The Child Who Takes a Little Longer
If you have more than one child, you probably learned pretty quickly that children do absolutely nothing on the same schedule.
One talks early. Another takes their time.
One walks into school like they own the building, while another is still holding onto Mom’s leg three weeks later.
One child sees a letter sound once and remembers it. Another child needs to see it in the workbook, say it with the teacher, trace it, practice it again and probably revisit it tomorrow.
And when it’s your child who needs a little longer, it can be hard not to worry.
We compare even when we don’t mean to.
We see another child reading or writing beautifully and wonder whether ours should be doing the same thing.
I think there is an important balance here because saying that every child develops differently doesn’t mean we ignore it when a child is struggling. We should pay attention. Teachers should know where their students are academically and developmentally, and parents should know too.
But taking longer to learn something doesn’t automatically mean a child can’t learn it.
Sometimes we just haven’t found the way that makes sense to them yet.
I see this all the time. A child struggles with something in a workbook, so the teacher changes how she presents it. We pull out manipulatives. We practice it verbally. We use a song. We work through the first one together and then ask them to try the next one.
And then comes my favorite part.
That little face changes.
They realize they did it.
You can almost see the confidence arrive.
I don’t want us to remove every difficult thing from a child’s path. There is value in learning that something can be hard and we can keep going anyway. At the same time, I don’t want a child sitting there feeling defeated because everyone else seems to understand something they don’t.
That’s where good teaching comes in.
Sometimes we challenge. Sometimes we help. Sometimes we back up and teach it another way. And sometimes we simply give them another day.
Ecclesiastes reminds us that there is a time for every purpose under heaven. I think about that with children quite a bit.
They don’t all bloom at exactly the same moment.
Our job is to keep teaching, keep encouraging, keep paying attention and give them room to grow.
Because there is nothing quite like hearing the child who once said, “I can’t do it,” suddenly say, “Look! I did it by myself.”
Want to learn more? Come visit us at Cornerstone Christian Academy in Justin, TX. We’d love to welcome you and your child into our joyful, encouraging school family.