Continuing to love school

[Viki63]

My grandson just started preschool. It’s a cooperative preschool, and one parent (or in our case, grandmother) stays in class one day a week. He loves it.

I’ve had several children, but never got to attend preschool with one of them. So I’m wondering how to head off the change from “he loves school” to the point where the child detests the thought of going.

Learning should be fun and challenging. I always enjoyed it, but not my kids after a certain age. What can we do to keep the enthusiasm going?

He will be going to public school in 2 years, as there’s no way his parents could afford Catholic school.

 

[oldgraymare2]

I think that continuing to show an interest in how he’s doing in school would be great.

I also still love to read, and that’s something that both of my parents really encouraged from an early age, so I have been a life-long reader and it started back when I was very young.

My Dad used to read to us when we were younger. He would read to my sister and I at bedtime.

 

[Allegra]

As an elementary school teacher, I find that kids who genuinely hate going to school are fairly rare and fall into a couple categories. Some have unaddressed behavior issues that cause them to be perpetually unsuccessful in a school environment. Some have unaddressed learning issues that make them feel as if they never “get it”. Some have unaddressed social issues, or are the victims of others who have unaddressed social issues, who bully them until they no longer want to go to school. Keeping an eye of these three things will go a long way. Also, encourage and allow kids to participate in school activities outside of the classroom like sports, clubs, music, etc. Statistically, being involved in these activities has been shown to increase graduation rate tremendously.

 

[Xantippe]

My oldest would give me “I hate school” and “I don’t want to go to school” literally every day before school and on the way from preschool through second grade, and then meekly walk in and have a good day. Our oldest would also have to be dressed until she was 8 and a 3rd–but she’s mildly autistic. Interestingly, I think she’s had a better and better time at school almost every year. Now that she’s a high schooler, I think she really does enjoy school. (It’s a small private school that she’s attended for the last 10 years.) She has occasional bad days (like today), but she runs a club, is in student government, is co-president of another club, has just gone to an informational meeting for another club, etc. She also is on very friendly terms with her classmates.

Our middle child was fine. I don’t remember much about his early school career, mostly that he was not as vociferously negative as his big sister. He’s a little anxious about starting junior high. (As you can tell from the length of each child’s paragraph, he is not a high maintenance child.)

Our youngest started parents’ day out earlier than either older sibling. She started going once a week just before her second birthday. I was expecting her to be sick all the time, but she did fine. She’s loved school ever since (except for one classroom where she only lasted three weeks). She’s in three full-day pre-k now, and was actually telling me how much she looked forward to going to five-day kindergarten next year. I have literally never seen a child LOVE school so much. I think part of it is that being a 3rd child, while she enjoys spending days alone with me pretending that we are baby kitty and mommy kitty, she is used to being around more people.

 

[Crusaderbear]

May he continue to love school the rest of his life!

For this intention…
Our Father, Hail Mary x10, Glory Be, Fatima Prayer, AMEN!