Hello, I am new here. My wife and I have been homeschooling for a few years. We have multiple children that have already begun several years ago. Our daughter in the first grade just doesn't have any interest whatsoever in school work. She understands what she is taught but when we ask her to answer questions about what she learned, she just says she cannot remember (but she is just playing a game with us). She is very strong-headed and when she decides she is not going to do her work she shuts completely down and pretends to be ignorant. We have been struggling with this for at least 1 full year and we are about to call it quits. Has anyone else been through this? Does it get better or will it just remain like this through all school? We are thinking that if we cannot teach her then just send her to public school and see if they can teach her. I almost think this is a mental problem and she needs medication but the family doctor is not calling for any meds but just recommends to be more firm with her. We are at our wits end and nothing is working. If anyone has any expience it would be much appreciated. Thank you, Scott
On one hand she might need meds but I hate to medicate a child unless they'll be seriously sick without meds. On the other hand, it sounds like she's being stubborn and maybe she needs some consequences for not doing her work? Or maybe a neato privilege for doing her work? For example, my ds9 was dragging his feet on doing homework. He loves to stay up late on the weekends with his dad and play video games. So, I wrote down all of the assignments I wanted us to get through for the week. If he got through everything, except his spelling test and a bit of Friday math, by dinner on Thursday, I let him stay up until midnight. He could sleep in Friday morning but doesn't get any computer/DS/gameboy privileges until the math and spelling test are done. Would something like this work for your dd? Not necessarily a late bedtime but something she really loves to do that doesn't cost you anything. I hope this helps, Heidi
Hi My advice may not be helpful, but I'll try. My son was a 1st grade age last year. He did the "I don't know"..."I didn't learn anything" routine. He still does. My son did that in public school kindergarten as well. I would ask him what he learned in such and such of subject and he would just say, "nothing" or "I don't know". I usually realized that he didn't want to talk about it. Then, I would observe his play or listen to his questions that he would ask and I could tell that he was really learning things in class and at home. He just didn't want to talk about it unless it was on his terms. My strange advice would be to be less firm and try to make school work more fun and playful at the 1st grade level. Do you guys play educational games? Maybe that would help. Observe your daughter to see if you can tell what and how much she is learning.
Hi Heidi, Thank you for responding. We tried these. We attempted being harsh with punishment and we also have tried the opposite and rewarded for completing assignments. She just doesn't care at all. I don't know what to do at this point. I can punish her and she just shuts down. If I try rewards she gives up and doesn't really care if she cannot achieve and get the reward (even if it is a huge reward that she really wants). Thank you for your suggestions. They are good ones. I don't want to medicate either but I almost think this is a problem that I cannot fix or maybe it is way above my level of expertise. Scott
I ditto WIMom. Have you tried doing things like writing the problems on a dry erase board and allowing your dd to do the problem solving on a dry erase board rather than a book? Sometimes you just have to mix things up and be creative. What about you doing the same work that she does so she sees that you dont have a problem with doing the school work too. Have part of a day dedicated to your dd being the school teacher and have her write the problems out on the board or on paper and have her make an answer key. Sneaky because she will be doing the problems too! Hope that helps!
Thank you and at this point nothing is a strange answer and I do appreciate your post. We do some crafts and she just LOVES crafts. She loves to create things. So it sounds like I need to figure out how to capitalize on the crafty side of her brain and incorporate this into other things like Math. Here is an example of her work. She does not like math at all. If I ask her to add two numbers together and give the result, this is what her answer would be... 4+1= "I don't know, is the answer 1, 2, 3, 4, I don't know" If I am helping her with math and we easily learn the numbers and how to add them, as soon as I quit helping and ask her for the answer she shuts completely down. I think you are on to something that I had not thought of. I should try to bring in crafts more for the hard subjects that she will not do on her own. This is going to be a challenge. Thank you again for responding. Scott
I am with those who say to make school more fun...make a game out of finding the answers to questions for review instead of just black and white questions. I used a lot of games with my kids in early years ( 13 year hs vet this year) It helps them to want to tell you, then they are thinking on it. What curriculuim are you using? Some of them are less effective than others as well.OH< And for math, let her count things buttons, m&Ms etc, something she would like to keep? if she gets them all correct then she gets a ---- what ever it is! GIve her a huge pile to sort and create a chart with how many of each color.... Shape, Design... then add up how many all together... I am sure its just a matter of needing to be more creative in learning, she is no doublt getting it, just not being vocal about it.
