Home Schooling

My nephew said that he needed help doing his home schooling. He was in the sixth grade. He was supposed to read the book Rules by Cynthia Lord and then complete the assignments given to him by his school about the book. One problem was that he simply didn't want to read the book. Yes, he could read it just fine, but he would rather immerse himself in any number of distractions that are available to kids his age these days. When he first asked for help, he had only read the first chapter or two. I got the impression he expected me to read the rest of the book out loud for him. No dice.

His other problem was that he needed to write paragraphs in order to answer some of the questions in his school work. He had a major motivational block to actually doing this. The mental effort required to organize information in his mind and then write it down caused him a great deal of distress. If I could not give him a word for word, sentence by sentence paragraph to write down, he became visibly upset and hit the computer screen in anger. I was not used to this. I tried to explain that he simply needed to read the book and carefully follow the directions in his school work. Since I was only visiting with my sister for a short amount of time, I wound up giving into his demands at one point.

Rules is a good book. I had no problem whatsoever reading and comprehending it, and I'm pretty sure my nephew understood it just fine too, at least as far as he read it. The problem was that the book was no match for video games on his X-Box 360. He could go on and on about the details of some tricked out virtual ride in Need for Speed. Ask him to write a simple paragraph or two about a book, and all hell broke loose.

I tried to explain to him that when it comes to writing, you must simply put down the first thing that comes to mind and proceed from there. One sentence follows another. Then reread the question and reread what you have written. Rearrange words and sentences if necessary to convey your thoughts more clearly. Honestly, kids these days with their word processors and spell checkers have it so much easier than I did as a child.

He wrote a paragraph to answer one question. I thought it sounded like a well worded paragraph, yet it didn't really answer the question. I told him that and suggested an alternate subject for his answer. Yes, he would then have to discard his carefully worded paragraph and write a new one. So, he got upset and complained that it was taking too much of his time. I asked what else did he want to do with his time? He wanted to watch TV and play video games!

How does one explain to a child the importance of this kind of work? In my mind writing is closely akin to painting as a creative process. Both writing and painting require practice and exercising one's decision making abilities. At first there may be no tangible reward for all the effort that gets put into a work of art or a writing assignment, other than perhaps commendation, encouragement, or a good grade. At what point, though, does the exercise itself become its own reward? When does a personal sense of satisfaction make the effort more than worthwhile, even desirable?