The whining and complaining about school
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Hey Reader, "Do I have to do this?" ... ...is not exactly the homeschool slogan we're hoping to embroider on a pillow. π It's tempting to hear the whining and complaining and immediately translate it into: They hate this. They're not engaged. This isn't working. Sometimes that interpretation is right. Sometimes it isn't. Because enjoying something and engaging with it aren't the same thing. Think about your own life. You can be deeply involved in solving a problem without enjoying every second of it. You can struggle through something because it matters to you. You can complain about a task and still be thinking hard. Kids can too. Your child may grumble about writing and then spend ten minutes choosing exactly the right word. They may insist the science activity is "weird" while continuing to poke at it, ask questions, and see what happens. Or they may happily complete something while barely thinking about it at all. That's why the visible reaction isn't the whole story. This doesn't mean you should ignore complaints or push through every bit of resistance. It means:
are two different pieces of information. Try separating them today. After one learning experience, ask yourself two questions: Did my child seem to enjoy this? and Did my child interact with the idea in some way? Maybe the answers are yes and yes. Maybe no and no. Maybe you get one yes and one no. You're not grading the experience. You're simply getting more precise about what happened. Because the more accurately you can describe what you're seeing, the less likely you are to make a big homeschool decision based on one sigh, one smile, or one rough morning. And that gives you much more useful information to work with. Christy's Corner π Think about something your child hasn't especially enjoyed lately. Was there still a moment of thinking, questioning, persisting, creating, or connecting? That's worth noticing too. |