yep agree with WImom and Katie.. make school more fun. Let her play games on the computer, there are tons and tons of educational games what about doing lap books with her. Maybe she needs to be taught in a different way. Every child is different some kids learn through books others need alot of hands on things. That is what she might need. There are so many wonderful web site out there for the youger children you could do something different every day for weeks if you want.... I am sure she is learning but she is just not like the way she is being taught. Try different things with her, like lapbook, computer games, movies... ok just read your note on Math she doesn't like to add, use beads to add with or m & m's any kind of food just change the way....
I was just wondering is there a person she could call. I know when I was a teacher in 1st I would put in my newsletters home what we were doing and to ask ie what happened to the ice when it sat in the room all day? Maybe there is someone that could also ask specific questions. I don't know it that makes sense. Just asking what you learned or what you did at school is a broad statement, maybe if Grandpa or Grandma could call and ask what did you learn while you were doing your math? I thought as a teacher it may help the parents at home open up the lines of communication if I could give them specifics of what was going on?!?
I am so glad I came here and asked for help because now I see a light at the end of the tunnel. I am going to go back in right now and try some of this out. This is good stuff and I truly appreciate your help. Sincerely, Scott
Thank you everybody. You are giving me good ideas and I am learning that my daughter is an exact opposite learner than my other children. I thought it was a medical condition but now I am realizing there are more answers to make this work out. Thank you. Scott
My son's the same way. Always has been. It doesn't matter what we do with him. We've tweaked the way we do things with him more times than we can count. He just doesn't care. Period. So, I can't say it'll get better (any time soon, at least), but I can say that it's doable. We got so frustrated with him last yr that we took him to school to enroll him. That's all it took to remind us WHY we homeschool to begin with -- all those little zombie-kids walking around in straight lines and just enduring eye-bleeding boredom. No thanks... not my kids! LOL BUT... what clicked with me from what you said is: "She understands what she is taught but when we ask her to answer questions about what she learned, she just says she cannot remember (but she is just playing a game with us)." Followed by: "We are thinking that if we cannot teach her then just send her to public school and see if they can teach her." Those statements contradict each other right there. She IS smart... She IS learning... She just wants to show mom & dad she doesn't HAVE to do it the way mom & dad tell her to do it. Do you think she'd do better by being singled out by a teacher to make a point to the 20 other kids in the class? I kind of doubt it. And I didn't see anything in what you said that would indicate she needs medication. At this point... it's 1st grade. It's supposed to be FUN. Keep it fun & maybe don't ask her a question straight out --- trick her into answering by showing you or having her correct you. Like... for example... maybe you do a little lesson on the sun... and then you make sure she hears you telling mom that "Yeah... and the sun is the biggest planet in the solar system"... and see if she corrects you. Or, the next time she's drawing for fun, you can ask her to draw you a picture of the solar system. Those are my suggestions, at least. They might not work LOL --- but it's worth a shot.
I just thought of something else... The mentioning of crafts and making school fun got me to thinking about one other approach. And you could use this will of your dc. What about lapbooks? You can get them free from all over the web to try them. In the Hands of a Child has a quarterly freebie and I think it's ecosystems right now. Some of the lapbooks have related craft kits that you can purchase. I never have as I like as much free stuff as possible. If you don't already go there, Currclick has free lapbooks from time to time and they are usually from Hands of a Child but they aren't always the same one as whatever the quarterly freebie is. Live and learn has a couple of freebies, too. Would this help too?
