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Old 03-26-2016, 06:35 AM
 
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Wow, your child sounds a little bit like me when I was a student. Without a strict routine and frequent reminders, I would come to school empty-handed. What worked best for me was (A) having frequent reminders of assignments--I remember my second grade teacher made us keep a special folder that we used to copy our assignments into; it was my very first planner, (B) getting another reminder at school and ample time to complete it during class if I forgot it the night before, (C) having the option to turn it in later online as an email attachment, (D) having the option to go online and look at the homework assignment and print it out.

To this day, I thrive in environments where organization is given and deadlines are flexible. In college, I often turned in my final projects about a week or so after they were due, to give you an idea.
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Old 03-26-2016, 06:12 PM
 
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Having some experience dealing with "angry" parents, you seem very reasonable. Your son needs a "homework" folder. Make it colorful and label it "HOMEWORK!!". Create a sheet in the folder, held in by brads, with a simple word document with a long table and about 20 rows. The headers need to be "name of assignment", "date given", "due date", "assigned (teacher initials)", "received/completed (parent initials), and "turned in" (teacher initials). Every assignment that is homework needs to be placed, paper clipped, or stapled into the left pocket of that folder. Your son will staple the assignment into the left side pocket and then fill in the name of the assignment, the date given, and the due date on the document with the table. The teacher needs to initial the "assigned" column to verify everything is correct. You will initial it to verify that it is completed. There is no need to remove the staple from the assignment when you work on it at home. The teacher will initial when the assignment is turned in and she will remove it from the staple. Once the folder is set up it takes literally less than 5 seconds of her time to make sure everything is done correctly.
The point of the folder is not to remove your son's responsibility from keeping track of the homework, but to show him how to be responsible for his homework despite having ADHD. You need to make sure the teacher is on board with this, which I don't think will be a problem, and that she knows what day you are starting the homework folder. The teacher may need to prompt your son to use the homework folder, especially in the beginning. Making the whole class keep such a folder would save her a lot of time tracking down incomplete/missing homework.
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Old 04-05-2016, 08:26 PM
 
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I teach Alg. 1 to freshman currently (and have for 5+ years) and your son does not sound all that different from the "typical" 14-year-old, to be honest. Students struggle with organization for a long time. In my Alg. 1 class, I give notes sheets everyday that are already hole-punched, and a corresponding worksheet for HW everyday. (I make them both up myself because I do not like math textbooks - a different story!)

I require the students to have a 3 ring binder, simply because of the sheer amount of papers they will get in one marking period. About 1-2 weeks before the end of the marking period, I give a notebook test based on the contents of the notebook, i.e, "What was the answer to Example 3 on the notes from Unit 2-5?" "What was the answer to #12 on Practice 4-1A?" etc.

I just gave my 3rd marking period quiz last week, and there actually has been a lot of improvement. Some students have told me it is really helped them learn to be organized. For others, they shove their notes and homework in whatever empty "folder" they have, history textbook, Spanish, shove in bottom of their backpack, etc. etc. etc. And then complain about the notebook quiz and ask why they got such a bad grade. I had one student one year who would not organize anything, and then the day of the notebook quiz would literally sit on the floor and spread out everything around him in a circle to find what he needed.

While it may seem simple to "us" -- just put the paper in the binder, on the top, when you get it, and it'll be organized (I say that mostly everyday!) -- for whatever reason, children just do not understand the concept. My online grading portal has an option for "Missing" for an assignment and I can't tell you how many students have missing assignments simply because they can't find them in the black hole of their notebook / binder / backpack / pocket.

My suggestion would be to perhaps get your son a different folder / binder for each subject. If you can find out what order he has the class in every day, perhaps number them so he knows which one should be first. Perhaps if it is a binder, put a 3-hole folder in the binder where he will put his homework that needs to be turned in. If the number thing doesn't appeal to him, perhaps color code them (in "rainbow" order) - this is how I organize my folders for work I collect for students. 1st period = red, 2nd = orange, 3rd = yellow. etc. I am slightly OCD so seeing them out of order bothers me and I will put them in order just to see them "correct" !

Agree with the IEP or 504 suggestions, that would be where the special ed teacher would have some more ideas, if he does have documentation. Definitely an assignment book / agenda would be helpful. Even if you just create something for him to use every week - make rows for the days of the week and columns for each subject where he can write down what his assignments are during the day. I often see my 9th graders do this - some have an agenda book, others use their hand (don't recommend that one!), others use a sheet of notebook paper everyday. Maybe put this on some colored paper that stands out so he can always find it.
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Old 04-05-2016, 08:52 PM
 
Location: Middle America
37,409 posts, read 53,412,743 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626 View Post
IMHO, the teacher should (and probably did) ask him individually to turn in his HW and should (and probably did) tell him that he needs to look through his binder for his HW & organize his binder. She probably also asked him to clean & organize his desk and may have even given his extra time during another activity or reminded him several times.

Does he have an IEP or a 504 Plan?

However, other things such as assisting him in organizing his binder, or standing next to him waiting while he searches his desk for his HW, or setting up some type of chart to help him remember to turn in his homework is not something that the classroom teachers, in my area, usually do. Those types of things are usually done by the special education teachers or the classroom teacher if they required by a 504 plan.

Yes. This type of accommodation is usually performed by a special education para (or special ed teacher, if the caseload isn't too huge), rarely by a classroom teacher, and in order for that to happen, the extra assistance required has to be spelled out in the IEP or 504. Even at that rate, increasing independence is the ultimate goal, so such accommodations would be faded over time.


Your son may benefit from some sort of self-monitoring system. Perhaps something very visual and attention-grabbing to him where he manually has to check something off when he turns in an assignment. This can be rein forced by offering some sort of meaningful incentive for _____ consecutive (days, weeks etc.) where he's successfully used the tool to hand things in versus lose them in his desk. Think outside the box, to use the cliche...assignment notebooks don't work for everyone. Trial and error will find what does.

This contingency system is something you can set up and reinforce in the home.

I have worked with many students like your son (and my brother was one...organizationally, at least, not hyperactive). No matter how many times you emphasize keeping papers organized, introduce color coded folders, etc., If the student has no meaningful motivation to use these systems, and if they are simply too taxing and overwhelming to use, THEY WON'T GET USED. Don't know how many times i had a student clean out his/her horrible desk, only to find pristine, unused color coded, labeled folders MIXED INTO THE mess. Creativity is needed.
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