I have four children, three of whom are boys. I have one son who is very studious and will sit and read a book for hours. You say, “School time,” and he’s right there with all his pencils sharpened and an expectant look on his face. Then I have one son who fights the entire process. He doesn’t understand why we even have to do school and he questions the need for each and every subject. What makes it the most difficult is that he’s the oldest boy, and his little brother idolizes him. I worry that his anti-school attitude will rub off on the little one. My daughter’s attitude is a little more middle-of-the-road.
One thing I’ve found that really helps my reluctant learner is to make everything into a game. He is a fun kid with a great sense of humor, and if you can make something fun, he’ll be all over it. So we’ve invested in some fun games, like Scrabble, Blurt, UpWords, Rummikube, floor puzzles, and the like, and we freely incorporate them into our day. The kids know they’re educational games, but they don’t mind playing them. (Unlike me and my sisters—when we were growing up, we begged our mother to buy us games that weren’t educational. But she knew what she was doing.)
Sometimes I’ve made up my own games for the kids. Rather than having them fill out a worksheet, I’ll make it into a game show-type event where the kids have to raise their hands to answer a question from the sheet. We’ve also written the answers on slips of paper, spread them out on the table, and matched the right answer to the proper question. Just about anything you can do to hold the child’s attention is completely appropriate.
So much so, in fact, that my reluctant learner came to me and asked if we could make school 100% games. I thought about that for a minute, and told him we could try. Now to hit some yard sales, thrift stores, and school supply stores to see what kinds of fun games we can get to add to our growing collection—if learning is fun, they will gravitate toward it. It’s just a matter of discovering what’s fun for each child.
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