I agree with everyone who has pointed out that the cost-benefit analysis here may look strange to YOU, but it (on some level) makes perfect sense to the person procrastinating.
Yes, sometimes it's red-lining-- particularly if that is the ONLY way to introduce "challenge" into the activity...
but it's
really tough to leverage a kid who is solely/mostly motivated intrinsically. I know. I have one of those.
She's
still mostly "meh" about a LOT of what the school thinks is "important" or worth her time. It's not that I can see her investing heavily in
alternative activities, necessarily, either. She's just not that
interested in most stuff.
[Man, I cannot BELIEVE that I've actually voiced that to anyone, anywhere. Good thing she's HG+, or she'd be flunking out, with her level of intrinsic motivation to work on schoolwork. Half-hearted effort from an HG+ child is generally MORE than good enough for A's, just so you know...
And no, I would NEVER admit that to any other group of parents. I realize this SOUNDS like Tiger Parenting-- but when you are adamantly, forcefully insisting on, er, well-- ~30-40% effort from your child, it's just... not.]
It's better than it used to be-- she has the discipline now to actually DO things that seem pointless, remedial, or stupid; this was most certainly NOT the case until she was about 12. Until then, it was me, applying the (metaphorical) whip as needed to make sure that she did ENOUGH to not tank her grades. Bad grades meant little to her, but being dropped back into less challenging coursework would have made the problem
far, FAR worse...That much was obvious to me.
She was impossible to punish
or reward, effectively-- I could have sticker charts, rewards, etc... or even have her "just sit" with nothing to do all day rather than do a single page of too-simple math problems. It was THAT bad. She'd placidly daydream and nap-- like a giant cat.
Her attitude about this was more or less--
{shrug} "Works for me, mom..."
Not exactly what I wanted. Once she dug in like that, there was NO moving her. None.
There's a reason her nickname was "Little Ghandi."
I second the recommendation for multi-tasking through low-level activities, and for making tedious ones SOCIAL in some way, if that works. I would
not take activities/etc. away-- because that (at least IME) tends to fuel the spiral that Zen Scanner mentions. We've seen it.
Dude, Blackcat, and ZS's posts particularly resonated with me, having struggled with one of these low-motivation, (frankly) lazy kids for
years...It's partially autonomy, and it's partially something else. The trick is turning their powers to
good and not letting them use the dark side. {ahem}
