I'm referring to the roller coaster ride we constantly experience as we deal with two sons who have Asperger's Syndrome.
Yesterday was a classic example with Big Guy. The high: He aced his history test in his college class. Big Guy enjoys this subject, and he is quite knowledgeable about it in general. As a result, he is motivated to study and try hard to do well in this class.
The low? Big Guy announced he was close to failing his math class and wanted to drop it. Math is something that Big Guy detests (his words) and has to work a little harder at in order to be successful. As a result, he is less motivated to do well in this class. Other factors contributing to this dilemma are the fact that he didn't take advantage of using a tutor, didn't buy a graphing calculator, and took a once weekly math class that lasted three hours (not good for someone with attention issues) which had double the work load between sessions (not good for someone who does things last minute).
We explained to Big Guy that this is only a temporary solution, as this math class is needed in order to get his degree. We talked through the issues listed above, and jointly came up with a plan to make the next math venture a successful one. Dropping this class puts Big Guy below full-time credit hours, so he will be picking up a block class in a couple of weeks - Intro to Computers, which is also a basic requirement for graduation. I feel this is a class that Big Guy can handle in a condensed session as he is very computer savvy AND IT'S SOMETHING THAT HE"S INTERESTED IN.
I hope that Big Guy has learned some valuable lessons in this experience, especially those that concern pitfalls to avoid in the future as he's planning his class schedule. I'm just glad that he realized he was in over his head before it was too late to drop the class.
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