I totally agree that she does not need medication. You shouldn't medicate a child just because she is stubborn! My DD was the same way for a while (2nd grade) and we also tried both punishment and rewards. The rewards worked better, but still not perfect. She was working toward getting lots of Webkinz, then she got 10 Webkinz for Christmas and seems to have lost her interest in them. We handled it by asking her...what do YOU want to learn? She replied that she wanted to learn about sharks. SO...we did READING about sharks. We did WRITING about sharks. We compared how a shark is different from a human (Ha! Sneaking stuff about our bodies in there!) I decorated her math worksheets with pictures of sharks and she go to color them in when she was done. We promised her if she did good on her schoolwork we'd take her to the aquarium to see some real sharks. It worked! Hooray! Now we're done with sharks and we moved on to what we wanted her to do and she's fine. We are learning about aligators and crocodiles and she's really moving along. We got Disney Princess math flash cards at Target for $1 and she loves those. I was a stubborn and very smart child. I'm sure I'm getting what I deserve
I agree, medication is not the answer. My kids have a stubborn streak running right down the middle of them. They got a dose from me and a dose from my dh. If I medicated every time they dug their heels into the ground, well............................ Just be creative in ways to get your dd to do the work. Like I said, if she makes up work sheets for you to do along with the answer key so she can grade them, she is doing the work! Wa-La!
I think you have gotten some great advice here. It may very well be you have the ultimate unschooler on your hands. You might look at some unschooler websites to get some "sneaky" ways to get your "learning" in. The other thing I would suggest is Dr. Mel Levine...two books, The Myth of Laziness and A Mind at a Time. His focus is on kids who process things different. While he doesn't go into what to do about it, it has really opened stuff up for us on what is going on in our ds head. He has a clinic with testing...I ran it by a pediatrician that I work with, and he was impressed. I am not at this time willing to go to either NC or NY for testing that costs 3500$, but If we were closer, I might consider it. (I was told some insurances might cover it also.) I was also helped with my reaction to the kids behavior by a book called "raising your spirited child" It went over a lot of "stimulus" sort of things and how one reacts to it. being a picky eater, not liking the feel of certain fabrics or clothing, having difficulty changing focus or being easily distractable. What I found really helpful was the way it got me to look at things from my sons point of view. That he was not doing these things to make me crazy, or manipulate me...he was just overwhelmed with sensations that he was not old enough to understand or control. It might not be the same thing in your case at all...but both of these books gave a fairly broad overview of a variety of "issues" They both changed the whole atmosphere in our home. (in a good way) We left a pediatrician that thought I was not being "firm enough" with ds...they just didn't click. He (the dr.) is a pretty good friend, and I realized they (dr. and ds) were actually quite a bit alike. you might also look at your own childhood learning exp. and your wifes and see if there is something about dd that is "pushing your buttons"
Oh gosh, she's only in first grade so I think the advice you're getting on taking a more hands-on, crafty approach is right on. You could just be dealing with a developmental problem - you're expecting more then she's mature enough to give (we all do this at some time or another) so backing off and taking a different approach may be a better option. My own daughter didn't do any formal work until grade 3 at which point she stepped into the work with relative ease. So: - Pick up lots of craft supplies and kits (dollar store is great for that) and spend a lot of time with those. All those math exercises happen naturally when instructions call for 6 pom-poms and you've got a pile of 10 to choose from! - Do lots of reading. There are a lot of great math related books for kids (Living Math has a list of them). There are also lots of great books related to history, science, etc. A LOT of learning happens in our house when I'm reading on the couch on my kids are listening while they're drawing, colouring, etc. - There's a book called Family Math with lots of great activities. - Do lots of walks and observation in nature for science. When you get home try science experiments and lots of cooking together. - Google "unschooling". You may not want to unschool your child forever but for her age there's a lot of great articles on how to approach learning. When my daughter was younger our main focus wasn't academics but rather thinking skills, observation and simply enjoying the process of learning new things. The best thing about homeschooling is that it's flexible. When one way isn't working there are many other styles and approaches you can try.
You've gotten a lot of great suggestions. I wanted to share a couple ideas. First, one of the ways I try to keep it "fresh" is with games - mostly board games. My kids have gotten several nice games as gifts, plus you can always do things like dominoes (count the dots to know which match). Sometimes, for kicks, we add the dots on both sides of the domino first, in order to take your turn. I suppose the kids think of it as fun, but I think of it as variety - hey, I get bored with the same old same old, too. Second, I have learned to keep something handy - something simple like crocheting or knitting or a puzzle. Something that doesn't take too much attention (like the computer), but takes enough of my attention that I will just BACK OFF and let my son answer. However long it takes him (which is why I need something to do).
Reading all this I'm reminded of my I don't think I could homeschool without some other homeschoolers to talk to. Because when you're standing on the ledge ready to jump into school (and we've all been there) they're ready to grab you and pull you back!
