11 Plus Exams Forum

Dear Forum,

My yr5 DS is due to sit the 11+ exams at the end of the year. We have got materials to work on and I have tried to gradually ease him into a bit of practice daily.

He is very bright, top tables at school but is incredibly relaxed about any formal assessments of any sort. He always scores well but they don't practise VR and NVR at his state primary.

My problem is that he has an addiction to PC games and the Xbox which we have tried quite hard to wean him off. I suppose some of it is my fault as I have another child who needs a lot of support academically, so he spends more time than I would like on them.

Other than taking away the whole set up and locking everything away, what tips would you suggest for his addiction? We have tried limiting it but he gets distracted even when he is not playing the games - talking constantly about his levels and progress when he should be focusing on his practice.

Thank you in advance for any help.

Can't wait to hear the answers to this one.

I have two that get totally obsessed by it all and two that don't. We do limit the time and I have point blank refused to let them have an x-box. Trouble is they just go to houses where friends have them.

The Wii is now only allowed on at weekends (creates too many arguments between the obsessed two) and they are told any conversation about it will get it banned completely.

Trouble is the games with levels are designed to get them hooked IMHO. Plus you get the " well everyone else has them I am so I am left out " blackmail, very tricky when it is a child who has trouble fitting in anyway.

Not that I cave even then.

can they not be used as rewards? half an hour of VR = half an hour on the X Box? Or threaten to take the handsets away. My husband does that, just calmly declares that he's going to take them to work and leave them there for a week and it works quite well. I've also found that "addiction" seems to go in phases. Sometimes they seem to be on it most nights, then a month will go by with no interest at all. But the short answer is to use his love of it to your advantage, surely?

You won't stop him talking about it, I don't think. When ours has been playing he insists on conducting long, boring monologues with me (I won't call them conversations) about every single mission.

You could try keeping the handsets in the kitchen drawer or wherever and insisting he asks before getting them so that you can ration how much time he spends on it and make sure he's finished everything he should be doing first. For some weird reason ours has always assumed he needs to ask permission to play on his XBox - and you can always tell when he's planning to ask because he suddenly does surprising things like offering to help with washing up - so we make the most of it to get things done that can otherwise be a struggle .

Mike

Wish I had an answer to this. I turned our Wii off at the main fuse box twice yesterday. Not until I appeared with wire snips ready to cut off the plug did my two turn it off! My younger DS settled to something constructive after an hour or so, but my elder one, who can be very difficult, followed me round the house for 4 hours issuing angry verbal abuse. He has now lost all his pocket money too, and was not, of course, in any fit mental state to do the homework I wanted him to do instead of the game.

I have the Wii controllers with me at work now, so I am not particularly looking forward to going home tonight! Jo Frost would have it all sorted in a few days, I'm sure, but we have struggled for ages. I find the Wii addictive myself when I have a go, so I can see how it grips the children. Ideally I would get rid of the whole thing, but I do feel that would cause peer difficulties, and is complicated by the fact that the boys have bought many of the games with their own money.

and is complicated by the fact that the boys have bought many of the games with their own money.

More so here as the DS who has bought games with his own money is not one of the culprits that has driven me to threatening to sling the darn thing out the window on numerous occasions

Normally I'm very good at rationing use of the Wii and DS, but last month I put DS's Nintendo DS in his bin, as I was so cross with him. It landed on the hinge which is now partially broken, but thankfully he can still play it

A very difficult one. My son Y8 GShas been hooked on Call of Duty on PS2, now PS3.
He is only allowed to play at the weekends, which we try to organise the way he does not have much time left for playing . If undisturbed (tried twice), he can sit in front of TV with headphones on for hours and hours without eating and drinking (hardly makes it to the toilet!) . He gets upset every weekend when told he has to stop playing, tries to play between 1st and 2nd course of his dinner and rushes through his homework in order to start playing. If not playing he wants to talk about it and the game is in his head all the time.
We beg him at the weeknd to watch TV instead, sth I wouldn't envisaged a few years ago!!! At least there is some info going into his head from TV box.
HIs schoolmate's father apparently smashed the boys bedroom TV with the hammer in the garden in order to stop night time PS3 games !
We have only one TV in the living room, we are trying to control it, but I must say it is a massive challange. Still somehow cannot bring myself to ban PS3 completely.
Any advice welcome.

blimey, moose, we've most def got it easy cf you!!! Mind you, sorry, don't want to sound judgemental and all, but am old-fashionedly strict about age limits and won't let our son have COD - he tried a bit of "all my friends ..." but has actually accepted it readily enough. Thank God. In fact, I think he's almost pleased. It sounds like your lad needs to go cold turkey for a while?? Could it tragically break for a bit? There MUST be something else he likes doing? Climbing wall or skating or diving or something. Just to break the habit by luring him out into something different (and wholesome!!)
(would love to know how you get on!)