house to see an overflowing trash bin in the kitchen, dirty laundry scattered around the living room, front driveway still full of leaves (all my younger son's designated daily chores) and I hear the steady gunfire of CoD coming from his room.

bitL 9y ago
The issue here might be overload of homework that kids have these days. Teachers are often literally going insane; you can see this at top universities and it's trickling down to elementary schools. Work like crazy, dread finals, do this till you die.
- cyberferret 9y ago
  I totally agree that the homework load can be crazy. My son I mentioned above used to bring home an inordinate amount of homework a couple of years ago. But it seems that his school has seen the light, as we've noticed that he and his brother do have a much lighter daily homework load this year. But that seems to have been replaced with more longer term projects and assignments (all of which they leave till the last minute - ^sigh^)
  - thriftwy 9y ago
    You can't expect children to plan assignments! Heck, you don't expect adults to plan anything either, until they hit management. For specialists and even team leaders, they do what's on their plate and everything which isn't, they don't. It is madness to expect from undergrads to not do everything at the last minute, but for school students it's laughable. I can plan one thing. I can't plan five assignments that just fell on me, with due date far in the future. If my work would be structured like that I'd fail it either.
    - jacobolus 9y ago
      School is horrible at teaching people to tackle non-trivial projects, because almost no time is spent practicing it. Figuring out how to break a large job into small pieces, do one piece at a time, and stick with the project until all of the pieces are done is a critical skill which can only be learned through practice. Someone who is 8 or 10 years old should be able to start doing projects that take hours of sustained effort stretched over a few days (as compared to the typical schoolwork which consists of externally specified small exercises that require a few minutes each), with a lot of hand holding. By age 18, after 10 years of consistent practice at the edge of their ability, students can certainly learn to deal with projects taking a month or more of sustained independent effort for a little bit of time every day.
- cududa 9y ago
  Back when I was in middle school (11-13 years old) in the early 2000's our public school got tons of state funds for our "great performance". This led to teachers compensation being tied to said performance. That meant each teacher would try and assign at least an hour of homework to stuff more and more into their students heads. The school had to implement a "maximum 4 hours of homework" policy. It didn't really do anything - teachers in different departments didn't coordinate. The next year they chose specific days teachers could assign homework... Two years ago my younger cousin went to the same school - he caught mono and pneumonia, requiring a long stay at home. As a 13 year old he started getting anxiety attacks for fear of the compounding work. Public schools are broken, and I don't think most parents realize the pressure put upon their children by teachers trying to get a bonus. All around a mess
  - Khelavaster 9y ago
    When teachers are so poor those piddling bonuses overrule putting childrens' needs first--and when bonuses encourage things other than putting childrens' needs first--there are far greater problems.
    - cududa 9y ago
      Probably about 40-60% of the problem right there
jacobolus 9y ago
14 year old kids used to spend tons of time playing outside unsupervised. Now they have a carefully choreographed schedule packed with structured supervised activities, an enormous pile of tedious homework, are not allowed to do anything mildly physically risky, and spend the remaining time sitting looking at a screen. Raking leaves or doing laundry is fine as far as it goes, but isn’t going to fundamentally rebalance anything. In my opinion kids that age (and especially younger) shouldn’t need to be experts at “time management”. They should just have engaging physical things to play with and a chance to learn about whatever happens to interest them.
- tomohawk 9y ago
  Part of being in a family is chipping in and doing what's required to keep the household going. A key teaching for children is for them to understand that we show our love for one another by our actions and inactions.
- cyberferret 9y ago
  Sorry, but I disagree with this. My son doesn't have any onerous 'structured supervised activities'. He mentioned from an early age that he hates team sports, so we have never pushed him to join a team or sports club of any sort. Of late, he has signed up and been accompanying me to my Kendo lessons (his choice), which has been a good opportunity for some father/son bonding, and also a way for him to improve his fitness and mental discipline. And that word 'discipline' is a key here. Chores aren't just about slave driving. I believe it is important for young kids to get used to a routine, and to learn that sometimes you have to do things even when it is not convenient. A well raked driveway (outside in the sunshine) should give him the satisfaction of a job well done at the end of it. Plus it is also necessary, as my wife and I (and his brother) simply struggle to cope with the daily maintenance tasks around the house given our work lives. Him doing chores hopefully also will impart on him that managing a household take a lot of work, and I hope it also makes him see that my wife and I are not just house cleaning and meal preparing robots that just make things magically happen. We have the philosophy that we ALL chip in to make our house a nice place to live in.
  - 9y ago
zeta0134 9y ago
I think the trick with your 14 year old is the same lesson I eventually learned for myself when I was older. I didn't see the negative value of ignoring the chores until I branched out on my own. Immediately, I found myself in an apartment with 3 other roommates, and I was the only one who would do the dishes with any regularity. Those'll attract bugs real fast if they're just left out. Trouble is, you already know this. You keep the house tidy because you're aware of the negative repercussions, but your kids maybe haven't figured that out for themselves to quite the same level. To them, a chore's a chore, and what Mom hasn't found out yet she can't get upset about. The immediacy of the task just isn't there. What finally did it for me as an adult was the realization that my relaxation activities will always be there. The deadline I'm skipping out on won't be, and it looms over my head, threatening my sanity if it's not done. Once I do the task, or at least make some forward progress on it (no zero days) then I can allow myself to relax in peace, confident that I'm in a good place. I think that's the trick. Get your kids to feel good about having accomplished their day's duties with positive encouragement, and make sure they know that they can game in peace after that. That'll balance out the bad cop moments, and if you can spin game time as its own reward for the day's efforts, you might just be able to turn a negative habit into a positive one.
- abhi3 9y ago
  I'd upvote this 10-times if I could.
hourislate 9y ago
Kids today don't watch TV anymore. Their source of entertainment is gaming on the PC. My 14 year old plays every evening and is on Discord with his schoolmates (a group of about 4-6). At some point they pull out their homework and work on it together and chat, laugh, argue and discuss the school day. It's actually really nice to see them work and help each other. I would encourage all parents to have your kids setup Discord Channel for themselves and friends to do homework together.
agnivade 9y ago
So, are you saying that if you come home to a clean living room, clean driveway and an empty trash bin, you will be happy and satisfied ? I dunno, my mom always found something to yell at me. Irrespective of how hard I tried to please her. She told me it was for my own good.

