> Then I would encourage him every time he does anything that resembles work. If he does some of his homework, give him a reward. If he doesn't, don't punish him, but certainly don't reward him. In essence, I'd let your son sink while also letting him know that it's the last thing that you want to see happen.

I can't agree with this bit. Rewarding someone for doing something that they should be doing anyway, and not punishing them for not doing stuff they should be doing sounds backwards to me. Sure, rewards are good, and I totally believe in the power of bribery. (I taught a class of 8 year olds and bribery works great.) But eventually they have to do the work because they have to do the work, not because you're going to give them candy or money or whatever to do it. In my class we started out with candy. After awhile we went to a chart system where they got stickers for doing the good things and once they got enough stickers, they got a big treat. Like a bag of candy or something. By the end of the year, when they were ready to advance, they were doing the stuff they were supposed to be doing (raising their hands to answer questions, not speaking out of turn, etc.) without any reward at all. So don't get me wrong... I know that bribery works. But I also had to punish them when they did things that they knew were wrong. Anyway...that's all I had to say.

Ticia