Be Your Child's Favorite Teacher
We all want our children to develop a love of learning or at least appreciate learning…after all, they will be in school for a long time. We often get laser focused on what our children should learn before kindergarten that we forget to make the learning process fun—me included.
While teaching my second son, my focus shifted from introducing him to new ideas, experiences, and fun to making sure he was learning what was necessary. Learning wasn’t fun anymore—for either of us! He didn’t enjoy it because it wasn’t something that interested him, and I didn’t enjoy it because it was a battle each time.
Luckily a light bulb went off and I realized that I had created this battle of learning for myself. I didn’t want my son to hate school. I want him to love it and always ask questions. I want learning to be an enjoyable experience for him. And I secretly want to be his favorite teacher!
So, I decided to get back to my roots of making learning fun. How did I do it?
1. Take an interest in their interests. This is big! If they are more interested in a topic, then they are going to soak up everything they can about that learning journey. If they love cooking, then cook. If they love cars, then learn about cars. If they love unicorns, then learn about unicorns. You can sneak in the “necessary” learning milestones while they are learning about what they love.
2. Have fun and enjoy the time together. This is another biggie! Your child takes their cue from you. So, if you are having fun and engaged, then they are more likely to have fun and be engaged.
3. Be a good listener. This shows them that you are interested in what they have to say and that you are also open to learning from them as well.
4. Give choices. Children appreciate when they have a say. Allow them to have a voice in their learning. Let them choose the learning topic (read number 1 again). Let them pick the activity for the day or what activity to do first.
5. Hands-on learning is more fun. Allowing a child to use their 5 senses to experience learning helps make the learning process meaningful and fun—this is how they remember what they learn. No one enjoys worksheets all the time.
6. Be open to creativity. This allows a child to express themselves and enjoy the learning process. My second son has a very creative mind that I was hindering. He likes to turn all of his letters into characters (like dragons, people, cars, etc.) and I was getting upset with him for not writing his letters the correct way. Then I realized that this is something he enjoys and I was basically telling him that creativity is bad. So we compromised, he gets to write his name as creative as he wants, but the assignment for school needs to be regular handwriting.
After I started implementing my core values of learning again, we both loved learning together again! I still want to and plan to teach him to be ready for kindergarten, but in a way that is fun for both of us. So, instead of just practicing writing letters with a paper and pencil, we write letters in shaving cream or snow (baking soda) trays. We learn things he wants to learn about, like machines or being a spy, and I incorporate skills like cutting, writing, counting, etc. into those topics he enjoys. And most importantly, we make sure that we are enjoying being together and having fun!