bitL 9y ago

The issue here might be overload of homework that kids have these days. Teachers are often literally going insane; you can see this at top universities and it's trickling down to elementary schools. Work like crazy, dread finals, do this till you die.

cyberferret 9y ago
I totally agree that the homework load can be crazy. My son I mentioned above used to bring home an inordinate amount of homework a couple of years ago. But it seems that his school has seen the light, as we've noticed that he and his brother do have a much lighter daily homework load this year. But that seems to have been replaced with more longer term projects and assignments (all of which they leave till the last minute - ^sigh^)
- thriftwy 9y ago
  You can't expect children to plan assignments! Heck, you don't expect adults to plan anything either, until they hit management. For specialists and even team leaders, they do what's on their plate and everything which isn't, they don't. It is madness to expect from undergrads to not do everything at the last minute, but for school students it's laughable. I can plan one thing. I can't plan five assignments that just fell on me, with due date far in the future. If my work would be structured like that I'd fail it either.
  - jacobolus 9y ago
    School is horrible at teaching people to tackle non-trivial projects, because almost no time is spent practicing it. Figuring out how to break a large job into small pieces, do one piece at a time, and stick with the project until all of the pieces are done is a critical skill which can only be learned through practice. Someone who is 8 or 10 years old should be able to start doing projects that take hours of sustained effort stretched over a few days (as compared to the typical schoolwork which consists of externally specified small exercises that require a few minutes each), with a lot of hand holding. By age 18, after 10 years of consistent practice at the edge of their ability, students can certainly learn to deal with projects taking a month or more of sustained independent effort for a little bit of time every day.
cududa 9y ago
Back when I was in middle school (11-13 years old) in the early 2000's our public school got tons of state funds for our "great performance". This led to teachers compensation being tied to said performance. That meant each teacher would try and assign at least an hour of homework to stuff more and more into their students heads. The school had to implement a "maximum 4 hours of homework" policy. It didn't really do anything - teachers in different departments didn't coordinate. The next year they chose specific days teachers could assign homework... Two years ago my younger cousin went to the same school - he caught mono and pneumonia, requiring a long stay at home. As a 13 year old he started getting anxiety attacks for fear of the compounding work. Public schools are broken, and I don't think most parents realize the pressure put upon their children by teachers trying to get a bonus. All around a mess
- Khelavaster 9y ago
  When teachers are so poor those piddling bonuses overrule putting childrens' needs first--and when bonuses encourage things other than putting childrens' needs first--there are far greater problems.
  - cududa 9y ago
    Probably about 40-60% of the problem right there

