On Mon, 5 Sep 2005 10:48:44 EDT, Banty
wrote:

My son is entering 8th grade this year.

I have some general comments to begin with, and hope to follow up a
little later with more specifics. I have a lot of personal experience
with absolutely hating rote memorizing, practicing, and dealing with
stuff that does not come easily. I also have a lot of professional
experience working with kids like that.

My general first comment would be to consider the time frame of your
goals, and to consider what kinds of things your child is having
trouble with. He does not like things that require sustained effort
and that will only pay off in the long run, but that will be very
uninteresting, repetitive and boring right now.

So the first thing I would say is that the goals you are setting are
way too far off into the future. These goasl are nice and good, and
your child may even appear - appear! - to verbally and otherwise
indicate that he finds them worthwhile and somewhat motivating. But
then, sitting in front of the book, trying to memorize, he finds the
work absolutely deadly, his mind wanders, and he feels that he "just
can't do it."

Behavior in children is motivated by immediate short term goals. I
once knew a mother whose eight-year-old just hated to memorize a short
poem that he was supposed to recite at a school play. The mother
arranged an "American Idol" type competition that evening with the
family and a neighbor as the audience to see which child would recite
the poem best. She told her child on Saturday morning that the
competition would be Saturday night, and they would videotape it! The
child obsessively worked on memorizing the poem all day and beat two
other children hands down. (The families had arranged for other
prizes so that each of the children was a winner in some category).

It is difficult to find short term goals and objectives for the "grunt
work" of studying. But that is where your parental ingenuity and your
emotional investment should go. Make bets with your son, reward and
get excited about specific and small steps. Get into the immediate
short term business. Do not expect your son to overcome this problem
by himself just because of some lofty long-term goal.

For instance, a good approach would be: Memorize this table, and then
you can play video games for an hour. Memorize this page and I will
take you to the car and let you drive in the driveway. Memorize this
poem and we are going (today) shopping for that new video game you
have wanted. Be very positive, very excited.

Finally, help your child do it by helping him discover what activity
helps him meorize the best. For instance, I discovered in college
that I learn very very well when hearing things, I can really mimic
what I hear, I have a "good ear." I started getting As when I started
to (secretly) tape record lectures. (In those days you didn't have
learning resource center, etc.) After hearing a lecture twice, I had
it totally memorized, something I was unable to do from reading notes
or books. Some kids learn best by reading a paragraph and then
writing it down, sometimes in colors. Some memorize "visually" with
cartoons.

Good luck.