My cat shredded my homework!

These excuses how they’ve served me so wellThey’ve kept me safe they’ve kept me stuck They’ve kept me locked in my own cell

These excuses how they’re so familiar

They’ve kept me blocked they’ve kept me small

They’ve kept me safe inside my shell

— Alanis (Excuses)

Ah yes, excuses. I do believe Sportsboy is working at being the King of Excuses. Now, in our family the joke is that Leo’s are really the best at those. It seems he is trying to prove that point. Had a parent teacher conference this morning with the first round of grades. Lots of…..C’s! I know this will sound strange to some, but his dad and I were actually glad we saw that. You see, SB is not only the King of Excuses, he is also the King of Doing as little as possible to get by. In the prior two years of letter grades, he’s still mostly received A’s because he was never *really * punished for late homework. Notice I didn’t say *missing*, just *late*. He waits until the last possible moment to get his work done and turn it in. According to his teacher this morning, that means Friday mornings and all Friday recess/breaks. He scrambles to complete missing homework from the week and by turning it in before final bell Friday, he avoids getting the dreaded “missing work” slip in his Friday folder for us to see. She’s been giving him the heads up on what he has to turn in and then he stays in class to do it. But then, she has also been marking him down for this late work – thank you!! His C’s are not from quality of work issues. As she kept saying – he is smart and should be getting straight As. The C’s are because he is losing points on homework for it being late. Good! Now maybe he will see that there *are* consequences to his lack of effort.

So, what happens next? On an immediate basis we told the teacher to stop helping him out on Fridays. Don’t let him stay in and catch up. Don’t tell him what he is missing – he already knows it! Let him get to the end of the week with that missing work report. But, email us, don’t just rely on him to bring us the slip J On our end we will not let him watch tv or play video games on school nights until he has shown us that his work for the day is done. That means he logs onto the computer and brings up his assignments and then brings us his work papers showing us they are complete. Only then will anything electronic be switched on. Now, some of you are thinking “what? You don’t check his work every night to make sure it is done and accurate?!” Uh, no. He is in 6^th grade. It is not our work, it is his. His dad and I are in full agreement that there is no coddling. You see, we don’t want to be doing this when he is in college. We want HIM to develop strong work habits and priorities now. Which is why we are so glad that his teacher is not giving him breaks on those homework scores. We provide him with the time, and the environment, to do his homework, then it is up to him to do it. We will remove distractions as needed (such as the electronic devices), but still, it is his work and he needs to do it and keep track of it himself. No excuses.