jacobolus 9y ago

14 year old kids used to spend tons of time playing outside unsupervised. Now they have a carefully choreographed schedule packed with structured supervised activities, an enormous pile of tedious homework, are not allowed to do anything mildly physically risky, and spend the remaining time sitting looking at a screen. Raking leaves or doing laundry is fine as far as it goes, but isn’t going to fundamentally rebalance anything. In my opinion kids that age (and especially younger) shouldn’t need to be experts at “time management”. They should just have engaging physical things to play with and a chance to learn about whatever happens to interest them.

tomohawk 9y ago
Part of being in a family is chipping in and doing what's required to keep the household going. A key teaching for children is for them to understand that we show our love for one another by our actions and inactions.
cyberferret 9y ago
Sorry, but I disagree with this. My son doesn't have any onerous 'structured supervised activities'. He mentioned from an early age that he hates team sports, so we have never pushed him to join a team or sports club of any sort. Of late, he has signed up and been accompanying me to my Kendo lessons (his choice), which has been a good opportunity for some father/son bonding, and also a way for him to improve his fitness and mental discipline. And that word 'discipline' is a key here. Chores aren't just about slave driving. I believe it is important for young kids to get used to a routine, and to learn that sometimes you have to do things even when it is not convenient. A well raked driveway (outside in the sunshine) should give him the satisfaction of a job well done at the end of it. Plus it is also necessary, as my wife and I (and his brother) simply struggle to cope with the daily maintenance tasks around the house given our work lives. Him doing chores hopefully also will impart on him that managing a household take a lot of work, and I hope it also makes him see that my wife and I are not just house cleaning and meal preparing robots that just make things magically happen. We have the philosophy that we ALL chip in to make our house a nice place to live in.
- 9y ago

zeta0134 9y ago

I think the trick with your 14 year old is the same lesson I eventually learned for myself when I was older. I didn't see the negative value of ignoring the chores until I branched out on my own. Immediately, I found myself in an apartment with 3 other roommates, and I was the only one who would do the dishes with any regularity. Those'll attract bugs real fast if they're just left out. Trouble is, you already know this. You keep the house tidy because you're aware of the negative repercussions, but your kids maybe haven't figured that out for themselves to quite the same level. To them, a chore's a chore, and what Mom hasn't found out yet she can't get upset about. The immediacy of the task just isn't there. What finally did it for me as an adult was the realization that my relaxation activities will always be there. The deadline I'm skipping out on won't be, and it looms over my head, threatening my sanity if it's not done. Once I do the task, or at least make some forward progress on it (no zero days) then I can allow myself to relax in peace, confident that I'm in a good place. I think that's the trick. Get your kids to feel good about having accomplished their day's duties with positive encouragement, and make sure they know that they can game in peace after that. That'll balance out the bad cop moments, and if you can spin game time as its own reward for the day's efforts, you might just be able to turn a negative habit into a positive one.

abhi3 9y ago
I'd upvote this 10-times if I could.

hourislate 9y ago

Kids today don't watch TV anymore. Their source of entertainment is gaming on the PC. My 14 year old plays every evening and is on Discord with his schoolmates (a group of about 4-6). At some point they pull out their homework and work on it together and chat, laugh, argue and discuss the school day. It's actually really nice to see them work and help each other. I would encourage all parents to have your kids setup Discord Channel for themselves and friends to do homework together.

agnivade 9y ago

So, are you saying that if you come home to a clean living room, clean driveway and an empty trash bin, you will be happy and satisfied ? I dunno, my mom always found something to yell at me. Irrespective of how hard I tried to please her. She told me it was for my own good.