Homework Mistake
I screwed up. I’d like to blame it all on my son’s seeming inability to focus on simple task, like looking up and writing definitions for 20 vocab words, but I started it.
We got home last night and Jack had afore mentioned definitions and 30 minutes of reading to do. That was all. Not a big deal. We should easily have that accomplished in an hour and a half. With no problem.
Then I said the words that unraveled that plan.
“If you don’t finish in an hour and a half we will just have to be late for the party.” Last night was Jacks Banquet and trophy presentation for Basketball. We were going to a place called “the Jump Zone”. It is a huge warehouse filled with moon bounces and other inflatable jumpy things (No that’s not a euphemism). Those are Jack’s favorites. He is a bouncing fool.
So, suddenly, once the decree was uttered, homework became…difficult. He forgot his alphabet. He would just stare at pages for a couple minutes, then declare the word was not there. Sometimes that was because in his new alphabet “l” came before “e”. Sometimes it was because the word wasn’t in fluorescent colors or have the ability to smack him in the face as he perused the page. It took us over an hour…with me being very patient and trying to focus him, to complete the 20 word assignment.
“How do you eat an elephant” I asked.
“I don’t get it” he replied…before I gave him the answer of “one bite at a time.” Then he still didn’t get it…I was trying to tell him that he was letting the dictionary overwhelm him. He needed to break everything down to starting letter, page it would be on, find column then find the word.
He would have digested that elephant faster than it took him to do the homework.
But we got it done, with minimal pouting. The reading took 30 minutes, as planned, and we got to the party…about 30 minutes late. Once there, he didn’t care if we were late or not. MOON BOUNCES!!!
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