I can't tell you how much your responses have helped to get me down off that ledge before I jumped.
Just to clarify, the 3 hours/night homework is NOT due to the school. If he sat down and just did it it would be less than an hour of homework. It is the temper tanrums, unreadable answers and corrections required that add up to so much time. They are not allowed to bring in uncorrected homework. The parents are responsible for making sure the homework is correct. On the occassional good night, DS spends less than an hour on the same assignments that the next night take 3 hours.
I do agree that there could be a social aspect to the problem. Although most of his close friends are also in the fast learner class (in fact the school did that deliberately for him this year), he still stands out for how he thinks and reasons. he doesn't stand out necessarily for his grades (especially now :)) but I think there is pressure both to know all the answers and also to not be too different. That would be hard to balance.
I also do think that he may be depressed, One set of grandparents who he saw almost daily moved to FL the end of Jan and took along their dogs. Also, soccer season ended and he wasn't able to participate in the Spring season due to my not knowing the sign up date.
regarding ADHD, his teacher says that he isn't one of her behavior problems in class. I can't help think that he holds it together in class and just doesn't have anything left by the time he gets home.
We do reward good report cards with his choice of a specific amount of money or a special treat. We define a good report card as maintaining an A or bringing up a grade at least 3 percentage points. A's can be any percentage 100-94. Anything else if it improves at least 3% points gets added to the pot. We don't take anything away for grades that drop but they also don't add to the pot. We also reward good homework nights (no temper tantrums or melt downs) neat writing, less than 5 corrections to try to make things more immediate.
I am considering due process but really other than the typing issue (which is major) his school has done things for him that they have never tried before. I don't want to ruin an overall good working relationship. His next IEP meeting is late April.
We have tried to get him to understand that his current actions can impact what he is doing next year but either he wants to lose the accomodations or just can't see that far ahead yet.
So at this point I think I'm going to try breaking up the homework into smaller pieces with short breaks. We did that a couple years ago but it might be time to try it again. I'm going to try even harder to keep my cool with him. I'm going to ask his Gifted Teacher, Emotional Support teacher and Guidance councelor to see what they can find out.
Thanks all for helping me to develop a plan. I do feel better
