So our DS9, school spelling bee champion, got caught cheating on a spelling test. He was afraid he might miss one. He saw it on TV (Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide, goodbye to you) and apparently thought it was a good idea.
I have told him that if he goes all the way through school without ever missing anything on tests, all that means is that he's not learning at his level, but he just doesn't get it.
First of all - read through this -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg's_stages_of_moral_development
He isn't acting in a very mature way, but that might be appropriate to his age/stage. Some gifted kids are advanced in some areas - this doesn't seem to be his. OTOH, if he wasn't personally involved, his 'moral reasoning' might be quite advanced.
"the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." King James Bible
I take that to mean that what a person understand is always more difficult to apply.
I think it's great that he realized that he wasted everyone's time, that time is precious, and that now he is 'in the penalty box' for a while. Howard Glasser has a long riff about how basically every punishment is some form of being prevented temporarily from doing the good stuff - ie having your time wasted. He thinks that even a spanking represents wasted time.
Anyway, you can't expect him to learn much in the middle of a storm. When things are going well, narrate aloud the process you go through of getting an impulse to do wrong and show him how you mentally process the possible outcomes. You might want to read "I Can Problem Solve"
www.thinkingpreteen.com/icps.htmI Can Problem Solve (ICPS) Program For Families. The focus of this program is on developing a set of interpersonal cognitive problem solving skills that relate to ...
2 How upset was he about the possibility of getting a wrong spelling? If he was really anxious, I would see that as perfectionism and advocate like @@@@@ to get him accomidated spelling words and a few other things.
Please stop telling him that he should expect to miss items on tests. It's like you are saying one thing and doing another. Hard to think that YOU get blamed for the actions of his school but from the child's point of view, all adults are basically working together. SHOW him that you believe in his enough to place him in an educational setting where he can make mistakes and ALLOW him to experience what it's like to MAKE mistakes and STILL by loved by you. When he complains that he feels like you won't love him, he really is saying that HE can't love himself. Your Mission, if at all possible, is to get him into environments where he gets to learn to handle making mistakes and keeping loving himself through them. Kids are way to concrete to be 'told' that something is 'normal' they have to experience many things for themselves.
Love and More Love,
Grinity
