As human beings we all know that we have a breaking point.  The place where we all stand and just start screaming because we are losing our calm.  This occurs with children as well, but instead of always screaming they might start acting out and ignoring the material that you are trying to present to them.  Such an experience occured here recently when my youngest (whom I highly suspect is ADHD) stopped paying attention at all to her reading lessons.

While she loves the book that we are using, she just cannot sit still.  Each lesson would end with me putting my head to the pillow and screaming while everyone else in the house looked at me as if I was crazy, and she bounced away without remembering anything.  After several days of this I stopped working on her reading.  She was still permitted to “read” books on the couch, and such to help encourage her reading habits, but the actual lessons stopped.

Just the other day I decided to give it a try again, she had been driving me insane asking for another reading lesson.  We gave it a try and it went along fabulously.  In fact, it was one of the best reading experiences that I have ever had with her.  Regardless of the reason, this was now the perfect situation to blog about.

When you find that you are hitting walls with your child and everyone is walking away from lessons unhappy it makes the perfect time to take a break.  Look for different ways to still encourage learning during that time, but instead of the focused lessons look for a different approach temporarily.  Then after a week or two, come back to the material and try again.  You just might discover that the small break was the perfect opportunity to clear the air and start all over again positively.

Tags: complications, curriculum, unusual learning