To some extent I've been though this with DS17 And to be honest it's always been a big fear that he will do it again. It's kind of what we went through at the end of freshman year in H.S. and what made me decide to go through formal testing that summer. But it happened a little bit less close to the end of the year and we were able to keep most grades at least C's. But it did mean he was out of all honors classes for sophomore year.
What did I do.. I did a LOT of scaffolding for him that spring, particularly with a huge project due right at the end of the year in social studies. We did a bit of picking and choosing what was most important to focus on.
My son has had extreme anxiety during 6th grade and again that end of year as a freshman in H.S. Long term we ramped back what he was involved in, had him testing, got him some accommodation through a 504. Sort term we made goals. Is there something he is looking forward to doing this summer? Help him focus on something fun that's going to happen in a few weeks. Make a chart and break things down. Make sure to give him study breaks, exercise & time outside are very important.
Take a good look at these projects and see if you can reduce them to be something smaller. I found my son would always want to make them "perfect" and bite off more than he could chew. Choosing topics that were more difficult than they needed to be. (Hard to find information about for example.) Several times he got permission to switch topics. And ramping back expectation.. Well lets look at this project in terms of getting a passing grade, what's the minimum that needs to get done.
I found I couldn't MAKE DS do anything. But what I could do was help break all this up into manageable chunks. Give him breaks, listen to him and support him. While still expecting that the work gets done. I never found discipline worked either, it just ramps up the stress.
